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The Logic Behind Metric Paper Sizes
Oily Pakora writes "Those of us in the United States are so used to our Letter and Legal paper sizes. We've seen the A4 paper size option in our printer trays and in printer preference menus. Metric sizes used almost everywhere in the world, save for the US and Canada. Here is an interesting article that discusses all of the aspects of metric paper. For those who enjoy a bit of math, did you know that in the Metric paper system, the height-to-width ratio of all pages is the square root of 2? This means that you can place two sheets of A4 side-by-side and they will equal an A3 sheet exactly, and two sheets of A3 will equal an A2."
News?
Come-on really, Do I want to measure a piece of paper using the square root of two?
No, but it's very pleasant that an A3 page folded in half is exactly the same size as an A4 page. root-two is just the mathematical means to that end.
My Karma: ran over your Dogma
StrawberryFrog
I mean, I guess for those who create and ship paper it makes fiting boxes together easier...
But the average guy printing out documents could care less.
Blar.
And this is interesting why?
Two shees of 8.5x11 = one sheet of 11x17 too. WOW!
paintball
I dunno, longer, less-wide paper means that the perimeter contains its writing
area less efficiently. (A square would be most efficient for a
rectangle.) So despite making my notepad almost 3/4" more unwieldy,
moving to A4 actually reduces the area of the sheet by a small
amount. (Do the math.)
Sure it's silly to quibble about a square centimeter of area; I'm just
trying to quantify my aesthetic objection to skinnier paper...
We claim to be one of the most scientifically advanced countries in the world, but we can't adopt a useful standard that the _rest_ of the scientific community uses. Seriously, what is the problem with metric? I find it so much easier to use than the English system. Our government should at least make the attempt to switch over.
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"In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."
-- George Orwell
So? Use metric for science-related stuff where it really matters. (Most in the US do anyway.) There's no good reason to go to the expense and trouble of switching from English to metric all at once. It's much more cost-effective to do it over the space of a couple generations rather than all at once.
How can we continue to believe in a just universe and freedom to eat crackers if we have no ale?
For those of us living in A4-using lands, it's a real pain in the arse trying to set everything (especially in Windows) from Letter to A4! Then you think you have it susses and sure enough... "PC Load Letter" - aaargh!
;)
Do you have any idea how much trouble and stress you've caused by making Letter the default even with UK set as the country?
(BTW the metric system sucks for times when you really do want to use fractions)
Care to explain?
Hmm best and most logical always wins - like VHS over Betamax?
And why the heck would you want to use fractions? They're hard to do addition and subtraction with. (But a little faster for multiplication and division.)
.25 + .125 = .375 makes sense.
1/4 + 1/8 = 3/8 doesn't make sense (1+1=3???)
That's why kids have such trouble with fractions; until you *get* it, it's counterintuitive. That's why I buy tape measures with decimals and fractions. (Of course, when I'm measuring stuff my fiance insists I use feet and inches instead of just inches, so I have to multiply, add, then divide by twelve, then find the modulus!!!)
I'm in the hole of the broadband donut.
Putting them side-by-side isn't as interesting as cutting them in half, though. I discovered this when I started printing photos from my inkjet. Photo paper is generally available in the stores in limited sizes. I can buy a bunch of A4, and cut it in half, and I have two A5s. Do it again, and I have A6s, which is nearly a 4x6. Best of all, these paper sizes are all standard, which is good, because my printer doesn't like me to define my own paper sizes. With the American system, I have to measure and cut, which is more difficult.
When you discuss the advantages of metric, it really is about convenience[1]. There's nothing that you can do with metric that you can't with the English system; it is just, generally, more difficult to do with the English system. If you don't care about convenience, and you live in the USA, then you probably don't have any reason to use metric.
[1] Of course, using metric in the US imposes a certain amount of inconvenience from compatability issues, but that's another argument.
