5 ms·

I've tried in the past to explain how awesome the sqrt(2) ratio used as the basis of DIN/ISO page sizes is, but there are some very dumb people on HN: https://n

I've tried in the past to explain how awesome the sqrt(2) ratio used as the basis of DIN/ISO page sizes is, but there are some very dumb people on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7821947 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7821947

mrottenkolber 12y ago
Haha that thread is great... good old metric system.
- talideon 12y ago
  It was like talking to a brick wall. A very dumb brick wall that couldn't get it through their head that the units didn't matter, and that what mattered was the ratio.
  - willvarfar 12y ago
    The A0 being 1m^2 is important too, if you're ordering paper by area?
    - talideon 12y ago
      Yeah, but that's really a different argument. Once you get the ratio argument, you get the utility of the system.
    - RVuRnvbM2e 12y ago
      The A0 being 1m^2 is important because paper weight is given in gsm - grams per square metre. Thus when calculating postage weight by counting the number of sheets you can calculate that, for example, the weight of one A4 sheet is 1/16 the gsm of the paper - 1/(2^4).
      - michaelhoffman 12y ago
        Oppose the totally insane system used along with U.S. paper sizes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_density#Basis_weight http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_density#Basis_weight In order to figure out the actual mass of a sheet of U.S. paper from the reported basis weight, you must know how many sheets of paper were in the "basis ream" and what dimensions they were. The basis ream sheet dimensions may have nothing to do with your final sheet of paper, and the number of sheets varies too.
  - skore 12y ago
    > It was like talking to a brick wall. I know those types of conversations. They stay with you for months and sometimes years, never ceasing to irritate.
    - jschwartzi 12y ago
      Sometimes the irritating part is when you realize that you're the brick wall.
      - skore 12y ago
        Exactly! Furthermore: In that case, it gets more vexing the longer it takes you to arrive at that conclusion. When it's the other way round, you can find peace at some point (even if it takes months or years). But if you were the brick wall, it first takes months or years and THEN, when you finally do realize the reality of the situation, it takes even longer to settle. shudders
  - smcl 12y ago
    I feel your pain. The tough part is realising how pointless those "someone is wrong on the internet"[1] discussions are. I get embarrassed looking back at situations like that, and think "why did I even care if this random person didn't get what I was saying about <thing-we-were-arguing-about>?" [1] http://xkcd.com/386/ http://xkcd.com/386/
    - talideon 12y ago
      Oh, I agree. I was as dumb as him for participating in it. If I'd any sense, I'd never have engaged with him after it became clear that he was fixated on something completely separate from the actual point.
      - smcl 12y ago
        Well if its any consolation I'm as guilty as you are, and you made plenty of sense to me.
        talideon 12y ago
        Thank! I really have no idea how I could've explained it better in context, which is the most frustrating thing.
andrepd 12y ago
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the point of the guy you were arguing with in that thread was that the Ax standard was defined in terms of SI units as the US imperial units are?
- talideon 12y ago
  And I was trying to get across to him that the units used really didn't matter at all, but he didn't seem to get that point. If you read the parent (by somebody else, not Turing_Machine), it said that the ISO/DIN page sizes are part of the metric system. I corrected him saying that they were only based on it (in that the sizes were defined in terms of metric units) and not part of it, but that what really mattered was the ratio between the long and short edges of the sheets being √2. Then Turing_Machine came in with this total non sequitur: > How are factors of 2 and sqrt(2) "based on metric"? And then things went completely off the rails. Edit: s/same/came/
raldi 12y ago
Instead of blaming others for being dumb, you might want to take the following brief blog post to heart: http://blog.codinghorror.com/but-you-did-not-persuade-me/ http://blog.codinghorror.com/but-you-did-not-persuade-me/
- talideon 12y ago
  No, in this case, he was being dumb. He started out with a complete non sequitur, and then got fixated on that. Clarification: the guy was being dumb, but I was dumb for engaging with him in the first place. I'm in no way 'blaming' somebody for being dumb.
  - teach 12y ago
    raldi didn't say that anyone was or wasn't being dumb. He said that "instead of BLAMING OTHERS for [x], YOU might want to [y]". Blaming others is a poor lifestyle adaptation. Whether or not the other guy was actually dumb or not isn't relevant.
    - talideon 12y ago
      Who was blaming anybody?
      - teach 12y ago
        You are. I can paraphrase your original comment like so: "I have tried in the past to explain how awesome the ratio is, but it didn't go well because of dumb people." You are correct that you're not blaming anyone for being dumb, but you are blaming others for the explanation not going well.
        talideon 12y ago
        No, I'm not, and you're putting words in my mouth. This: > I have tried in the past to explain how awesome the ratio is, but it didn't go well because of dumb people. Does not mean the same thing as this: > I've tried in the past to explain how awesome the sqrt(2) ratio used as the basis of DIN/ISO page sizes is, but there are some very dumb people on HN.
maxerickson 12y ago
They are more or less agreeing with you that convenient scaling is a feature. They just use a bad analogy, and you talk past each other a lot. (I agree that they miss the point that you aren't promoting metric)
- philh 12y ago
  Yes. talideon wrote two unrelated sentences next to each other, Turing_Machine thought they were related, and the two of them started talking about different things. (This is my impression, at least. I can't seem to bring myself to properly read the whole thread, it's too frustrating.) talideon, you do not come across well from that exchange. You may or may not have been talking to a brick wall, but you weren't listening to one. I more-or-less agree with raldi: instead of fixating loudly on what Turing_Machine did wrong in that thread, think about how you could do better next time.
  - talideon 12y ago
    Look, I repeated told him that the units didn't matter, and that it was the ratio that mattered. Other than disengaging sooner (which I would've done if I'd any cop-on myself), what could I have said differently? I'm truly at a loss. I straight-up wrote this: > _The units are irrelevant._ That's what you're not getting. What is relevant is that the same page width/height ratio is maintained between the different page sizes. When I was younger, I would've had more patience with this kind of thing; but as I get older, it becomes less and less worth my time and energy.
    - philh 12y ago
      You shouldn't have said "You appear not to understand the actual utility behind the page width/height ratio used in ISO/DIN page sizes." Turing_Machine wasn't talking about utility at that point. Ve had misunderstood something confusing that you had said, and you basically straight up said "you're dumb".
      - talideon 12y ago

