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Germany has been metric forever but has the comma as a decimal separator, and the dot as a thousands group separator. It’s deeply engrained in our typography, i
by Hackbraten 4y ago
Germany has been metric forever but has the comma as a decimal separator, and the dot as a thousands group separator. It’s deeply engrained in our typography, it has typographical idioms such as ,— (comma em-dash), up to the point that even brands have adopted it in their brand name.
I’m afraid we can’t really change that on a whim. Why would we, anyway?
- bmacho 4y ago" Why would we, anyway? " To be compatible with the world, so Germans can use international software, and could sell software to international people.
- Mordisquitos 4y agoCall me crazy, but I'm under the impression that Germans do use international software, and that Germany may even be home to the fourth largest software company in the world.
- CRConrad 4y agoAnd in a largely successful attempt at German self-parody, that software is hugely complex and laborious; in short, over-engineered. It is the only software I know of where you regularly hear of "implementation" -- which in this context means installing the software, not writing it -- projects being planned to take years, actually taking twice as long, and sometimes being abandoned altogether when the prospective client finds out it just can't be done. I mean, it is SAP you're talking about, right?
- gpvos 4y agoAmerica is not the world; at least in the western world[0] there are more countries and languages that follow the German convention. Also, there is more to the world than software (although that seems to be changing). [0] Yes, that shows my limited perception.