The height-to-width ratio of the pages isn't solely responsible for the fact that metric pages "add up" when placed side-by-side. They also have to be the right size, and that has nothing to do with the metric system. I could design any arbitrary measurement system, and a paper standard based on it that would have the same properties.
:)
On an unrelated note, one benefit of the English system is that measurements tend to be divisible in more ways. For example, 10 is evenly divisible by 1, 2 and 5. 12 (upon which much of the English system is based) is evenly divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6.
Not that I think that's a reason not to switch over
Read my keyboard review.
BTW the metric system sucks for times when you really do want to use fractions
Can you describe a few of these times? I'm being serious... as a novice work worker and DIY home improvement and maintenance guy, I find using mixed fractions very annoying. Yes, you get accustomed to them, but I hardly say that makes it acceptable (hey, people get accustomed to Windows crashing, and find it acceptable to have to reboot or reinstall - I'm not one of them).
Besides, it's not like you can't use fraction in metrics, either - so you say 1/2 cm instead of 5 mm, if it floats your boat.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
What if you have to divide by 5? or 8? How heavy is each patty then?
It's easy to pick the numbers you like. There are always numbers a given multiplier won't divide nicely to.
IMHO, the metric system is doomed in the US because it's not American. That's not meant to be funny, sarcastic, or anything other than a simple fact. Well, perhaps it's meant to be a comment on the American psyche...
You are indeed an excellent troll.
Kudos to you and how you offset your trolling habits with karma whoring.
Examples:
Here
Here
Here
Here
Here
and here
I am actually quiet impressed with how you fool the moderators. Skillfull indeed you are with your time. Quiet funny actually.
BSD is designed. Linux is grown. C++ libs
I was once talking with some of family and I happened to say something like: 'It was 2 meters from me...' Immediately, one of my uncles interjected a joking comment about how I was the 'product' of the 'new' Math. We then proceeded to go off on a tangent about the merits of the two systems and how expensive it would be to switch to metric.
At that point though, I was struck by how his comment was loaded with negative connotation, which obviously did not stem simply from an aversion to the cost of a hypothetical switch to metric. I realized that the source of his distaste for metric was really just the instinctive reaction social animals use to build communities. The 'Us Vs. Them' filter that we all use to clump ourselves into social groups.
From this perspective, a human perspective, it makes complete sense to have differing systems of measurement. There would be obvious advantages if we all spoke the same language, but no one is proposing that we make everyone learn Chinese (quit being ethnocentric!). Even if everyone DID speak Chinese, people would still use their native languages at home, en familia. Why? Because the stratification of languages helps us to identify our social groups. In this way, we're 'The people who use miles', and they're/you're 'The people who use kilometers'. Communities, when you come down to it, are just sets of these bifurcations.
Taking all that into consideration, I've thrown in with the english system curmudgeons. Why? For the same reason I'm in favor of driver's tests in 16 languages. Because being human ain't about being efficient, it's about communities.
The meek shall inherit the earth, in 3 by 6 plots. - Lazerus Long
Yes, but skinnier is easier to read. That's why newspapers are split into columns. It's easier to move to the next line if your eyes don't have to trace back 8 1/2 inches. Although, I don't think A4 is skinny enough to make a difference.
Win a signed Stephen Carpenter ESP Guitar from the Deftones: http://def-tag.com/?r=0008781
As an American physicist, I use SI units for work, but happily use US units for everything else. I don't know why it just pisses off the rest of the world that we like Farenheit, inches, etc. WHO CARES! Why doesn't Europe get ONE FREAKING TYPE OF ELECTRICAL PLUG!
I found it funny that the article predicted the US switching, as I really don't see it happening.
Can anyone tell me why any A4 paper I get in Europe has a purple tinge to it? I find that very annoying.
Both systems work. Both systems, for the most part, do what the users need them to do. There's no good reason to switch from the one you know to the one you don't, unless you're moving to a place where the other system is used.
