OT - Convert output of byte count to GB count?

[Kent West]

This is off-topic because it's on OS/X instead of Debian, but you folks are the smartest, so....

The GNU dd command, when sent the -USR1 signal, pauses processing long enough to spit out a status line, like so:

18335302+0 records in

18335302+0 records out 9387674624 bytes (9.4 GB) copied, 34.6279 seconds, 271 MB/s

But the OS/X version (requiring the -SIGINFO signal instead of -USR1, which kills the process instead of just pausing it), spits out a status line like so:

5346+0 records in

5346+0 records out

5605687296 bytes transferred in 1890.826832 secs (2964675 bytes/sec)

The command I'm using to get this status message is:

kill -SIGINFO 32816

(32816 is the PID of the dd command in this case)

Is there any thing I can throw at this command, perhaps a sed or awk command, etc, which would convert the status' bytes output to GB output?

Thanks!

--
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Westing Peacefully - http://kentwest.blogspot.com

[Bob Proulx]

Kent West wrote:
> The GNU dd command, when sent the -USR1 signal, pauses processing long
> enough to spit out a status line, like so:
>

> 18335302+0 records in18335302+0 records out 9387674624 bytes (9.4 GB)

> copied, 34.6279 seconds, 271 MB/s

> ...

> 5605687296 bytes transferred in 1890.826832 secs (2964675 bytes/sec)

> ...

> Is there any thing I can throw at this command, perhaps a sed or awk
> command, etc, which would convert the status' bytes output to GB output?

1. Wouldn't it just be easier to use a Debian machine? :-)

2. If not that then I would compile a local copy of the GNU coreutils
dd command. You don't need to install everything from coreutils.
Just copy the ./src/dd to /usr/local/bin/dd (or gnudd or whatever) and
then use it.

3. You could just convert that single number on the command line using
cut and paste.

$ bc -ql
5.22070312500000000000

$ perl -le 'print 5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024)'
5.220703125

$ echo $((5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024) ))
5

3. You could post process the output with a script.

$ echo '5605687296 bytes transferred in 1890.826832 secs (2964675 bytes/sec)' | awk '{print $1/(1024*1024*1024)}'
5.2207

4. See the brand new 'numfmt' command in the next GNU coreutils
release snapshot. Of course if you can build numfmt from latest
sources then you are back to number 2 above where you would simply
build the dd from it.

http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/coreutils/2012-12/msg00087.html

http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/coreutils.git/tree/NEWS
** New programs
numfmt: reformat numbers

Bob

[Darac Marjal]

On Thu, Feb 07, 2013 at 01:26:45PM -0600, Kent West wrote:
> This is off-topic because it's on OS/X instead of Debian, but you folks
> are the smartest, so....
> The GNU dd command, when sent the -USR1 signal, pauses processing long
> enough to spit out a status line, like so:
>
> 18335302+0 records in
> 18335302+0 records out 9387674624 bytes (9.4 GB) copied, 34.6279
> seconds, 271 MB/s
> But the OS/X version (requiring the -SIGINFO signal instead of -USR1,
> which kills the process instead of just pausing it), spits out a status
> line like so:
> 5346+0 records in
> 5346+0 records out
> 5605687296 bytes transferred in 1890.826832 secs (2964675 bytes/sec)
> The command I'm using to get this status message is:
> kill -SIGINFO 32816
> (32816 is the PID of the dd command in this case)
> Is there any thing I can throw at this command, perhaps a sed or awk
> command, etc, which would convert the status' bytes output to GB output?

Probably, but see if pv is nicer for your purposes. pv (pipeviewer) will
give you constant status output for data passing through it. For dd,
you'd replace something like

## dd if=/dev/foo of=/dev/bar
with
## dd if=/dev/foo | pv | dd of=/dev/bar

There are options for pv such as naming the progress bar or telling pv
the expected size (so you get a percentage complete) and so on.

Might be useful to you.

[Jon Dowland]

You could use GNU units. It appears to treat SI prefixes as strictly base 10,
so use the KiB/MiB etc. variants where applicable:

> $ units 8112116KiB MiB
> * 7921.9883
> / 0.00012623094

Something like

> …2>&1| awk '/transferred/' {print $1}'|while read i; do units "${i}bytes" "GiB"; done

That will need playing around with.


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[Pascal Hambourg]

Hello,

Bob Proulx a ï¿œcrit :

> Kent West wrote:
>> The GNU dd command, when sent the -USR1 signal, pauses processing long
>> enough to spit out a status line, like so:
>>
>> 18335302+0 records in18335302+0 records out 9387674624 bytes (9.4 GB)
>> copied, 34.6279 seconds, 271 MB/s
>> ...
>> 5605687296 bytes transferred in 1890.826832 secs (2964675 bytes/sec)
>> ...
>> Is there any thing I can throw at this command, perhaps a sed or awk
>> command, etc, which would convert the status' bytes output to GB output?

[...]

> $ perl -le 'print 5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024)'
> 5.220703125

Note that 1 GB (gigabyte) is 10^9 bytes as can be seen in the GNU dd
output. 1024^3 is 1 GiB (gibibyte).

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[Bob Proulx]

Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Bob Proulx a écrit :

> > $ perl -le 'print 5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024)'
>

> Note that 1 GB (gigabyte) is 10^9 bytes as can be seen in the GNU dd
> output. 1024^3 is 1 GiB (gibibyte).

You say "tomato", I say "tomahto". You can make your own divider the
number 34,969[1] if you like. For me I prefer binary powers of two
when using it in relation to computer tasks.

Bob

[1] The Count von Count's favorite number.

[Eduard Bloch]

Hallo,
* Bob Proulx [Sat, Feb 09 2013, 11:44:03AM]:

> Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> > Bob Proulx a écrit :
> > > $ perl -le 'print 5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024)'
> >
> > Note that 1 GB (gigabyte) is 10^9 bytes as can be seen in the GNU dd
> > output. 1024^3 is 1 GiB (gibibyte).
>
> You say "tomato", I say "tomahto". You can make your own divider the
> number 34,969[1] if you like.

Wow, someone trying to disguise the own mistaken convention as pure
matter of preference?

> For me I prefer binary powers of two when using it in relation to
> computer tasks.

You can prefer whatever you want but the means of reliable communication
are unambiguous terms. EOD.

Some dudes in nineteen-seventies didn't get it and another generation of
dudes is still trying to protect those "values" even perfectly knowing
they are wrong.

Regards,
Eduard.

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[Bob Proulx]

Eduard Bloch wrote:
> Hallo,
> * Bob Proulx [Sat, Feb 09 2013, 11:44:03AM]:

> > You say "tomato", I say "tomahto". You can make your own divider the
> > number 34,969[1] if you like.
>
> Wow, someone trying to disguise the own mistaken convention as pure
> matter of preference?
>
> > For me I prefer binary powers of two when using it in relation to
> > computer tasks.
>
> You can prefer whatever you want but the means of reliable communication
> are unambiguous terms. EOD.
>
> Some dudes in nineteen-seventies didn't get it and another generation of
> dudes is still trying to protect those "values" even perfectly knowing
> they are wrong.

Wow. My response pulled you in to post on debian-user! It has been a
while. Good to see you here.

For anyone who gets upset by the topic I will only offer this
following treatise as highly recommended reading.

On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace
http://www.ietf.org/rfc/ien/ien137.txt

Bob

[Pascal Hambourg]

Bob Proulx a ï¿œcrit :

> Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>> Bob Proulx a ï¿œcrit :

>>> $ perl -le 'print 5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024)'
>> Note that 1 GB (gigabyte) is 10^9 bytes as can be seen in the GNU dd
>> output. 1024^3 is 1 GiB (gibibyte).

> For me I prefer binary powers of two
> when using it in relation to computer tasks.

This is perfectly fine. But you proposed this command to mimic the
output of GNU dd, which uses SI prefixes (powers of 10).

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/11/2013 6:54 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Bob Proulx a ï¿œcrit :
>> Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>> Bob Proulx a ï¿œcrit :
>>>> $ perl -le 'print 5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024)'
>>> Note that 1 GB (gigabyte) is 10^9 bytes as can be seen in the GNU dd
>>> output. 1024^3 is 1 GiB (gibibyte).
>
>> For me I prefer binary powers of two
>> when using it in relation to computer tasks.
>
> This is perfectly fine. But you proposed this command to mimic the
> output of GNU dd, which uses SI prefixes (powers of 10).
>
>

Historically, byte counts have been based on powers of 2 - 2^10 is 1Kb,
2^20 is 1Mb, etc.

But back in the mid 80's when hard disks started coming out for PC's
(all - not just IBM derivatives), companies wanted to make their drives
look as big as they could. So a drive which had 81,920 512 byte sectors
(41,943,040 bytes) was 41 (or even 41) mb, instead of 40mb as computer
users previously defined storage. And therefore the confusion as to
what actually makes up a gigabyte.

I'm with Bob. A gigabyte is still 2*30. And this laptop has 4GB of ram
- which means 4,294,967,296 bytes - not 4,000,000,000 bytes.

