On Sat, Apr 9, 2011 at 6:48 PM, Mike S <[email protected]> wrote: > At 05:03 PM 4/9/2011, Tom Van Baak wrote... >> >> A note on notation. >> >> That ISO convention... > In what ISO spec/standard/??? is that convention given?
I suspect it is a EIA or JEDEC (or NEMA) standard or convention perhaps. I don't recognize it as an ISO standard that I am familiar with. > I suspect it is strictly informal, as the convention violates the SI rules: > "A multiple or sub-multiple prefix, if used, is part of the unit and > precedes the unit symbol without a separator. A prefix is never used in > isolation" - BIPM, SI Brochure, Section 5.1; > http://www.bipm.org/en/si/si_brochure/chapter5/5-1.html Americans can (and should) use and follow US NIST Special Publication 811 _The NIST Guide for the use of the International System of Units_ (2008 edition, web version 3.2) as a suitable guide to SI usage in USA. <http://www.nist.gov/pml/pubs/sp811/> Personally though I do find the US alternative (deka) spelling of the deca prefix disconcerting, and prefer trying to avoid potential ambiguity by using metre for the unit, to avoid being mistaken with the meter device. Unfortunately I don't believe that Canada's NRC-INMS has an equivalent document readily available. Just so long as I don't have to deal between US "customary" and UK "imperial", I'm pretty easy going. -Michael _______________________________________________ time-nuts mailing list -- [email protected] To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