I swear to Me, I'm getting *really* tired of hearing people who naturally assume that the "other" system is the "wrong" system or somehow non-standard. As long as it works, use what you're most comfortable with and leave it at that.
> Take a meter (100 cm) divide by 3 - you get 33.3333333 repeating. Find that on a ruler.
33.3 cm is precise enough. Metric rulers are divided in cm's which are divided in mm's. There are few applications where greater precision than mm is needed. (And I suspect that metric is used in all those application as well.)
If you're going to brag about a feature, at least brag about the part that is better. With metric paper sizes, the described relationship exists, and the paper sizes all share the same aspect ratio, so you can reduce or enlarge to different paper sizes without having to worry about the margins.
If we wanted consistent numeric dates we could always use the format described in ISO 8601:1988 and write 2004-05-14. It also has the nice property that if you wanted to sort a list of dates in chronological order, you can sort it as a string (at least for the ASCII, ISO-8859-x, and UTF-8 encodings).
A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that works.â"John Gaule
the same irregular number
It's an irrational number, meaning that it cannot be represented by a ratio of two integers. For any rational number r, there exist two integers x and y, such that x/y = r.
But anyway, regardless of the choice of a standard ratio of height to width, there will always be a need for other ratios of height to width. All you have to do is look at photography to see all kinds of weird ratios for film and print sizes (e.g., 4:5, 2:3, 4:3, 1:1, 6:17).
My other first post is car post.
No, it not a fact. Your just America bashing. The idea that Americans don't accept anything that wasn't invented hear is the stupidest thing I've read in long time. There are tons of items and concepts that were not specifically invented here that Americans use every day.
e tric.html
What you think the day the Declaration of Independance was signed there was ban on adopting all ideas and cultural practices from the rest of World? Um Okay.
FYI the metric system is being used in the US. In fact it was legalized as a form of measurement by Congress in 1866. They also passed the the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act in 1988 "which designates the metric system of measurement as the preferred system of weights and measures for United States trade and commerce."
http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/usm
Anyway, nice Troll. You've unsuccessfully tried to paint every single American as acting the same way and believing the same things. Its bad enough when Trolls try to say every Slashdoter thinks the same way. Saying an entire country does it just makes you look like a jackass.
It comes in remarkably useful when you design a poster at A4 size. You can then enlarge it on a photocopier to exactly fit A3 size for larger posters, and also reduce it to exactly fit two A5 (or 4 A6) hand flyers on a sheet of A4 paper: a real-world example that I've used many times.
the lazarus corporation
To all of you who are complaining about sqrt(2) bein g a bad factor because it's irregular and to all you who keep saying that you can put two 8.5x11's together to get 11x17, you're missing the point.
Take a moment to think about it mathematically. Paper has two dimensions, length (L) and width (W). If you take two pieces of paper of size L x W and put them side by side, the new paper's size would be of width L and length 2W. So we have to sizes of paper here: L x W and 2W x L. What would really be nice is if the proportion of the width to the length of both sets was equal, that way you could keep doubling or halfing paper infinitely. So mathematically, you want to solve for W/L = L/2W. If you solve the only solution to that problem is L = sqrt(2) * W. So if you want to half paper or double paper and keep the same proportion, you have no choice but to use sqrt(2). It's not some number somebody pulled out of their ass.
As for the crowd who keeps saying that the English system is better because 12 is divisible by 2, 3, 4, and 6 while 10 is only divisible by 2 and 5, you people need to think a bit more about the numbers too. I think I can divide 12 centimeters into thirds much easier than I can divide 10 inches into thirds. Since you people obviously aren't concerned about the actual specific length involved (given that your only complaint in comparing meters to yards or inches to centimeters is divisibility) and are only concerned about divisibility, you can easily accomodate any divisor in either system merely by choosing a size that is divisible by your divisor. Neither the metric nor the English system accomodates dividing a length into seven portions evenly using a single unit (or the multiplier), but if you use seven or fourteen or twenty-one of a given unit, it works pretty damn well in any system you care to use.