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[Ralf Mardorf]

On Mon, 2013-02-11 at 20:13 -0500, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> And this laptop has 4GB of ram
> - which means 4,294,967,296 bytes - not 4,000,000,000 bytes.

My machine has got 4GB RAM too, but only 1,000,000,000 hex-bytes ;p.
Serious, there is no other correct sum than 4,294,967,296 bytes. For an
old former Assembler programmer it's disgusting to distinguish between
GB and GiB. OTOH kilos etc. are 10^x, but for the computer I do the math
based on 1024.

Regarding to hard disk drives GB/GiB values by one way or another are a
vague information about how much space there is on the disk, seemingly
the file system needs some space itself, for directory entries, bad
sectors and what ever else. However, for RAM the binary prefix is
absolutely correct and a "decimal prefix" less informative, while even
here we are aware that at least the kernel needs some space.

People who never programmed should become aware that for programming
using bin and hex instead of dec often makes more sense, it's easier,
clearer.

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
1+ 2+ 4+ 8+ 16+ 32+ 64+128 = 255 = hex FF
but 256 possible values, including 0

Assumed you'll build a fence, 10m long and every 1m there should be 1
fence post, how many fence posts do you need?

Regards,
Ralf

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[Richard Hector]

On 12/02/13 22:43, Ralf Mardorf wrote:

> My machine has got 4GB RAM too, but only 1,000,000,000 hex-bytes ;p.
> Serious, there is no other correct sum than 4,294,967,296 bytes. For an
> old former Assembler programmer it's disgusting to distinguish between
> GB and GiB. OTOH kilos etc. are 10^x, but for the computer I do the math
> based on 1024.

Abusing the standard prefixes like that was always a horrible hack.

GiB is a nice way to give humans a rough idea of what scale we're
talking about, while giving the standard multipliers their proper
meaning back.

Perhaps we should just give up, and call it 10^8 base 16? (I think you
got an extra 0 there?) - or 10^100000 base 2 :-)

Richard

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/12/2013 4:43 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> On Mon, 2013-02-11 at 20:13 -0500, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
>> And this laptop has 4GB of ram
>> - which means 4,294,967,296 bytes - not 4,000,000,000 bytes.
>
> My machine has got 4GB RAM too, but only 1,000,000,000 hex-bytes ;p.
> Serious, there is no other correct sum than 4,294,967,296 bytes. For an
> old former Assembler programmer it's disgusting to distinguish between
> GB and GiB. OTOH kilos etc. are 10^x, but for the computer I do the math
> based on 1024.
>
> Regarding to hard disk drives GB/GiB values by one way or another are a
> vague information about how much space there is on the disk, seemingly
> the file system needs some space itself, for directory entries, bad
> sectors and what ever else. However, for RAM the binary prefix is
> absolutely correct and a "decimal prefix" less informative, while even
> here we are aware that at least the kernel needs some space.
>

It is the amount of data the disk can hold. Sure, the OS needs some for
directory entries, etc. How much the fs requires depends on the fs
being used. But to the disk, that is also data. It doesn't mean there
is that much room for files.

Theoretically, if you had a 200GB disk you could create a file system
which would allow you to use the entire 200GB for file data, but I'm not
sure how useful that would be.

> People who never programmed should become aware that for programming
> using bin and hex instead of dec often makes more sense, it's easier,
> clearer.
>
> 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
> 1+ 2+ 4+ 8+ 16+ 32+ 64+128 = 255 = hex FF
> but 256 possible values, including 0
>
> Assumed you'll build a fence, 10m long and every 1m there should be 1
> fence post, how many fence posts do you need?
>

11 :)

> Regards,
> Ralf
>


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[Richard Hector]

On 13/02/13 14:32, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> On 2/12/2013 4:43 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:

>> Assumed you'll build a fence, 10m long and every 1m there should be 1
>> fence post, how many fence posts do you need?
>>
>
> 11 :)

Depends how you interpret the instructions. If it's "you can leave up to
1m hanging without a post", then you only need 9 :-)

Richard

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[Ralf Mardorf]

-------- Forwarded Message --------
From: Ralf Mardorf <ralf.m...@alice-dsl.net>
To: debia...@lists.debian.org
Subject: Re: OT - Convert output of byte count to GB count?
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2013 02:52:08 +0100

On Wed, 2013-02-13 at 14:41 +1300, Richard Hector wrote:
> "you can leave up to 1m hanging without a post"

:D

Having the knowledge, but ignoring it, to safe time and money is more
evil, than a lack of knowledge. I won't you as a craftsman working for
me ;).

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[Alois Mahdal]

On Wed, 13 Feb 2013 14:41:47 +1300
Richard Hector <ric...@walnut.gen.nz> wrote:

> On 13/02/13 14:32, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> > On 2/12/2013 4:43 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
>
> >> Assumed you'll build a fence, 10m long and every 1m there should
> >> be 1 fence post, how many fence posts do you need?
> >>
> >
> > 11 :)
>
> Depends how you interpret the instructions. If it's "you can leave up
> to 1m hanging without a post", then you only need 9 :-)

According to Jerry's interpretation: 11. According to yours, it's
actually 10 posts less, i.e. only 1.

(Finally, as we know, there's only 10 kinds of people...)

> Richard
>
>


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[Ralf Mardorf]

On Wed, 2013-02-13 at 15:35 +0100, Alois Mahdal wrote:
> On Wed, 13 Feb 2013 14:41:47 +1300
> Richard Hector <ric...@walnut.gen.nz> wrote:
>
> > On 13/02/13 14:32, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> > > On 2/12/2013 4:43 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> >
> > >> Assumed you'll build a fence, 10m long and every 1m there should
> > >> be 1 fence post, how many fence posts do you need?
> > >>
> > >
> > > 11 :)
> >
> > Depends how you interpret the instructions. If it's "you can leave up
> > to 1m hanging without a post", then you only need 9 :-)
>
> According to Jerry's interpretation: 11. According to yours, it's
> actually 10 posts less, i.e. only 1.
>
> (Finally, as we know, there's only 10 kinds of people...)
>
> > Richard

The wanted answer is 11, but OTOH 9 is also correct. "every 1m", so
thanks to my broken English, it's possible to have the fence hanging on
both ends.

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[Ralf Mardorf]

On Wed, 2013-02-13 at 15:39 +0100, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> On Wed, 2013-02-13 at 15:35 +0100, Alois Mahdal wrote:
> > On Wed, 13 Feb 2013 14:41:47 +1300
> > Richard Hector <ric...@walnut.gen.nz> wrote:
> >
> > > On 13/02/13 14:32, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> > > > On 2/12/2013 4:43 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> > >
> > > >> Assumed you'll build a fence, 10m long and every 1m there should
> > > >> be 1 fence post, how many fence posts do you need?
> > > >>
> > > >
> > > > 11 :)
> > >
> > > Depends how you interpret the instructions. If it's "you can leave up
> > > to 1m hanging without a post", then you only need 9 :-)
> >
> > According to Jerry's interpretation: 11. According to yours, it's
> > actually 10 posts less, i.e. only 1.
> >
> > (Finally, as we know, there's only 10 kinds of people...)
> >
> > > Richard
>
> The wanted answer is 11, but OTOH 9 is also correct. "every 1m", so
> thanks to my broken English, it's possible to have the fence hanging on
> both ends.

"how many fence posts do you need?" ... e.g. interpreted as "at
minimum". So 9 and not 10.

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[Andrei POPESCU]

On Mi, 13 feb 13, 14:08:15, Richard Hector wrote:
> On 12/02/13 22:43, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
>
> > My machine has got 4GB RAM too, but only 1,000,000,000 hex-bytes ;p.
> > Serious, there is no other correct sum than 4,294,967,296 bytes. For an
> > old former Assembler programmer it's disgusting to distinguish between
> > GB and GiB. OTOH kilos etc. are 10^x, but for the computer I do the math
> > based on 1024.
>
> Abusing the standard prefixes like that was always a horrible hack.

+1

It's also a major source of confusion for many users.

Kind regards,
Andrei
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[Ralf Mardorf]

On Thu, 2013-02-14 at 09:50 +0200, Andrei POPESCU wrote:
> On Mi, 13 feb 13, 14:08:15, Richard Hector wrote:
> > On 12/02/13 22:43, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> >
> > > My machine has got 4GB RAM too, but only 1,000,000,000 hex-bytes ;p.
> > > Serious, there is no other correct sum than 4,294,967,296 bytes. For an
> > > old former Assembler programmer it's disgusting to distinguish between
> > > GB and GiB. OTOH kilos etc. are 10^x, but for the computer I do the math
> > > based on 1024.
> >
> > Abusing the standard prefixes like that was always a horrible hack.
>
> +1
>
> It's also a major source of confusion for many users.

$ hwinfo --memory
Memory Size: 3 GB + 512 MB

so it should be GiB, but they call it GB.