mrottenkolber 12y ago

Haha that thread is great... good old metric system.

talideon 12y ago
It was like talking to a brick wall. A very dumb brick wall that couldn't get it through their head that the units didn't matter, and that what mattered was the ratio.
- willvarfar 12y ago
  The A0 being 1m^2 is important too, if you're ordering paper by area?
  - talideon 12y ago
    Yeah, but that's really a different argument. Once you get the ratio argument, you get the utility of the system.
  - RVuRnvbM2e 12y ago
    The A0 being 1m^2 is important because paper weight is given in gsm - grams per square metre. Thus when calculating postage weight by counting the number of sheets you can calculate that, for example, the weight of one A4 sheet is 1/16 the gsm of the paper - 1/(2^4).
    - michaelhoffman 12y ago
      Oppose the totally insane system used along with U.S. paper sizes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_density#Basis_weight http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_density#Basis_weight In order to figure out the actual mass of a sheet of U.S. paper from the reported basis weight, you must know how many sheets of paper were in the "basis ream" and what dimensions they were. The basis ream sheet dimensions may have nothing to do with your final sheet of paper, and the number of sheets varies too.
- skore 12y ago
  > It was like talking to a brick wall. I know those types of conversations. They stay with you for months and sometimes years, never ceasing to irritate.
  - jschwartzi 12y ago
    Sometimes the irritating part is when you realize that you're the brick wall.
    - skore 12y ago
      Exactly! Furthermore: In that case, it gets more vexing the longer it takes you to arrive at that conclusion. When it's the other way round, you can find peace at some point (even if it takes months or years). But if you were the brick wall, it first takes months or years and THEN, when you finally do realize the reality of the situation, it takes even longer to settle. shudders
- smcl 12y ago
  I feel your pain. The tough part is realising how pointless those "someone is wrong on the internet"[1] discussions are. I get embarrassed looking back at situations like that, and think "why did I even care if this random person didn't get what I was saying about <thing-we-were-arguing-about>?" [1] http://xkcd.com/386/ http://xkcd.com/386/
  - talideon 12y ago
    Oh, I agree. I was as dumb as him for participating in it. If I'd any sense, I'd never have engaged with him after it became clear that he was fixated on something completely separate from the actual point.
    - smcl 12y ago
      Well if its any consolation I'm as guilty as you are, and you made plenty of sense to me.
      - talideon 12y ago
        Thank! I really have no idea how I could've explained it better in context, which is the most frustrating thing.

