[Python-ideas] SI scale factors in Python

Steven D'Aprano steve at pearwood.info
Thu Aug 25 19:50:53 EDT 2016


On Thu, Aug 25, 2016 at 09:03:32PM +0100, Paul Moore wrote:

> That's not to say there's no room for debate here - the proposal is
> interesting, and not without precedent (for example Windows Powershell
> supports constants of the form 1MB, 1GB 

That's great! I know a few command line tools and scripts which do that, 
and it's really useful.

> - which ironically are
> computing-style 2*20 and 2*30 rather than SI-style 10*6 and 10*9). 

Do I remember correctly that Windows file Explorer displays disk sizes 
is decimal SI units? If so, how very Microsoft, to take a standard and 
confuse it rather than encourage it :-(

Historically, there are *three* different meanings for "MB", only one of 
which is an official standard:

http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html


-- 
Steve


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