Regards,
Ralf

--
Btw. my PC has got got 4048 M(i)B - 256 M(i)B framebuffer = 3 G(i)B +
768 M(i)B and I've given up to find out what's going wrong a long time
ago. IIRC with a PAE kernel it always was ok, IIRC just 64-bit kernels
cause this issue on my machine. I couldn't find a BIOS setting or any
other bad setting, that might be the cause for the missing 256 M(i)B.
I've got a FreeBSD install for a while, this thread reminds me to check
if there is the same issue for BSD.

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[Pascal Hambourg]

Ralf Mardorf a écrit :

> On Thu, 2013-02-14 at 09:50 +0200, Andrei POPESCU wrote:
>> On Mi, 13 feb 13, 14:08:15, Richard Hector wrote:
>>> Abusing the standard prefixes like that was always a horrible hack.
>> +1
>>
>> It's also a major source of confusion for many users.

Agreed. And now there are "official" binary prefixes, so there is no
excuse for not using them when powers of 2 are more convenient instead
of abusing SI decimal prefixes.

> $ hwinfo --memory
> Memory Size: 3 GB + 512 MB
>
> so it should be GiB, but they call it GB.

Bad habits die hard. Many programs have been faulty, but more and more
are getting fixed.

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[Chris Bannister]

On Wed, Feb 13, 2013 at 03:35:01PM +0100, Alois Mahdal wrote:
>
> (Finally, as we know, there's only 10 kinds of people...)

Yeah, those that put people into categories and those that don't :)

--
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who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the
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[Chris Bannister]

On Wed, Feb 13, 2013 at 02:41:47PM +1300, Richard Hector wrote:
> On 13/02/13 14:32, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> > On 2/12/2013 4:43 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
>
> >> Assumed you'll build a fence, 10m long and every 1m there should be 1
> >> fence post, how many fence posts do you need?
> >>
> >
> > 11 :)
>
> Depends how you interpret the instructions. If it's "you can leave up to
> 1m hanging without a post", then you only need 9 :-)

Don't you need a gate somewhere?

--
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who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the
oppressing." --- Malcolm X

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[Ralf Mardorf]

On Fri, 2013-02-15 at 15:58 +1300, Chris Bannister wrote:
> Don't you need a gate somewhere?

No gate needed:
http://de.fotolia.com/id/31812215
http://www.zettels-traum-lesen.de/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/AS-am-Draht.jpg

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[Darac Marjal]

On Fri, Feb 15, 2013 at 03:56:58PM +1300, Chris Bannister wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 13, 2013 at 03:35:01PM +0100, Alois Mahdal wrote:
> >
> > (Finally, as we know, there's only 10 kinds of people...)
>
> Yeah, those that put people into categories and those that don't :)

Then surely you're in the category of "people not otherwise categoried"?

[Carroll Grigsby]

On Fri, 15 Feb 2013 15:58:16 +1300
Chris Bannister <cbann...@slingshot.co.nz> wrote:

> On Wed, Feb 13, 2013 at 02:41:47PM +1300, Richard Hector wrote:
> > On 13/02/13 14:32, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> > > On 2/12/2013 4:43 AM, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> >
> > >> Assumed you'll build a fence, 10m long and every 1m there should
> > >> be 1 fence post, how many fence posts do you need?
> > >>
> > >
> > > 11 :)
> >
> > Depends how you interpret the instructions. If it's "you can leave
> > up to 1m hanging without a post", then you only need 9 :-)
>
> Don't you need a gate somewhere?
>

I got rid of Gates 12 years ago. And Windows.

-- cmg

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/14/2013 4:52 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Ralf Mardorf a écrit :
>> On Thu, 2013-02-14 at 09:50 +0200, Andrei POPESCU wrote:
>>> On Mi, 13 feb 13, 14:08:15, Richard Hector wrote:
>>>> Abusing the standard prefixes like that was always a horrible hack.
>>> +1
>>>
>>> It's also a major source of confusion for many users.
>
> Agreed. And now there are "official" binary prefixes, so there is no
> excuse for not using them when powers of 2 are more convenient instead
> of abusing SI decimal prefixes.
>

And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?

Making up prefixes for something which has always been that way is
confusing.

It's simple. When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. When
dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.

Not confusing at all.

>> $ hwinfo --memory
>> Memory Size: 3 GB + 512 MB
>>
>> so it should be GiB, but they call it GB.
>
> Bad habits die hard. Many programs have been faulty, but more and more
> are getting fixed.
>
>

Yep, and maybe sooner or later Debian will catch up.

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[Ralf Mardorf]

On Sat, 16 Feb 2013 04:20:54 +0100, Jerry Stuckle <jstu...@attglobal.net>
wrote:

> And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?
>
> Making up prefixes for something which has always been that way is
> confusing.
>
> It's simple. When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. When
> dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.
>
> Not confusing at all.

I'm not a computer pioneer, but anyway a computer dino. When I started
programming the prefix "*iB" wasn't introduced or perhaps it was
introduced, but not used in Germany. The first Assembler editors were not
similar to the compiling language editors, but comparable to hex editors.
It wasn't needed to "compile" Assembler, but in return it was impossible
to add a command between two commands, if the coder did not keep free
space.

So my generation is aware of the powers of 2 and powers of 10 were
completely absurd.

I don't know when I was confused for the first time, however, it's no
issue for me to drop the prefix *B and to use the prefix *iB, but I can't
stand that since around 10 years using Linux, it's still a chaos, an
arbitrary usage of the prefixes. Powers of 10 make completely no sense.
Why not simply dropping the powers of 10 and using the prefixes *B and *iB
both for the powers of 2?

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[Richard Hector]

On 16/02/13 17:45, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> Powers of 10 make completely no sense. Why not simply dropping the
> powers of 10 and using the prefixes *B and *iB both for the powers of 2?

Powers of 2 make sense when you're talking about RAM, where the modules
have a certain number of binary address lines, so they naturally fall on
those boundaries.

For disks, there's no particular advantage, and manufacturers generally
use proper prefixes. For network bandwidth, there's even less advantage,
and 'binary' prefixes are hardly ever used.

But when you're working out how long it will take to fill up your RAM
buffer from disk or network, you'd better be aware of the differences
between the units, and it only adds to the confusion if the same
prefixes mean different things in different contexts.

Of course the ultimate craziness is "1.44Mb" (1440kiB) floppies ...

Richard

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[doug]

> On Sat, 16 Feb 2013 04:20:54 +0100, Jerry Stuckle
> <jstu...@attglobal.net> wrote:
>> And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?
>>
>> Making up prefixes for something which has always been that way is
>> confusing.
>>
>> It's simple. When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. When
>> dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.
>>
>> Not confusing at all.

/snip/

Actually, when dealing with distances, it's not powers of 10, it factors
of 12, (inches/foot) 3, (feet.yard) and 5280 (ft/mile).
Leave us not get into furlongs, leave us not!

--doug

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[Ralf Mardorf]

On Sat, 16 Feb 2013 07:37:20 +0100, Richard Hector <ric...@walnut.gen.nz>
wrote:

> Of course the ultimate craziness is "1.44Mb" (1440kiB) floppies

Wow, I never noticed that, or I have forgotten hat I noticed it. In my
defence, I used 3.5" discs quasi only for the Atari ST, so most of them
are DD, but indeed, I've got some HD disks too. FWIW, no data loss even
when used with drives for DD disks, at least last time when I tested some
of the HDs they were much older than CDs that were already borked.

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[Lisi Reisz]

On Saturday 16 February 2013 03:20:54 Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2.  When
> dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.

Not so. Manufacturers of hard drives normally (frequently?) give the size in
decimal, though they obviously don't say so, to make them look bigger.

Lisi

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[Eduard Bloch]

Hallo,
* Bob Proulx [Sun, Feb 10 2013, 11:46:30AM]:

> Eduard Bloch wrote:
> > Hallo,
> > * Bob Proulx [Sat, Feb 09 2013, 11:44:03AM]:
> > > You say "tomato", I say "tomahto". You can make your own divider the
> > > number 34,969[1] if you like.
> >
> > Wow, someone trying to disguise the own mistaken convention as pure
> > matter of preference?
> >
> > > For me I prefer binary powers of two when using it in relation to
> > > computer tasks.
> >
> > You can prefer whatever you want but the means of reliable communication
> > are unambiguous terms. EOD.
> >
> > Some dudes in nineteen-seventies didn't get it and another generation of
> > dudes is still trying to protect those "values" even perfectly knowing
> > they are wrong.
>
> Wow. My response pulled you in to post on debian-user! It has been a
> while. Good to see you here.

Nah, not having much spare time to post doesn't mean I have to drop all
the good habits.

> For anyone who gets upset by the topic I will only offer this
> following treatise as highly recommended reading.
>
> On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace
> http://www.ietf.org/rfc/ien/ien137.txt

And there is it again :-( Please don't justify pure misuse of
terminology with false analogies like this document about Holy Wars at
absolutely equivalent things (equivalent WRT their application).

In the field of arithmetics the effects of such "misnomers" can become
fatal. For example, see the US speciality called "billion" which has a
custom meaning incompatible to the rest of the world.

Regards,
Eduard.

