endian (data, architecture) Suffix used in the terms big-endian and little-endian that describe the ordering of bytes in a multi-byte number.
The term comes from Swift's "Gulliver's Travels" via the famous paper "On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace" by Danny Cohen, USC/ISI IEN 137, 1980-04-01. The Lilliputians, being very small, had correspondingly small political problems. The Big-Endian and Little-Endian parties debated over whether soft-boiled eggs should be opened at the big end or the little end. See also middle-endian, holy wars, NUXI problem, swab. Last updated: 2007-08-14
