Re: Using standardized SI prefixes
#include <hallo.h>
* Thijs Kinkhorst [Mon, Jun 11 2007, 08:38:11PM]:
> On Monday 11 June 2007 20:06, Bastian Venthur wrote:
> > I agree with the "sounds stupid" part, although I don't belive this is a
> > valid argument. What I don't believe is your 80 colums argument. Could
> > you please name a few of the *many* programs which would have to drop
> > information, precision, or significantly change their display to use the
> > "KiB" unit?
>
> What I'm missing in this request is the practical use.
>
> The original example given at the start of this thread was:
>
> Package: filezilla
> State: not installed
> Version: 3.0.0~beta10-0ubuntu1
> Priority: optional
> Section: universe/net
> Maintainer: Ubuntu MOTU Developers <ubuntu-motu@lists.ubuntu.com>
> Uncompressed Size: 2134k
>
> Can you tell me in which cases you would make a different decision if this was
> either 2134*1000 or 2134*1024 bytes?
>
> In either case, ~ 2 million bytes suits your requirement, or it doesn't.
> This sounds to me like solving a non-problem, unless you can of course tell me
> in which situations adding the "B" or "iB" in the field above would solve a
> real question.
Excuse me? Pretty simple example: you have only 2.03 GB (real GB)
remaining free space (seen in some disk info tool) on your harddisk and
you are fetching a 2GB file (2 fake GB, 2GiB in fact). So what, it
breaks about 99% and displays some very unexpected message.
I hate this disambiguation since I had to deal with lots of 1.44MB
floppies. Oh wait, was there 1.48MB? 1.39MB? Or 1.4MB? Or 1,440MB? Or
what was the point again? The point is that some old bad idea of how a
real-world prefix can be abused in computer world has burned so deep
into the minds of even respectable people that it seems to need another
four decades to make people use the correct terms again.
Eduard.
--
<Alfie> Getty: Solche Aussagen tätigt man hier nicht - sonst kommt
wieder der weasel daher und zitiert einen auf der #-Seite!
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