... the same as distilled water (pure H2O)?
I was wondering about that 0C too, thanks to the gp for clarifying.
I would have infinitely greater respect for the Imperial system if all of it did indeed work in twelves, like with feet and inches. But inches are not divided into twelfths but sixteenths. Then there are three feet in a yard, 5.5 yards in a rod, 40 rods in a furlong, 8 furlongs (or a nice round 1760 yards) in a mile. 16 ounces in a pound, 14 pounds in a stone, 2000 pounds in a ton. Don't get me started on liquid measure. And ultimately, you have to measure so closely that you *have* to use decimal places of the smallest unit (like 11.6 inches or whatever) - which means tens all round.
Remind me again what makes it easier to use?
Just go with tens. Tens are simple.
qntm.org
Is you realise it's not as big a deal as the rest of the world makes it out to be. I am totally fluent in the metric system, having taken lots of lab science and being a Canadian citizen and spend lots of time in Canada. I am also totally fluent in the US system, being an American citizen (I'm both) and living in the US my whole life.
Transitioning back and forth is no great feat at all, I just use whatever system those around me are using. When I was a surveyor's assistant, most jobs were in US units, but government jobs were metric. No problem, set the gun (digital theodalite) to metric and go.
What you discover is that, for day to day usage, the units are irrelivant so long as you are farmilar with them. All the fancy inter unit conversions that are what make the metric system really cool, you just don't use. What you need to have is a sense of how much a unit is. To be able to estimate how many feet, or metres, soemthing is away. To have a feel for how fast 60 mph, or kph, looks from a car. To know about how hot or cold 40 degrees F or C is.
In the lab it's different, metric is the only way to go or your calculations will be needlessly complex, but in everyday life it makes no difference at all.
You also find that if you use both systems, different things are more natural to you in one or the other. Air temperature I do better with in Farenheight, liquid and solid in Kelvin cooking however is Farenheight again. Driving I think in mph, but ballistics I think is metres/second.
That's why there's no big care to transition. For 99.99% of the population is just doesn't matter. The US units work just fine, since they aren't dealing with any inter-unit conversion (like the mass of 1000cc of water or something). Those that do, ie scientists, learn the Metric system and can use it proficiently. It's not hard to know, and use, both in your life.
I still find VERY confusing is the way fuel consumption is reported. Gone is the familiar Miles/Gallon where bigger is better only to be replaced by Liters/100Km where smaller is better!
I was born with metric and do not understand Miles/Gallon (well, I do. Just not used to them). But I can relate very well as I was used to km/l (that's kilometres per litre) and still have problems figuring out the l/100km everybody is using now.
However I think there's a stronger reason than cospiracy. After all you are measuring a consumption and what you consume are the litres not the kilometres. So that's what should be at the numerator. Think it this way: how would you expess a cost instead of a consumption? Dollars per 100 miles would make much more sense than miles per dollar. Switch that to metric and consumption and what you get? Litres per 100 kilometres. Makes sense. Even if it doesn't figure.
I was told of the ultimate reason against imperial by and Engineer. Take a 5 year old and ask him/her to add 1mm + 5 + 12 + 25 and he may do it in his head. As an engineer to add 1/2" + 3/8" + 1" and watch him bring out the HPcalc
"For non-UK (and probably Aus and NZ)"...
As an Australian, I take offense to being equated with those in the world who are so self centered that the do not know anything that is outside their own borders (You know who I mean).
In Australia, we have fish and chip shops where you can still go in and buy a "minimum chips"*.
*Minimum chips - a standard measure for the sale of chips that equates to about 10 large fries from McDonands. and costs between $2 - $4 dollars.