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[Eduard Bloch]

Hallo,
* Lisi Reisz [Sat, Feb 16 2013, 08:20:45AM]:

> On Saturday 16 February 2013 03:20:54 Jerry Stuckle wrote:

> > When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. ï¿œWhen

> > dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.
>
> Not so. Manufacturers of hard drives normally (frequently?) give the size in
> decimal, though they obviously don't say so, to make them look bigger.

Actually, they do say so. Most harddisks I have seen so far have the
explanation printed on them or an explicite reference to the
documentation where they tell you that.

In fact, the main reason for becoming a drama is the impression that
numbers have on some people's mind. "I bought a 32 gig stick and Windows
says it's not even 30 gig on it... that's FRAUD!!"

Regards,
Eduard.

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[Lisi Reisz]

On Saturday 16 February 2013 10:43:51 Eduard Bloch wrote:
> Hallo,
>
> * Lisi Reisz [Sat, Feb 16 2013, 08:20:45AM]:
> > On Saturday 16 February 2013 03:20:54 Jerry Stuckle wrote:

> > > When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2.  When

> > > dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.
> >
> > Not so. Manufacturers of hard drives normally (frequently?) give the
> > size in decimal, though they obviously don't say so, to make them look
> > bigger.
>
> Actually, they do say so. Most harddisks I have seen so far have the
> explanation printed on them or an explicite reference to the
> documentation where they tell you that.

You may be in a different country. I have not seen this. If the print is
very small I wouldn't be able to see this. But anyway it doesn't alter my
main point that they give the numbers in decimal, not binary, to make the
size look bigger. Jerry had made the point that things connected to
computers are always in binary.

Lisi

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[Tony van der Hoff]

On 16/02/13 03:20, Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> On 2/14/2013 4:52 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>> Ralf Mardorf a écrit :
>>> On Thu, 2013-02-14 at 09:50 +0200, Andrei POPESCU wrote:
>>>> On Mi, 13 feb 13, 14:08:15, Richard Hector wrote:
>>>>> Abusing the standard prefixes like that was always a horrible hack.
>>>> +1
>>>>
>>>> It's also a major source of confusion for many users.
>>
>> Agreed. And now there are "official" binary prefixes, so there is no
>> excuse for not using them when powers of 2 are more convenient instead
>> of abusing SI decimal prefixes.
>>
>
> And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?
>

Display your ignorance at your peril. It doesn't enhance your argument.

The IEC declared these prefixes back in 1999 (IEC 60027-2 Amendment 2),
and the BIPM (which regulates the SI) explicitly deprecates the use of
the power-of-10 units for binary quantities.

See Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (2006).
http://www1.bipm.org/utils/common/pdf/si_brochure_8.pdf page 121 (sidenote):

"These SI prefixes refer strictly to powers of 10. They should not be
used to indicate powers of 2 (for example, one kilobit represents 1000
bits and not 1024 bits). The IEC has adopted prefixes for binary powers
in the international standard IEC 60027-2: 2005, third edition, Letter
symbols to be used in electrical technology – Part 2: Telecommunications
and electronics. The names and symbols for the prefixes corresponding to
210, 220, 230, 240, 250, and 260 are, respectively: kibi, Ki; mebi, Mi;
gibi, Gi; tebi, Ti; pebi, Pi; and exbi, Ei. Thus, for example, one
kibibyte would be written: 1 KiB = 210 B = 1024 B, where B denotes a
byte. Although these prefixes are not part of the SI, they should be
used in the field of information technology to avoid the incorrect usage
of the SI prefixes."

(Apologies for the exponentation in this extract; I didn't want to edit
it. 210, etc should say 2^10).

That's official enough for most people. However, if you want to declare
the earth flat, then don't be surprised if your opinion is disrespected.
--
Tony van der Hoff | mailto:to...@vanderhoff.org
Buckinghamshire, England |

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[John Hasler]

doug writes:
> Actually, when dealing with distances, it's not powers of 10, it
> factors of 12, (inches/foot) 3, (feet.yard) and 5280 (ft/mile). Leave
> us not get into furlongs, leave us not!

Or stones, or the fact that there are two very, very slightly different
miles...

Much of this comes from the ancient practice of using different sets of
units in different fields of endeavor (sometimes with the same names).
Which is what the opponents of the new prefixes are advocating.

I started using the old system in the 1960's. I've not had any trouble
adapting to the new one. Why are younger people finding it so hard?
It's an improvement!

Might not be a bad idea to put it in Debian policy, though, as a
"should".
--
John Hasler

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 3:20 AM, Lisi Reisz wrote:
> On Saturday 16 February 2013 03:20:54 Jerry Stuckle wrote:
>> When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. When
>> dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.
>
> Not so. Manufacturers of hard drives normally (frequently?) give the size in
> decimal, though they obviously don't say so, to make them look bigger.
>
> Lisi
>
>

Correct - as I said in an earlier post, this started back in the 80's to
make their disks look bigger.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 1:30 AM, doug wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 16 Feb 2013 04:20:54 +0100, Jerry Stuckle
>> <jstu...@attglobal.net> wrote:
>>> And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?
>>>
>>> Making up prefixes for something which has always been that way is
>>> confusing.
>>>
>>> It's simple. When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. When
>>> dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.
>>>
>>> Not confusing at all.
> /snip/
>
> Actually, when dealing with distances, it's not powers of 10, it factors
> of 12, (inches/foot) 3, (feet.yard) and 5280 (ft/mile).
> Leave us not get into furlongs, leave us not!
>
> --doug
>
>

Not when you're using kilometers (the international standard), it isn't.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 1:37 AM, Richard Hector wrote:
> On 16/02/13 17:45, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
>> Powers of 10 make completely no sense. Why not simply dropping the
>> powers of 10 and using the prefixes *B and *iB both for the powers of 2?
>
> Powers of 2 make sense when you're talking about RAM, where the modules
> have a certain number of binary address lines, so they naturally fall on
> those boundaries.
>
> For disks, there's no particular advantage, and manufacturers generally
> use proper prefixes. For network bandwidth, there's even less advantage,
> and 'binary' prefixes are hardly ever used.
>
> But when you're working out how long it will take to fill up your RAM
> buffer from disk or network, you'd better be aware of the differences
> between the units, and it only adds to the confusion if the same
> prefixes mean different things in different contexts.
>
> Of course the ultimate craziness is "1.44Mb" (1440kiB) floppies ...
>
> Richard
>
>

Incorrect. Disks still use powers of 2 - 512 bytes per sector, for
instance. As I said before - back in the 80's, some manufacturers
started using 1,000 for 1K instead of 1,024 because it made their disks
look larger. The same is true with bandwidth - it makes the link look
faster.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

I agree, I wish people WOULD stop applying terms in the incorrect
context. That's what confuses matters.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 5:43 AM, Eduard Bloch wrote:
> Hallo,
> * Lisi Reisz [Sat, Feb 16 2013, 08:20:45AM]:
>> On Saturday 16 February 2013 03:20:54 Jerry Stuckle wrote:

>>> When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. When

>>> dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.
>>
>> Not so. Manufacturers of hard drives normally (frequently?) give the size in
>> decimal, though they obviously don't say so, to make them look bigger.
>
> Actually, they do say so. Most harddisks I have seen so far have the
> explanation printed on them or an explicite reference to the
> documentation where they tell you that.
>
> In fact, the main reason for becoming a drama is the impression that
> numbers have on some people's mind. "I bought a 32 gig stick and Windows
> says it's not even 30 gig on it... that's FRAUD!!"
>
> Regards,
> Eduard.
>
>

Sure it has 32GB on it. But that doesn't mean 32GB is available for
your files. There is OS overhead, also.

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[Chris Bannister]

I hope so, it sounds rather painful.

--
"If you're not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people
who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the
oppressing." --- Malcolm X


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[Chris Bannister]

On Sat, Feb 16, 2013 at 08:20:45AM +0000, Lisi Reisz wrote:
> On Saturday 16 February 2013 03:20:54 Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> > When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. �When
> > dealing with distances, it's powers of 10.
>
> Not so. Manufacturers of hard drives normally (frequently?) give the size in
> decimal, though they obviously don't say so, to make them look bigger.

Weird, since we are talking about it this pops up:
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/13/02/11/0254238/when-1-gb-is-really-09313-gigabytes

--
"If you're not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people
who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the
oppressing." --- Malcolm X

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[Pascal Hambourg]

Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :

> On 2/14/2013 4:52 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>> And now there are "official" binary prefixes, so there is no
>> excuse for not using them when powers of 2 are more convenient instead
>> of abusing SI decimal prefixes.
>
> And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?

BIPM (SI), NIST (USA), CENELEC (Europe) IEC, IEEE.
Are these official enough for you ?
See <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_prefix>

> Making up prefixes for something which has always been that way is
> confusing.

Abusing already-existing prefixes by giving them a different meaning is
confusing too.

> It's simple. When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2.

Actually not in all cases but mostly in storage capacity only. When time
or frequencies are involved, i.e. in clock, speed or data rate (bus,
network, disk...) use of powers of 10 has been constant. 10Base-2 speed
is 10 000 000 bits/s.

