User talk:Bobblewik/units of length

Hi Bobblewik, Yes, Miles do mean statute miles and not nautical miles for space shuttle distances traveled. However orbital altitudes are given in nautical miles. And thanks for the help on shuttle missions, if you want to add new missions, please use the template that can be found here. Theon 15:36, Mar 13, 2004 (UTC)

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Of course, this begs the question (especially considering recent snafus) why they are still using miles at all?

WhiteDragon 04:53, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

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Thanks. Bobblewik

NASA gives distances in miles and nautical miles, at least in the official mission summaries. Click on the external link in any shuttle mission to see where im getting my info from (its public domain). (also you can sign your name using three tildes (~) or sign with date using four tildes) Theon 16:19, Mar 13, 2004 (UTC)

While updating all the ship articles to the new table code would be good, I think it'd be best to coordinate this through Wikipedia:WikiProject Ships first, since they have a defined standard for them. I've therefore reverted your table changes to the 3 or so ship articles, not because I think it's a bad idea in general, but because such a wide-ranging change should have consensus before we do it. —Morven 06:25, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Discuss it on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ships —Morven 19:01, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Same happened with some Album articles where you changed "sec" to "s". Discuss it on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums --KeyStorm 17:53, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)

mm versus cm

Hi Bobblewick, thanks for the notes; can see your points, tho' in botanical & zoological books, cm are very commonly used (the mm / m / km convention is much more an engineering use), and so are hyphens for ranges; I'd prefer to keep these for plants & animals (what I'm mostly working on) as they're in such wide use; saying e.g. a leaf is 300-450 mm long (rather than 30-45 cm) is harder to visualise for most people. I'll take your suggestion up on putting spaces in (when I remember!!), that seems sensible on reflection. Excellent work on metrication, I've done a few too and approve 100% :-) - MPF 23:32, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)

units of length railways

A quick note about the use of measurements in chains in some British railway articles (see the Minimum Radius specification in e.g. British Rail Class 01. Chains are an obscure unit, but traditional in British railway engineering. I decided to leave Imperial measurements in chains for such as are originally quoted in them, because this is British Rail / industry practice. This refers mostly to curve radii. I provided an equivalent in metres, but not one in a more familiar Imperial unit. —Morven 16:53, Sep 17, 2004 (UTC)

OK. As you know, I do tinker with imperial units. But now you have told me about it, I will leave the imperial units in whatever form you like, certainly for railways (and cricket!). A priority for me is metric units, and a secondary priority is non-metric units. Although British railway engineering is metric in other respects, I was aware that the chain is still used for location referencing. I have seen the issue of chains discussed on usenet, and have spoken with track workers about it whilst they are at work. Thanks for mentioning it. Bobblewik  (talk) 17:30, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for cleaning up the units at dual gauge. Man it'd be easier if all countries would use metric. Mind you, I doubt anyone tops Ireland's use of Metric distances (on road signs since the 70s, old ones in miles aren't necessarily removed, and may be Imperial miles, Old Irish miles or Old English miles) :o) but use of MPH speed limits (nothing to tell you that on them). We're changing to km/h sometime soon (announcement of the date will happen in Sept.) - that should be fun :o) zoney ███ talk 15:53, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You are very welcome. Feel free to help out, I normally use the excellent google converter. Yes it will be interesting to see what happens when Ireland changes speed limits. Some people in other countries are bound to comment on the success of the transition.

Bobblewik 16:32, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

units of length in roads

I missed your note (bcz you left it on User:Jerzy, instead of User talk:Jerzy where it belongs) for about a month. Did you look for a Wikipedia:Wikiproject for guidance? If there is one, you would propose a change there. If there is not, i would argue that a change such as you have in mind should not be launched without "retrofitting" a Wikipedia:Wikiproject first.

