Date   : Sat, 11 Feb 2006 10:16:23 +0000 (GMT)
From   : Greg Cook <debounce@...>
Subject: Re: Grammar

On 10 Feb 2006 21:34:01 +0000, Jonathan Graham Harston
<jgh@...> wrote:

> > Message-ID:
> <SERVER4yp8ARf3sllNY00000067@...>
>  
> "Austin Pass" <austinpass.bbc@...> wrote:
> > > (etc).  I particularly hate the modern tendency to write, say:
> > >
> > > 1mb
> > 
> > The worst one with respect to this phenomenon is people (most often
> supposed
> > "ICT authorities") who don't understand the difference between a
> bit and a
> > byte, usually in the context of megabits and megabytes, usually
> with
>  
> When I worked in Hong Kong everybody measured lengths in Megamoles
> - yes 80MM disks!
>  
> And even here I see liquids dispensed in some unknown unit 'L'.

Probably because the markings:

     1l

appearing on their own on a container, are not instantly understood.
Especially in Helvetica and certain industrial stroke fonts, and in an
international context.  If one surmises it's an indication of capacity,
one could complain of fluids being vended in an unfamiliar unit, "I".

This isn't helped by the Système International specifying the official
Unicode character to be U+006C, "l".  One kludge (yes, kludge) is to
use U+2113 SCRIPT SMALL L, where that is unavailable engineers plump
for capital L.  This usage has some official recognition:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SI#SI_writing_style

-- Greg



               
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