But this is not the point. I repeat, the use of powers of 2 is perfectly
acceptable. What is not acceptable any more is the abuse of decimal SI
prefixes for powers of 2. I have abused them too, but always felt
uncomfortable with this practice because of the potential and real
confusion it caused. I felt happy when standardized binary prefix were
adopted, and used them right way. Hey guys, it just takes a tiny "i"
inserted in the notation to avoid confusion ! Are you just so lazy ?

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[Pascal Hambourg]

Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :

> On 2/16/2013 1:37 AM, Richard Hector wrote:
>> Powers of 2 make sense when you're talking about RAM, where the modules
>> have a certain number of binary address lines, so they naturally fall on
>> those boundaries.
>>
>> For disks, there's no particular advantage, and manufacturers generally
>> use proper prefixes. For network bandwidth, there's even less advantage,
>> and 'binary' prefixes are hardly ever used.
>

> Incorrect. Disks still use powers of 2 - 512 bytes per sector, for
> instance.

Big deal. The sector size is 2^9 bytes, but the sector count is a
totally arbitrary number, and is orders of magnitude bigger. So the
binary nature of the sector size is completely invisible in the disk
capacity. Even SSDs or other flash storage don't have a binary capacity
even though they are made of flash chips which have a binary capacity.

> As I said before - back in the 80's, some manufacturers
> started using 1,000 for 1K instead of 1,024 because it made their disks
> look larger. The same is true with bandwidth - it makes the link look
> faster.

Maybe there is another reason than make figures look bigger : SI decimal
prefixes have a legal value in many countries.

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[Pascal Hambourg]

Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :

> On 2/16/2013 5:43 AM, Eduard Bloch wrote:
>>
>> In fact, the main reason for becoming a drama is the impression that
>> numbers have on some people's mind. "I bought a 32 gig stick and Windows
>> says it's not even 30 gig on it... that's FRAUD!!"
>

> Sure it has 32GB on it. But that doesn't mean 32GB is available for
> your files. There is OS overhead, also.

Bullshit. Overhead does not consume 7% of the disk capacity. This is
just the difference between 1 GiB and 1 GB.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 9:54 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
>> On 2/14/2013 4:52 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>> And now there are "official" binary prefixes, so there is no
>>> excuse for not using them when powers of 2 are more convenient instead
>>> of abusing SI decimal prefixes.
>>
>> And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?
>
> BIPM (SI), NIST (USA), CENELEC (Europe) IEC, IEEE.
> Are these official enough for you ?
> See <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_prefix>
>
>> Making up prefixes for something which has always been that way is
>> confusing.
>
> Abusing already-existing prefixes by giving them a different meaning is
> confusing too.
>
>> It's simple. When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2.
>
> Actually not in all cases but mostly in storage capacity only. When time
> or frequencies are involved, i.e. in clock, speed or data rate (bus,
> network, disk...) use of powers of 10 has been constant. 10Base-2 speed
> is 10 000 000 bits/s.
>

True, I will agree it is storage capacity.

> But this is not the point. I repeat, the use of powers of 2 is perfectly
> acceptable. What is not acceptable any more is the abuse of decimal SI
> prefixes for powers of 2. I have abused them too, but always felt
> uncomfortable with this practice because of the potential and real
> confusion it caused. I felt happy when standardized binary prefix were
> adopted, and used them right way. Hey guys, it just takes a tiny "i"
> inserted in the notation to avoid confusion ! Are you just so lazy ?
>
>

Using an extra "i" will be confusing to the majority of the world.

Please show me one major manufacturer which uses it, for instance. Or a
mainstream publication.

Saying something is a standard does not make it so. Only acceptance by
the users makes it a standard. And that has not occurred.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 10:04 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
>> On 2/16/2013 1:37 AM, Richard Hector wrote:
>>> Powers of 2 make sense when you're talking about RAM, where the modules
>>> have a certain number of binary address lines, so they naturally fall on
>>> those boundaries.
>>>
>>> For disks, there's no particular advantage, and manufacturers generally
>>> use proper prefixes. For network bandwidth, there's even less advantage,
>>> and 'binary' prefixes are hardly ever used.
>>
>> Incorrect. Disks still use powers of 2 - 512 bytes per sector, for
>> instance.
>
> Big deal. The sector size is 2^9 bytes, but the sector count is a
> totally arbitrary number, and is orders of magnitude bigger. So the
> binary nature of the sector size is completely invisible in the disk
> capacity. Even SSDs or other flash storage don't have a binary capacity
> even though they are made of flash chips which have a binary capacity.
>

Not at all. Sector counts are integers. It is impossible to have a
disk of 1,000,000 bytes (or 1,000,000,000 or any other direct multiple).

It is, however, quite possible to have a disk of 1,048,576 bytes, i.e. 8
sectors/track, 4 tracks/cylinder and 64 cylinders. That would be a 1MB
disk.

>> As I said before - back in the 80's, some manufacturers
>> started using 1,000 for 1K instead of 1,024 because it made their disks
>> look larger. The same is true with bandwidth - it makes the link look
>> faster.
>
> Maybe there is another reason than make figures look bigger : SI decimal
> prefixes have a legal value in many countries.
>
>

Sure. They do in the United States, also. But that isn't the point.
Misleading advertising is.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 10:20 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
>> On 2/16/2013 5:43 AM, Eduard Bloch wrote:
>>>
>>> In fact, the main reason for becoming a drama is the impression that
>>> numbers have on some people's mind. "I bought a 32 gig stick and Windows
>>> says it's not even 30 gig on it... that's FRAUD!!"
>>
>> Sure it has 32GB on it. But that doesn't mean 32GB is available for
>> your files. There is OS overhead, also.
>
> Bullshit. Overhead does not consume 7% of the disk capacity. This is
> just the difference between 1 GiB and 1 GB.
>
>

Overhead can easily take up 7% of the disk, depending on the file system
being used.

You have just shown you have no idea what you're talking about.

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[Ralf Mardorf]

I'm willing to use what prefix ever, but it's annoying, if I need exact
information, to figure out how the Linux app I'm using, does interpret the
prefix.

hwinfo does use GB for powers of 2 and gparted does use GiB for powers of
2, for Linux apps I'm using seldom I never do know what they mean by "GB".

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[Tony van der Hoff]

It certainly won't happen with luddite attitudes like yours prevailing.
It IS a standard, whether you like it, or not. Get used to it.

--
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Buckinghamshire, England |

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[Pascal Hambourg]

Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
> On 2/16/2013 10:04 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>
>> Big deal. The sector size is 2^9 bytes, but the sector count is a
>> totally arbitrary number, and is orders of magnitude bigger. So the
>> binary nature of the sector size is completely invisible in the disk
>> capacity. Even SSDs or other flash storage don't have a binary capacity
>> even though they are made of flash chips which have a binary capacity.
>
> Not at all. Sector counts are integers. It is impossible to have a
> disk of 1,000,000 bytes

Indeed, but it is possible to have a disk of 8 000 000 bytes (8 MB).

> (or 1,000,000,000 or any other direct multiple).

You should check your numbers.
10^9 = (5 * 2)^9 = 5^9 * 2^9 = 1953125 * 512.
So it is possible to have a disk of 1 953 125 sectors of 512 bytes,
which is exactly 1 000 000 000 bytes.
I personnally own a disk of exactly 20 GB (20 000 000 000 bytes).

Anyway, that does not matter. The real capacity is slightly bigger that
the rounded capacity advertised by manufacturers, so it's all fine : you
get a few extra bytes.

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[Pascal Hambourg]

Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
> On 2/16/2013 10:20 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>> Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
>>> On 2/16/2013 5:43 AM, Eduard Bloch wrote:
>>>> In fact, the main reason for becoming a drama is the impression that
>>>> numbers have on some people's mind. "I bought a 32 gig stick and Windows
>>>> says it's not even 30 gig on it... that's FRAUD!!"
>>
>>> Sure it has 32GB on it. But that doesn't mean 32GB is available for
>>> your files. There is OS overhead, also.
>>
>> Bullshit. Overhead does not consume 7% of the disk capacity. This is
>> just the difference between 1 GiB and 1 GB.
>
> Overhead can easily take up 7% of the disk, depending on the file system
> being used.

Let me rephrase it. Can you provide an example of a freshly created
filesystem of a common size with an overhead of at least 7%, i.e. with
the free space being less than 93 % of the raw size ?

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 12:33 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
>> On 2/16/2013 10:04 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>>
>>> Big deal. The sector size is 2^9 bytes, but the sector count is a
>>> totally arbitrary number, and is orders of magnitude bigger. So the
>>> binary nature of the sector size is completely invisible in the disk
>>> capacity. Even SSDs or other flash storage don't have a binary capacity
>>> even though they are made of flash chips which have a binary capacity.
>>
>> Not at all. Sector counts are integers. It is impossible to have a
>> disk of 1,000,000 bytes
>
> Indeed, but it is possible to have a disk of 8 000 000 bytes (8 MB).
>
>> (or 1,000,000,000 or any other direct multiple).
>
> You should check your numbers.
> 10^9 = (5 * 2)^9 = 5^9 * 2^9 = 1953125 * 512.
> So it is possible to have a disk of 1 953 125 sectors of 512 bytes,
> which is exactly 1 000 000 000 bytes.
> I personnally own a disk of exactly 20 GB (20 000 000 000 bytes).
>

No, it's not possible to have 1,953,125 sectors. Among other things,
current disks have an even number of heads (older ones had an odd number
because one head was use for tracking).

