Are units required for DSP measurements?

While DSP is pervasive in contemporary engineering practice, there are no standardised units for digital signals. Amplitude is the problematic quantity; although the waveforms present in a DSP system are analogous to voltages, like acoustic intensity they cannot be measured in volts. This paper outlines the requirement for digital units, discusses the measurement of digital amplitude and proposes a unit for DSP, namely the dBF (decibels re full scale of linking pipes)