andrepd 12y ago

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the point of the guy you were arguing with in that thread was that the Ax standard was defined in terms of SI units as the US imperial units are?

talideon 12y ago
And I was trying to get across to him that the units used really didn't matter at all, but he didn't seem to get that point. If you read the parent (by somebody else, not Turing_Machine), it said that the ISO/DIN page sizes are part of the metric system. I corrected him saying that they were only based on it (in that the sizes were defined in terms of metric units) and not part of it, but that what really mattered was the ratio between the long and short edges of the sheets being √2. Then Turing_Machine came in with this total non sequitur: > How are factors of 2 and sqrt(2) "based on metric"? And then things went completely off the rails. Edit: s/same/came/

raldi 12y ago

Instead of blaming others for being dumb, you might want to take the following brief blog post to heart: http://blog.codinghorror.com/but-you-did-not-persuade-me/ http://blog.codinghorror.com/but-you-did-not-persuade-me/

talideon 12y ago
No, in this case, he was being dumb. He started out with a complete non sequitur, and then got fixated on that. Clarification: the guy was being dumb, but I was dumb for engaging with him in the first place. I'm in no way 'blaming' somebody for being dumb.
- teach 12y ago
  raldi didn't say that anyone was or wasn't being dumb. He said that "instead of BLAMING OTHERS for [x], YOU might want to [y]". Blaming others is a poor lifestyle adaptation. Whether or not the other guy was actually dumb or not isn't relevant.
  - talideon 12y ago
    Who was blaming anybody?
    - teach 12y ago
      You are. I can paraphrase your original comment like so: "I have tried in the past to explain how awesome the ratio is, but it didn't go well because of dumb people." You are correct that you're not blaming anyone for being dumb, but you are blaming others for the explanation not going well.
      - talideon 12y ago
        No, I'm not, and you're putting words in my mouth. This: > I have tried in the past to explain how awesome the ratio is, but it didn't go well because of dumb people. Does not mean the same thing as this: > I've tried in the past to explain how awesome the sqrt(2) ratio used as the basis of DIN/ISO page sizes is, but there are some very dumb people on HN.

maxerickson 12y ago

They are more or less agreeing with you that convenient scaling is a feature. They just use a bad analogy, and you talk past each other a lot. (I agree that they miss the point that you aren't promoting metric)

philh 12y ago
Yes. talideon wrote two unrelated sentences next to each other, Turing_Machine thought they were related, and the two of them started talking about different things. (This is my impression, at least. I can't seem to bring myself to properly read the whole thread, it's too frustrating.) talideon, you do not come across well from that exchange. You may or may not have been talking to a brick wall, but you weren't listening to one. I more-or-less agree with raldi: instead of fixating loudly on what Turing_Machine did wrong in that thread, think about how you could do better next time.
- talideon 12y ago
  Look, I repeated told him that the units didn't matter, and that it was the ratio that mattered. Other than disengaging sooner (which I would've done if I'd any cop-on myself), what could I have said differently? I'm truly at a loss. I straight-up wrote this: > _The units are irrelevant._ That's what you're not getting. What is relevant is that the same page width/height ratio is maintained between the different page sizes. When I was younger, I would've had more patience with this kind of thing; but as I get older, it becomes less and less worth my time and energy.
  - philh 12y ago
    You shouldn't have said "You appear not to understand the actual utility behind the page width/height ratio used in ISO/DIN page sizes." Turing_Machine wasn't talking about utility at that point. Ve had misunderstood something confusing that you had said, and you basically straight up said "you're dumb".
    - talideon 12y ago