Subject: Re: Configure.help editorial policy
To: bcrl@redhat.com (Benjamin LaHaise)
Date: Sat, 22 Dec 2001 00:32:54 +0000 (GMT)
Cc: esr@thyrsus.com (Eric S. Raymond),
        garfield@irving.iisd.sra.com (David Garfield),
        linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org (Linux Kernel List)
In-Reply-To: <20011221141847.E15926@redhat.com> from "Benjamin LaHaise" at Dec 21, 2001 02:18:47 PM
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From: Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk>
Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org

> by the MB, everyone talks about MB == 1024*1024...  I'm having a 
> hard time giving a sympathetic ear to anyone try to change the well 
> established, and consistent (barring the storage venduhs), standard.

If someone sells you 16MB of RAM and it turns out to be 16,000,000 bytes,
not only would it be appropriate use of units, it would be quite reasonable
as far as I can see to say it was in accordance with labelling of products.

The world did not begin in 1970, A-Za-z is not English collate order and
M is 1,000,000. When computing meets the rest of planet earth usages for
the odd hundred years its hard to see any reason to believe we are "right"

Eric using MiB seems the right thing. Its an ugly but appropriate unit, its
at least recommended as a solution by a standards body. We can either
redefine SI units ("You cannot change the laws of physics") or find a better
label. What better than a recommended one others use.

Alan
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