Dictionary.net

1. A computer architecture in which,within a given multi-byte numeric representation, the mostsignificant byte has the lowest address (the word is stored"big-end-first").Most processors, including the IBM 370 family, the PDP-10,the Motorola microprocessor families, and most of thevarious RISC designs current in mid-1993, are big-endian.See -endian.2. A backward electronic mailaddress. The world now follows the Internet hostnamestandard (see FQDN) and writes e-mail addresses startingwith the name of the computer and ending up with the countrycode (e.g. fred@doc.acme.ac.uk). In the United Kingdom theJoint Networking Team decided to do it the other way round(e.g. me@uk.ac.wigan.cs) before the Internet domainstandard was established. Most gateway sites requiredad-hockery in their mailers to handle this.By July 1994 this parochial idiosyncracy was on the way outand mailers started to reject big-endian addresses. By about1996, people would look at you strangely if you suggested sucha bizarre thing might ever have existed.