3 ms·

> Invent a new word for decimal, metric units where appropriate. No, they already did the opposite with KiB, MiB. Because most metric decimal units are used f

> Invent a new word for decimal, metric units where appropriate. No, they already did the opposite with KiB, MiB. Because most metric decimal units are used for non-computing things. Kilometers, etc. Are you seriously proposing that kilometers should be renamed kitrimeters because you think computing prefixes should take priority over every other domain of science and life?

kstrauser 9mo ago
Do you often convert between inherently binary units like RAM sizes and more appropriately decimal units like distances? It would be annoying of one frequently found themselves calculating gigabytes per hectare. I don't think I've ever done that. The closest I've seen is measure magnetic tape density where you get weird units like "characters per inch", where neither "character" nor "inch" are the common units for their respective metrics.
- crazygringo 9mo ago
  I have no idea what that is supposed to have to do with anything.
  - array_key_first 9mo ago
    It means that is fine for Kilo to mean 1024 in the context of computers and 1000 in the context of distances, because you're never going to be in a situation where that is ambiguous.
    - crazygringo 9mo ago
      Except it's not because it's constantly ambiguous in computing. E.g. Macs measure file sizes in powers of 10 and call them KB, MB, GB. Windows measures file sizes in powers of 2 and calls them KB, MB, GB instead of KiB, MiB, GiB. Advertised hard drives come in powers of 10. Advertised memory chips come in powers of 2. When you've got a large amount of data or are allocating an amount of space, are you measuring its size in memory or on disk? On a Mac or on Windows?
      - kazinator 9mo ago
        It's the forced revisionism of what "kilobyte", "megabyte" and "gigabyte", that has caused most of the confusion. Especially that it was only partially successful. Which is not to say that there had been zero confusion; but it was only made worse.
        crazygringo 9mo ago
        What forced revisionism? Things like hard drives often used decimal/metric sizing from the start. Because their capacity has always been based on physical platter size and density, not powers of two the way memory is. So this confusion has been with computing since the beginning. The attempt to introduce units like KiB isn't revisionism, it's an attempt at clarity around something that has always been ambiguous. And obviously, if you need two separate prefixes, you're going to change the one whose unit of measurement differs from all the rest of science and technology.
        kazinator 9mo ago
        > The attempt to introduce units like KiB isn't revisionism Yes it is; it is literally asking people who call 1024 bytes "kilobyte" to stop doing that and say "kibibyte" instead, and to revise the meaning of "kilobyte" to 1000 bytes. Some people have not stopped doing that, so there is more confusion now. You no longer know whether a fellow engineer is using powers of 1000 or powers of 1024 when using kilobyte, megabyte or gigabyte; it depends on whether they took the red pill or the blue pill.
        crazygringo 9mo ago
        It's a partial renaming but it's not revisionism. > You no longer know whether a fellow engineer is using powers of 1000 or powers of 1024 when using kilobyte, megabyte or gigabyte You never knew this, that's the point. You didn't know it in e.g. 1990, before KiB was introduced in 1998. People didn't only start using powers of 10 once KiB was formally introduced. They'd always used them, but conventions around powers of 10 vs 2 depended greatly on the computing context, and were frequently confusing. There isn't more confusion now. Fortunately, places that explicitly state KiB result in less confusion because, at least in that case, you know for sure what it is. Unfortunately, a lot of people won't get on board with it, so the confusion persists. And frankly, I don't care what you call it when you're speaking, as long as you just use the right label in software and in tech specs.

kstrauser 9mo ago

Do you often convert between inherently binary units like RAM sizes and more appropriately decimal units like distances? It would be annoying of one frequently found themselves calculating gigabytes per hectare. I don't think I've ever done that. The closest I've seen is measure magnetic tape density where you get weird units like "characters per inch", where neither "character" nor "inch" are the common units for their respective metrics.

crazygringo 9mo ago
I have no idea what that is supposed to have to do with anything.
- array_key_first 9mo ago
  It means that is fine for Kilo to mean 1024 in the context of computers and 1000 in the context of distances, because you're never going to be in a situation where that is ambiguous.
  - crazygringo 9mo ago
    Except it's not because it's constantly ambiguous in computing. E.g. Macs measure file sizes in powers of 10 and call them KB, MB, GB. Windows measures file sizes in powers of 2 and calls them KB, MB, GB instead of KiB, MiB, GiB. Advertised hard drives come in powers of 10. Advertised memory chips come in powers of 2. When you've got a large amount of data or are allocating an amount of space, are you measuring its size in memory or on disk? On a Mac or on Windows?
    - kazinator 9mo ago
      It's the forced revisionism of what "kilobyte", "megabyte" and "gigabyte", that has caused most of the confusion. Especially that it was only partially successful. Which is not to say that there had been zero confusion; but it was only made worse.
      - crazygringo 9mo ago
        What forced revisionism? Things like hard drives often used decimal/metric sizing from the start. Because their capacity has always been based on physical platter size and density, not powers of two the way memory is. So this confusion has been with computing since the beginning. The attempt to introduce units like KiB isn't revisionism, it's an attempt at clarity around something that has always been ambiguous. And obviously, if you need two separate prefixes, you're going to change the one whose unit of measurement differs from all the rest of science and technology.
        kazinator 9mo ago
        > The attempt to introduce units like KiB isn't revisionism Yes it is; it is literally asking people who call 1024 bytes "kilobyte" to stop doing that and say "kibibyte" instead, and to revise the meaning of "kilobyte" to 1000 bytes. Some people have not stopped doing that, so there is more confusion now. You no longer know whether a fellow engineer is using powers of 1000 or powers of 1024 when using kilobyte, megabyte or gigabyte; it depends on whether they took the red pill or the blue pill.
        crazygringo 9mo ago
        It's a partial renaming but it's not revisionism. > You no longer know whether a fellow engineer is using powers of 1000 or powers of 1024 when using kilobyte, megabyte or gigabyte You never knew this, that's the point. You didn't know it in e.g. 1990, before KiB was introduced in 1998. People didn't only start using powers of 10 once KiB was formally introduced. They'd always used them, but conventions around powers of 10 vs 2 depended greatly on the computing context, and were frequently confusing. There isn't more confusion now. Fortunately, places that explicitly state KiB result in less confusion because, at least in that case, you know for sure what it is. Unfortunately, a lot of people won't get on board with it, so the confusion persists. And frankly, I don't care what you call it when you're speaking, as long as you just use the right label in software and in tech specs.