And exactly which disk is it you have that has exactly 20,000,000,000
bytes? Make and model?

> Anyway, that does not matter. The real capacity is slightly bigger that
> the rounded capacity advertised by manufacturers, so it's all fine : you
> get a few extra bytes.
>
>

Yup, and it does not matter if the price the store charges you for your
groceries is a little more than advertised.

But your comment is immaterial, anyway.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

It has not been accepted by the mainstream, so it's not a "standard" -
no matter who defined it, whether you like it or not. Get used to it.


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[Pascal Hambourg]

Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
> On 2/16/2013 9:54 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>
>> But this is not the point. I repeat, the use of powers of 2 is perfectly
>> acceptable. What is not acceptable any more is the abuse of decimal SI
>> prefixes for powers of 2. I have abused them too, but always felt
>> uncomfortable with this practice because of the potential and real
>> confusion it caused. I felt happy when standardized binary prefix were
>> adopted, and used them right way. Hey guys, it just takes a tiny "i"
>> inserted in the notation to avoid confusion ! Are you just so lazy ?
>
> Using an extra "i" will be confusing to the majority of the world.

Not using it for binary prefixes is already confusing. I believe that
most unaware people would not even notice the "i" if it was present.

> Please show me one major manufacturer which uses it, for instance. Or a
> mainstream publication.

Let's make it clear. I am not saying that everyone should use only
binary prefixes. I am saying that when binary prefixes are useful, then
insert the "i" to make it clear that you use binary prefixes and not
decimal prefixes. Disk manufacturers do not need to use binary prefixes.
They are only useful for semiconductor manufacturers (RAM, flash memory
chips, CPUs...). Unfortunately it seems that JEDEC, which develops
standards for semiconductor devices, has not adopted the (now not so)
new binary prefixes and their symbols.

> Saying something is a standard does not make it so. Only acceptance by
> the users makes it a standard. And that has not occurred.

See above. Most users do not need binary prefixes.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 12:52 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
>> On 2/16/2013 10:20 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>> Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
>>>> On 2/16/2013 5:43 AM, Eduard Bloch wrote:
>>>>> In fact, the main reason for becoming a drama is the impression that
>>>>> numbers have on some people's mind. "I bought a 32 gig stick and Windows
>>>>> says it's not even 30 gig on it... that's FRAUD!!"
>>>
>>>> Sure it has 32GB on it. But that doesn't mean 32GB is available for
>>>> your files. There is OS overhead, also.
>>>
>>> Bullshit. Overhead does not consume 7% of the disk capacity. This is
>>> just the difference between 1 GiB and 1 GB.
>>
>> Overhead can easily take up 7% of the disk, depending on the file system
>> being used.
>
> Let me rephrase it. Can you provide an example of a freshly created
> filesystem of a common size with an overhead of at least 7%, i.e. with
> the free space being less than 93 % of the raw size ?
>
>

How about answering my question. Exactly which disk do you have that
you claim has 40,000,000,000 bytes?

And depending on your disk, almost any fs, including ext2 and ntfs, can
have 7% overhead. Even the old FAT could have more than that.

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 12:47 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Jerry Stuckle a ï¿œcrit :
>> On 2/16/2013 9:54 AM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>
>>> But this is not the point. I repeat, the use of powers of 2 is perfectly
>>> acceptable. What is not acceptable any more is the abuse of decimal SI
>>> prefixes for powers of 2. I have abused them too, but always felt
>>> uncomfortable with this practice because of the potential and real
>>> confusion it caused. I felt happy when standardized binary prefix were
>>> adopted, and used them right way. Hey guys, it just takes a tiny "i"
>>> inserted in the notation to avoid confusion ! Are you just so lazy ?
>>
>> Using an extra "i" will be confusing to the majority of the world.
>
> Not using it for binary prefixes is already confusing. I believe that
> most unaware people would not even notice the "i" if it was present.
>
>> Please show me one major manufacturer which uses it, for instance. Or a
>> mainstream publication.
>
> Let's make it clear. I am not saying that everyone should use only
> binary prefixes. I am saying that when binary prefixes are useful, then
> insert the "i" to make it clear that you use binary prefixes and not
> decimal prefixes. Disk manufacturers do not need to use binary prefixes.
> They are only useful for semiconductor manufacturers (RAM, flash memory
> chips, CPUs...). Unfortunately it seems that JEDEC, which develops
> standards for semiconductor devices, has not adopted the (now not so)
> new binary prefixes and their symbols.
>

So it's not a standard then - at least not in the context you claimed.

>> Saying something is a standard does not make it so. Only acceptance by
>> the users makes it a standard. And that has not occurred.
>
> See above. Most users do not need binary prefixes.
>
>


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[Eduard Bloch]

Hallo,
* Jerry Stuckle [Sat, Feb 16 2013, 09:09:42AM]:

> >And there is it again :-( Please don't justify pure misuse of
> >terminology with false analogies like this document about Holy Wars at
> >absolutely equivalent things (equivalent WRT their application).
> >
> >In the field of arithmetics the effects of such "misnomers" can become
> >fatal. For example, see the US speciality called "billion" which has a
> >custom meaning incompatible to the rest of the world.

> I agree, I wish people WOULD stop applying terms in the incorrect
> context. That's what confuses matters.

Which part do you agree with? I cannot see any. You keep insisting on
being right with the incorrect use of other people's words, telling
them that THEY have to rethink and adapt the meaning every time they
need to communicate with you in your little sandbox.

Reminds me on doublespeak and doublethink (google it if you don't know
what I mean).

Regards,
Eduard.

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[Eduard Bloch]

Hallo,
* Jerry Stuckle [Sat, Feb 16 2013, 01:36:42PM]:

> >>>>On 2/16/2013 5:43 AM, Eduard Bloch wrote:
> >>>>>In fact, the main reason for becoming a drama is the impression that
> >>>>>numbers have on some people's mind. "I bought a 32 gig stick and Windows
> >>>>>says it's not even 30 gig on it... that's FRAUD!!"
> >>>
> >>>>Sure it has 32GB on it. But that doesn't mean 32GB is available for
> >>>>your files. There is OS overhead, also.
> >>>
> >>>Bullshit. Overhead does not consume 7% of the disk capacity. This is
> >>>just the difference between 1 GiB and 1 GB.

Funny. I made an example to demonstrate the irrational
effects that numbers have on people, and you both immediately start a
holy war based on it.

> >>Overhead can easily take up 7% of the disk, depending on the file system
> >>being used.
> >
> >Let me rephrase it. Can you provide an example of a freshly created
> >filesystem of a common size with an overhead of at least 7%, i.e. with
> >the free space being less than 93 % of the raw size ?
> >
> >
>
> How about answering my question. Exactly which disk do you have

I am with him. There is no real question from you that I could discover
so far, just some attempts to distract attention after not understanding
the point (or even the content) of the original example.

Regards,
Eduard.

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[Bob Proulx]

Eduard Bloch wrote:
> Nah, not having much spare time to post doesn't mean I have to drop
> all the good habits.

I had nothing in the mailbox for the last year of recent memory. I
will call that good enough to be called "a while".

> Bob Proulx wrote:
> > $ perl -le 'print 5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024)'
> > ...

> > For anyone who gets upset by the topic I will only offer this
> > following treatise as highly recommended reading.
> >
> > On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace
> > http://www.ietf.org/rfc/ien/ien137.txt
>

> And there is it again :-( Please don't justify pure misuse of
> terminology with false analogies like this document about Holy Wars at
> absolutely equivalent things (equivalent WRT their application).

Please quote my exact words where I misused terminology. I do not see
it. I never said GB nor GiB. I used a number. I think you are
objecting to me using GB but I never said GB anywhere. Others did.

Because of the fervor on this topic I believe the Holy Wars article is
very obviously as relevant now as then. It is talking about human
nature. As was the original Swift. As proven by this thread human
nature hasn't changed any in all of these years.

I would much rather be arguing over something that matters. Such as
aptitude versus apt-get. Or NetworkManager versus wicd. Or systemd
versus upstart. Or C++ versus C. Or Python versus Ruby. Or vim
versus emacs. Or the one true brace and indention style. Using a
period, point or comma for the decimal mark and thousands separator.
Or even which end of an egg to open. :-)

> You can prefer whatever you want but the means of reliable
> communication are unambiguous terms. EOD.

The number 1024 that I used is not ambiguous. It is an exact value.

> Some dudes in nineteen-seventies didn't get it and another generation
> of dudes is still trying to protect those "values" even perfectly
> knowing they are wrong.

I used a number 1024 as a divisor for binary data and I don't think I
am misinterpreting your words as telling me that I was wrong. But a
number is not wrong nor right. It is number. Please use any number
you want.

