Originally Posted by
Katchii
The reason for the squish was the system being unable to handle numbers that large because it was 32-bit (highest number allowed was 2,147,483,647). Since the implementation of the squish they've fixed that problem by upgrading to a 64-bit system and the system can now handle the larger numbers so the need for the squish is more aesthetic than technical at this point from what I understand. Since it's now 64 bit the largest number allowed is 9,223,372,036,854,775,807...which we're not likely to hit any time soon.