I would be fired from my job if I were to insist that we change commas to
spaces. Get a real-world perspective once in a while. I would LOVE to live
in a clean, tidy world with uniformity in such matters. I think we would do
well to pick our battles carefully. This battle is akin to Harold insisting
that Americans spell metre instead of meter.
----- Message from Michael Payne <[email protected]> ---------
Date: Mon, 14 Jul 2014 06:45:05 +0200
From: Michael Payne <[email protected]>
Reply-To: [email protected]
Subject: [USMA:54120] RE: Don't be a dunce!
To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]>
I can only speak about the English language Wikipedia. Many English
speaking nations use the comma as the decimal, South Africa is one, So
do the French and probably most Europeans. It’s a cleaner way of
writing
and it works for the digits on the right side of the decimal.
Claiming Americans like their freedom is the same as saying we’ll
stick with American Customary because we’re free to. It does not help
in
international trade! We need standardisation and this is one standard
recommended by NIST.
Mike Payne
On 14 Jul 2014, at 06:34, Harold_Potsdamer
<[email protected]> wrote:
Try checking an authoritative source, like the BIPM before insisting
Americans has some sort of derogation based on their claimed
exceptionalism.
Here is a style guide from the US construction industry:
https://www.wbdg.org/ccb/VA/VAMETRIC/guide.pdf
Rules for Writing Numbers
-
Always use decimals, not fractions (write 0.75 g, not ¾g).
-
Use a zero before the decimal marker for values less than one
(write 0.45
g, not .45 g).
-
Use spaces instead of commas to separate blocks of three digits
for any
number over four digits (write 45 138 kg or 0.004 46 kg or 4371
kg). Note
that this does not apply to the expression of amounts of money.
-
In the United States, the decimal marker is a period; in other
countries a comma usually is used
See also 5.3.4 from the NIST guide:
http://physics.nist.gov/Pubs/SP330/sp330.pdf
Under what authority do you operate under that gives you the
right to break the rules? Those who want to do things their way and
think they are exceptional are the real dunces.
FROM: [email protected]
SENT: Sunday, 2014-07-13 22:51
TO: U.S. Metric Association[1]
SUBJECT: [USMA:54114] RE: Don't be a dunce!
Harold. Americans use commas or spaces. We love our freedom.
----- Message from Harold_Potsdamer <[email protected]> ---------
Date: Sun, 13 Jul 2014 20:07:41 -0400
From: Harold_Potsdamer <[email protected]>
Reply-To: [email protected]
Subject: [USMA:54113] RE: Don't be a dunce!
To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]>
Not only that, commas dividing thousands which should be spaces.
FROM: [email protected]
SENT: Sunday, 2014-07-13 14:26
TO: U.S. Metric Association[1]
SUBJECT: [USMA:54111] RE: Don't be a dunce!
No zeroes on the leading decimals? Tsk tsk
tsk. :)
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [USMA:54110] Don't be a dunce!
From: [email protected]
Date: Sun, July 13, 2014 11:22 am
To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]>
Posted on Facebook and Twitter today:
Don't be a dunce! http://MetricPioneer.com/Metrication-America[2]
David Pearl www.MetricPioneer.com[3] 503-428-4917
----- End message from Harold_Potsdamer <[email protected]> -----
David Pearl www.MetricPioneer.com[3] 503-428-4917
----- End message from Michael Payne <[email protected]> -----
Links:
------
[1] mailto:[email protected]
[2] http://metricpioneer.com/Metrication-America
[3] http://www.metricpioneer.com/
David Pearl www.MetricPioneer.com 503-428-4917