When I am working with binary data I use binary numbers. When I am
working with decimal data then I use decimal numbers. This is neither
right nor wrong. Those are conventions because they are convenient to
the data they are describing.

Others are of course free to use their own preferences. Many people
still prefer octal representations. Such as with chmod. I typically
eschew use of octal values with chmod and prefer the modern purely
symbolic modes. But I don't declare others wrong for using octal
values with chmod. At times it is also convenient to the data it is
describing.

> In the field of arithmetics the effects of such "misnomers" can become
> fatal. For example, see the US speciality called "billion" which has a
> custom meaning incompatible to the rest of the world.

I do not understand your point with regards to "billion". Please
explain further.

I am aware that in the old days (prior to the 1970's?) for some
countries (primarily the British Commonwealth?) a billion was a
million million (10^12) and a trillion was a million million million
(10^18). Those derived from "bi" and "tri" meaning million^2 and
million^3. Which makes sense. But I believe that now common English
communication throughout the US, UK, and Commonwealth it is now
considered obsolete usage. Today a billion is 1000000000 (10^9) aka a
thousand million and a trillion is 1000000000000 (10^12) aka a
thousand thousand million.

I am aware that this changeover has happened within living memory for
a lot of people and therefore causes colloquial speech to fall back,
often intentionally, to the old ways at times. Also any literature
prior to this needs to be read within that context. Context is always
important. Using full exact numbers in communication can avoid
confusion over this issue. If the name may be confused then reading
the exact number should clarify it.

Is this the meaning you are referring to which is incompatible with
the rest of the world?

Bob

[Jerry Stuckle]

Maybe you should learn to read. He made a statement - I challenged it.
So far he hasn't answered my question.

But I DID answer his question - although you conveniently trimmed that
part of the message (as other points which prove that it is NOT a
"defined standard" by the applicable body.

But then trolls often do trim parts they want to ignore, instead of
responding to them.

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[Joe Pfeiffer]

Jerry Stuckle <jstu...@attglobal.net> writes:

> On 2/14/2013 4:52 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>
>> Agreed. And now there are "official" binary prefixes, so there is no

>> excuse for not using them when powers of 2 are more convenient instead
>> of abusing SI decimal prefixes.
>>
> And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?

The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC).

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[Jerry Stuckle]

On 2/16/2013 3:50 PM, Joe Pfeiffer wrote:
> Jerry Stuckle <jstu...@attglobal.net> writes:
>
>> On 2/14/2013 4:52 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>>
>>> Agreed. And now there are "official" binary prefixes, so there is no
>>> excuse for not using them when powers of 2 are more convenient instead
>>> of abusing SI decimal prefixes.
>>>
>> And who declared these made-up prefixes "official"?
>
> The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC).
>
>

Which, unfortunately, is the wrong organization for RAM devices. JEDEC,
the appropriate governing body, hasn't.

And even then, it's not a standard until it's been accepted by the
mainstream. Please show where that has occurred.

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[Joao Luis Meloni Assirati]

This conversation is unbelievable. Debian-user is supposedly a list where
voluntary people answer simple practical questions of users. Are you
really going to enforce list members to watch such ego demonstrations and
unfunny jokes?

Archive: http://lists.debian.org/5defc303bb457fbb2bf8...@nonada.if.usp.br

[agroconsultor0]

On 02/16/2013 03:23 PM, Joao Luis Meloni Assirati wrote:
> This conversation is unbelievable. Debian-user is supposedly a list where
> voluntary people answer simple practical questions of users. Are you
> really going to enforce list members to watch such ego demonstrations and
> unfunny jokes?
>

Well, Stable is coming, and this kind of conversations had happened for
years. You can block them if you want it.

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[Ralf Mardorf]

On Sun, 17 Feb 2013 01:28:06 +0100, agroconsultor0
<agrocon...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 02/16/2013 03:23 PM, Joao Luis Meloni Assirati wrote:
>> This conversation is unbelievable. Debian-user is supposedly a list
>> where
>> voluntary people answer simple practical questions of users. Are you
>> really going to enforce list members to watch such ego demonstrations
>> and
>> unfunny jokes?
>>
>
> Well, Stable is coming, and this kind of conversations had happened for
> years. You can block them if you want it.

The discussion isn't completely OT, but it can happen that things become
OT, then ask the people to move to
http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/d-community-offtopic
.

I'm subscribed to a moderated list, it started with the advantage that
completely annoying discussions were banned, but now even short, useful
requests and replies often are rejected. The advantage became a serious
drawback.

Everybody getting excited by such a harmless and easy to filter discussion
should join
https://mailman.archlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/arch-general
and ask some useful questions and give some useful answers. You'll be
surprised what point of view moderators could have after a while.

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[agroconsultor0]

Ralf

I do not know why you are answering to my message, but have you seen
that you usually create noise in the list? it is probably because you
can not focus correctly on the target. What is the similarity between 1
moderated list and 1 no moderated list? Do you understand it?

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[Ralf Mardorf]

Hi agroconsultor0,

somebody captured a thread, instead of replying to this thread or opening
a new one.

This OP ask people who were talking about a technical issue, Debian does
ship with apps that use wrong prefixes, to stop this discussion, calling
it a "ego demonstration".

You don't like to see the "noise" I make.

So what the OP and you want is to be moderators or perhaps more likely
dictators of this list.

Reconsider to filter the subject "Convert output of byte count to GB
count" to get rid of the noise the people make by this thread and to
filter mails from "ralf.mardorf@", I've got 2 mail addresses and both
include this.

You never explained that I make noise off-list, you don't use a real name,
this is an "ego demonstration".

Please, if somebody should reply, neither do it to me or to this list, but
to
http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/d-community-offtopic
, resp. d-communit...@lists.alioth.debian.org .

A lot of noise is made by people who are unable to read top posting, HTML
and who are unable to use filters and who don't accept continuing to talk
at D-community-offtopic.

Humans aren't standardised. I like to help people, ask for help myself,
but I also like to write OT. I also don't like all mails I receive, but
I'm able to unsubscribe, to use the MUA's filters, or simply not to read a
mail I receive.

What's your problem agroconsultor0?

Regards,
Ralf

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[Pascal Hambourg]

Jerry Stuckle a écrit :

> On 2/16/2013 12:33 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>
>> 10^9 = (5 * 2)^9 = 5^9 * 2^9 = 1953125 * 512.
>> So it is possible to have a disk of 1 953 125 sectors of 512 bytes,
>> which is exactly 1 000 000 000 bytes.
>> I personnally own a disk of exactly 20 GB (20 000 000 000 bytes).
>
> No, it's not possible to have 1,953,125 sectors. Among other things,
> current disks have an even number of heads (older ones had an odd number
> because one head was use for tracking).

Isn't your information a bit outdated ?
Current disks can have an arbitrary number of heads : 1, 2, 3, 4... up
to 8 at least for 1" height disks. Check for exemple the datasheet of
the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 series. The 80 GB models (ex: ST380215AS)
has one head, the 750 GB models (ex: ST3750640AS) has 8 heads.

Anyway the physical geometry is hidden by the embedded controller and
the "logical" geometry advertised to the host system is purely virtual
(and deprecated in favor of linear LBA addressing), so the number of
physical heads is irrelevant.

> And exactly which disk is it you have that has exactly 20,000,000,000
> bytes? Make and model?

Maxtor 2B020H1. Printed on the label is "LBA: 39062500".

Here is the output of "hdparm -IN" which confirms the size and checks
that HPA (host protected area) is disabled :
==========================
ATA device, with non-removable media
Model Number: Maxtor 2B020H1
Serial Number: B1C42JYE
Firmware Revision: WAH21PB0
Standards:
Used: ATA/ATAPI-6 T13 1410D revision 0
Supported: 6 5 4
Configuration:
Logical max current
cylinders 16383 16383
heads 16 16
sectors/track 63 63
--
CHS current addressable sectors: 16514064
LBA user addressable sectors: 39062500
Logical/Physical Sector size: 512 bytes
device size with M = 1024*1024: 19073 MBytes
device size with M = 1000*1000: 20000 MBytes (20 GB)
cache/buffer size = 2048 KBytes (type=DualPortCache)
Capabilities:
LBA, IORDY(can be disabled)
Standby timer values: spec'd by Standard, no device specific minimum
R/W multiple sector transfer: Max = 16 Current = 16
Advanced power management level: disabled
Recommended acoustic management value: 192, current value: 0
DMA: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2 udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 *udma5
Cycle time: min=120ns recommended=120ns
PIO: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
Cycle time: no flow control=120ns IORDY flow control=120ns
Commands/features:
Enabled Supported:
* SMART feature set
* Power Management feature set
* Write cache
* Look-ahead
* Host Protected Area feature set
* WRITE_VERIFY command
* WRITE_BUFFER command
* READ_BUFFER command
* NOP cmd
* DOWNLOAD_MICROCODE
Advanced Power Management feature set
SET_MAX security extension
Automatic Acoustic Management feature set
* Device Configuration Overlay feature set
HW reset results:
CBLID- above Vih
Device num = 0 determined by the jumper
Checksum: correct
max sectors = 39062500/39062500, HPA is disabled
==========================
I can understand your skeptcism, this exact GB size seems to be
uncommon. On the other disks I checked, the sector count seems to be a
multiple of 1008 = (16 heads * 63 sectors/track).