BTW. The only difficulty with using the metric system is the transition from the other way. It can be compared to switching from Windows to Linux, may be confusing at first, but it is much easier in the long run. Plus, in Australia, we get to drive a 110
it is only after a long journey that you know the strength of the horse.
The fact that the D/C/B/A1/A2/A3/A4.. standard has that cut-in-half aspect ratio is a good thing, but it has ZERO to do with the fact that it's measuring things in metric, and everything to do with the fact that it's a newer standard invented with machinery in mind. The same efffect could have been had with inches as with centimeters, and if there was some compelling reason to re-do the paper sizes in America, the same thing would probably happen.
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
I was going to post the same thing, but I'll give you a MAJOR advantage of the US sizing system (A,B,C,D,E)...
Every single size sheet can fold down to an 8.5x11 size. This makes it VERY easy to keep a binder full of technical drawings.
Huh? What are you trying to say? That this doesn't work with metric papers? Every sheet from 4A0 will (well, would, given thin enough paper) fold down to miniscule A10 or more practically to A4.
This means that you can place two sheets of A4 side-by-side and they will equal an A3 sheet exactly, and two sheets of A3 will equal an A2."
Turn this backwards and it says: you can fold a sheet of A2 to just A3, and you can fold an A3 to exactly A4.
The same ratio is nice for a few things, but the doubling the length of the long edge is MUCH more convienent for those of us that actually use large paper sizes in everyday life.
Good then, that both systems use doubling of one edge to help folding, eh? Ratio is just extra bonus to help scaling, it doesn't prevent this.
I'm an American, and I use the term "customary units" (using it as a technical term, not whatever units are customary) to refer to inches, feet, pounds, slugs (non-metric unit of mass), etc.
While maintaining the aspect ratio of paper is a nice trick, I hope that elegantness of the solution for division didn't trump ergonomics or convenience. I believe A4 is negligibly different from 8.5" by 11" ("letter" size), so it sounds like it doesn't matter.
By the way, "legal" paper (8.5" by 14") is the size it is so that you can photocopy "letter"-sized paper and then affix signatures and legal stuff at the bottom. Having a standard size that is longer than the commonly used sizes makes sense for these purposes. I'm curious: Is there something equivalent in international standard paper sizes?
The right way to design software is to use all units in metric inside the system, all ratios as 100% = 1.0, not 100.0, etc. Simple principles like these remove a lot of unnecessary bugs. Unfortunately, there are many text books, even recognized books like Large Scale C++, that use imperial units in examples. Using imperial units or even scaled metric units (like cm) is asking for trouble. Stick to m, kg, s, etc. and do the conversions only when needed: in user interface and system interfacing.
-- Imperial units must die --
Pish, tosh. You just have conversion tables where necessary - Australian cookbooks still often have these up the back of the book, a generation after we switched to metric. Older ovens often have the conversion printed on them or people would pin up a converstion table on the fridge. Sure, it's irritating, but if we could handle it, I'm sure you Yanks could too.
The cultural cost. This is the most overlooked, but there are so many books and poems that are an important part of our culture that would be less accessible if people weren't familiar with the units. To give a small example, I don't ever use leagues, so this was the first time that I realized that the 20000 Leagues in Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea is nearly ten times the diamter of the Earth! To some extent conversions can be done, but losing personal familiarity with older units does cost some understanding of the text for most readers.
That's a fair point (I didn't realise that about 20,000 Leagues under the Sea! Well, I'm sure I must have checked in my geeky childhood but have forgotten. I guess then it refers to the length of the submarine voyage around the world, rather than the depth under the sea, as I had always assumed.) But even so lots of people here still know what a mile is, what a foot is and so on. I still express my height in feet and inches, not cm, because it's familiar and customary. But we use metric for all the important stuff :) What I'm saying is that even a fully metric system does not preclude the use of some customary units on an informal basis.
The real Captain Avatar is a fictional character, so I suppose he doesn't mind if I impersonate him.