Exemples :
Maxtor 6E040T0, Seagate ST340014AS (40 GB) : 78165360 = 77545 * 16 * 63
Maxtor 6E040L0 (40 GB) : 80293248 = 79656 * 16 * 63
Western Digital WD800AAJS (80 GB) : 156301488 = 155061 * 16 * 63

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[Pascal Hambourg]

Jerry Stuckle a écrit :

> On 2/16/2013 12:52 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>> Let me rephrase it. Can you provide an example of a freshly created
>> filesystem of a common size with an overhead of at least 7%, i.e. with
>> the free space being less than 93 % of the raw size ?
>
> How about answering my question. Exactly which disk do you have that
> you claim has 40,000,000,000 bytes?

I just did. Will you now answer mine please ?

> And depending on your disk, almost any fs, including ext2 and ntfs, can
> have 7% overhead. Even the old FAT could have more than that.

FWIW, I just created ext2, ext3 and ext4 filesystems on a ~10 GB
partition with default settings, and the overhead was roughly 3% in the
worst case (ext3 and ext4 due to the journal file). Of course if you
force a huge journal file size or inode count, I guess you can reach 7%.

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[agroconsultor0]

I do not care what you think or say; just do not come to me whit this
big ball of shit, frau.

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[Ralf Mardorf]

So you ask other people for something, but you don't care about those
people, you mentioned "noise", but you don't care about list rules
yourself.
Why should we care about you?

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[Bonno Bloksma]

Hi,

>>>> When dealing with computers, it's powers of 2. When dealing with
>>>> distances, it's powers of 10.
>>>
>>> Not so. Manufacturers of hard drives normally (frequently?) give the
>>> size in decimal, though they obviously don't say so, to make them look bigger.
>>
>> Actually, they do say so. Most harddisks I have seen so far have the
>> explanation printed on them or an explicite reference to the
>> documentation where they tell you that.

>>
>> In fact, the main reason for becoming a drama is the impression that
>> numbers have on some people's mind. "I bought a 32 gig stick and
>> Windows says it's not even 30 gig on it... that's FRAUD!!"
>>
>
> Sure it has 32GB on it. But that doesn't mean 32GB is available for your files. There is OS overhead, also.

When buying 3,5" floppies it sometimes said 2MB on them. Which was the unformatted disk capacity. Of course once formatted you only had the 1.4MB space left for your files.

Bonno Bloksma

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[Eduard Bloch]

Hallo,
* Bob Proulx [Sat, Feb 16 2013, 01:54:44PM]:

> Eduard Bloch wrote:
> > Nah, not having much spare time to post doesn't mean I have to drop
> > all the good habits.
>
> I had nothing in the mailbox for the last year of recent memory. I
> will call that good enough to be called "a while".
>
> > Bob Proulx wrote:
> > > $ perl -le 'print 5605687296 / (1024*1024*1024)'
> > > ...
> > > For anyone who gets upset by the topic I will only offer this
> > > following treatise as highly recommended reading.
> > >
> > > On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace
> > > http://www.ietf.org/rfc/ien/ien137.txt
> >
> > And there is it again :-( Please don't justify pure misuse of
> > terminology with false analogies like this document about Holy Wars at
> > absolutely equivalent things (equivalent WRT their application).
>
> Please quote my exact words where I misused terminology. I do not see
> it. I never said GB nor GiB. I used a number.

Yeah. A number as answer to something about "GB". Have you ever been on
the Jeopardy show?

> Because of the fervor on this topic I believe the Holy Wars article is
> very obviously as relevant now as then. It is talking about human
> nature. As was the original Swift. As proven by this thread human
> nature hasn't changed any in all of these years.

What is so unclear in what I have written before? In Gulliver's travels,
as in most holy wars, the outcome is absolutely identical, so choosing
any method doesn't make a difference. This analogy does NOT apply here.

Following your logics means that it's ok to use "pint" for business
communication because it's a soo well defined unit and anyone
understands how much it is. Now tell that to a globally operating
company...

> > You can prefer whatever you want but the means of reliable
> > communication are unambiguous terms. EOD.
>
> The number 1024 that I used is not ambiguous. It is an exact value.

Sure. But please, never use it to refer to any unit name using a SI
prefix.

> > Some dudes in nineteen-seventies didn't get it and another generation
> > of dudes is still trying to protect those "values" even perfectly
> > knowing they are wrong.
>
> I used a number 1024 as a divisor for binary data and I don't think I

Responding to someone asking for "GB".

> When I am working with binary data I use binary numbers. When I am
> working with decimal data then I use decimal numbers. This is neither

And when exactly does the data stop being decimal and becomes binary?
When it's read from the the PHY buffer and written to the 2nd level
cache of your CPU? Sorry, that kind of hairsplitting is just
ridiculous.

> Others are of course free to use their own preferences. Many people
> still prefer octal representations. Such as with chmod. I typically

Yet another false analogy. You keep presenting more and more of them,
always implying that somebody ...

> eschew use of octal values with chmod and prefer the modern purely
> symbolic modes. But I don't declare others wrong for using octal
> values with chmod. At times it is also convenient to the data it is
> describing.

... revealing them as not applicable here is "declaring others wrong".

A better analogy would be like telling compiler makers to watch
out for the special word "chmod". If present and the programmer writes
chmod(..., 755) they should not handle it like chmod(..., 0755) because
that's what looks convinient for many people. Oh, and please, the
compiler should guess the meaning based on the count of *.c files in the
home directory because that's a good indication for being used by an
expert or newbie.

> > In the field of arithmetics the effects of such "misnomers" can become
> > fatal. For example, see the US speciality called "billion" which has a
> > custom meaning incompatible to the rest of the world.
>
> I do not understand your point with regards to "billion". Please
> explain further.
>
> I am aware that in the old days (prior to the 1970's?) for some
> countries (primarily the British Commonwealth?) a billion was a
> million million (10^12) and a trillion was a million million million
> (10^18). Those derived from "bi" and "tri" meaning million^2 and
> million^3. Which makes sense. But I believe that now common English
> communication throughout the US, UK, and Commonwealth it is now
> considered obsolete usage. Today a billion is 1000000000 (10^9) aka a
> thousand million and a trillion is 1000000000000 (10^12) aka a
> thousand thousand million.

There is a long story ("short and long scales") where different
mathematics started using the same words for different counts. The
result is the mess we currently have (i.e. billion is still 10^12 in
most of the Europe and Trillion is 10^18, not 10^12), and we have a
chance to avoid this with binary-style SI prefixes.

> I am aware that this changeover has happened within living memory for
> a lot of people and therefore causes colloquial speech to fall back,
> often intentionally, to the old ways at times. Also any literature
> prior to this needs to be read within that context. Context is always
> important. Using full exact numbers in communication can avoid
> confusion over this issue. If the name may be confused then reading
> the exact number should clarify it.

And therefore, the proper answer to the original question should have
been "If you mean GiB aka binary-GB, you could use this command: ...".

Regards,
Eduard.

--
Alles altert, selbst die Achtung, wenn man sich nicht in Acht nimmt.
-- Joseph Joubert (Gedanken, Versuche und Maximen)

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[Bob Proulx]

Eduard Bloch wrote:

> * Bob Proulx wrote:
> > Please quote my exact words where I misused terminology. I do not see
> > it. I never said GB nor GiB. I used a number.
>
> Yeah. A number as answer to something about "GB". Have you ever been on
> the Jeopardy show?

I interpreted the question as how to reduce large hard to comprehend
numbers into smaller human readable numbers. If you didn't like my
answer then you can return it for a full refund of the cost paid.
Except that it was addressed to another and we haven't heard if he
found the hints satisfactory or not. I imagine he is rather chagrined
through no fault of his by the ruckus that has been kicked up in this
thread.

> Following your logics means that it's ok to use "pint" for business
> communication because it's a soo well defined unit and anyone
> understands how much it is. Now tell that to a globally operating
> company...

Certainly if I am going to order a pint in a pub what I get will
depend upon where the pub is located. I would hope that I would get a
20oz British pint. Not one of our smaller 16oz US pints. But when I
order a pint I already know what I will get without qualification. No
one in the UK calls it an "Imperial" pint. It is just "a pint". And
in the US we don't call it a small "American" pint. It is again just
"a pint".

But in the US we know it will be 16oz. Or smaller. Of all things a
Haagen Daz "pint" is down to 14oz. Ben & Jerry's says that they will
stick with the full size pint. Go B&J! So actually the pint is quite
well defined. The pint will be as small as they can get away making
it that consumers will still buy it so as to maximize profit.

I could keep debating points of your email but I will be offline for
some days and so will be unable to keep up my end of it. We are only
going to be able to agree to disagree.

Bob