IMO, SI is so little used here that statute miles must be primary, but i would support a change of heading to make more sense of including both miles and km. (in that order). --Jerzy(t) 15:56, 2004 May 20 (UTC)

units of length in mountains

You rounded my exact conversions in the peak bagging article. Please see Talk:peak bagging for an explanation of why the conversions are exact. Gdr 18:15, 2004 Jul 7 (UTC)

Thanks for reverting my edit of the precision in Peak Bagging. I made the change because I thought it was excessive precision. The list maintainer's (Scottish Mountaineering Club) website at http://www.smc.org.uk/hkeyfac.htm, indicates that 0.1 m precision is correct. Thanks for putting it back.
Bobblewik 18:25, 7 Jul 2004 (UTC)

You're welcome. I guess the point is that the 3,000 feet criterion for Munros isn't a measurement and so doesn't have a precision as such. Gdr 18:29, 2004 Jul 7 (UTC)

units of length (yard) in American football

A minor point about the units conversion project: In American football, yards aren't really a measurement, but a game parameter and a component of many statistical records. To my eye it looks kind of strange to read that Franco Harris "caught 307 passes for 2,287 yards (2091 m)". By comparison, I have no problem with "Harris is 6 ft 2 in (1.88 m) tall and weighs 225 lb (102 kg)." I don't know if it's worth your while to try to exclude yardage in the game sense from your conversions. JamesMLane 20:31, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out. I assumed that 'yardage' is merely a distance equal to the sum of other distances. I will try to obtain a better idea of what 'yardage' represents. As you suggest, I will try to exclude 'yardage in the American football sense' for the time being. Thanks for your feedback. Bobblewik  (talk) 17:07, 18 Oct 2004 (UTC)

This isn't a straightforward question, because your assumption is largely correct -- "yardage" is a distance. It's not a completely invented idea (as when a tennis player is leading, 40-15 -- forty what?). A player who's run for 983 yards, according to the statistics, has actually advanced the ball by something fairly close to 983 yards, and fairly close to 899 meters. It's possible, however, that the actual distance was less than that covered by a player who's credited with only 981 yards.

The sensible and valuable purpose of your conversions is to make the articles intelligible to a reader who has a good idea of only one of the two systems. A metrics-only reader might happen to see a reference to an American football player named Franco Harris and want to know something more about him, and be glad to learn (without doing any math) that Harris was 1.88 m tall. But if the reader knows nothing about American football, I don't know what he or she would make of the statement that Harris's receptions totaled 2,287 yards. How hard is that to achieve? How much impact would it have on the game? How does it compare with other players' totals? What difference does it make that Harris was a back, not a wide receiver? Being told that it's "2091 m" doesn't really help this reader. For practical purposes, it's still a meaningless statistic unless you know at least a little about the sport -- and if you know that much, then you understand yardage without the metric conversion. (A metrics-using NFL fan wouldn't need to know anything else about Imperial, e.g., wouldn't even need to know that a yard is three feet.) Briefly, the team with possession of the ball has four tries (called "downs") to advance it a total of ten yards, or relinquish possession. That's why many NFL statistics are stated in yards, as are game situations ("3rd and 4" meaning this is the third of the four downs and the offensive team still needs 4 yards, having gained only 6 on the first two downs).

Well, by now I've probably told you more than you wanted to know. I don't have a clear picture about what non-Americans would find helpful in an article about American football. All I can give you is my individual perspective: "Harris is 6 ft 2 in (1.88 m) tall" looks unusual (because I'm used to seeing everything in Imperial units only) but not jarring; "Harris caught 307 passes for 2,287 yards (2091 m)" looks really weird and distracting. JamesMLane 16:53, 21 Oct 2004 (UTC)

You have explained it very well. I did not know how American football worked. The concept of 4 attempts to get 10 yards is interesting, with terminology like '3rd and 4'. Thanks.

units of length in weapon ratings

Re: your edit on the Northrop YB-49 page. Note that .50 is an ammunition calibre and there is not always a 1:1 correspondence between metric and imperial calibres. For example, the 7.62 mm NATO round is not equivalent to a .30 round - it's a .308, and guns designed for the 7.62 can fire a .30 round only if specifically modified to do so. Similarly, the 5.6 mm NATO is a .223 round.

The problems arise because different weapon and ammunition manufacturers are measuring different things when they specify calibre. If we were to try standardising, we would have to decide on an independent, arbitrary standard. IMHO, best practice is not "translating" calibres.

Note too that imperial calibres are most conventionally specified as .50, not 0.50 in (which might be the same as the weapon's bore, but also might not be - in the case of the M2 or M2-derived guns on the YB-49, it just happens to be true although this isn't a given).

Artillery and naval guns are a whole other ball game though, and are conventionally specified as bore diameters. I'm not sure that I would convert those either, though. Note that the US Army specifies its howitzers as 105 mm and 155 mm, not 4.13 in and 6.10 in.

I think these issues are broader than WikiProject Aircraft, and should probably be thrashed out in conjunction with WikiProject Weapons before deciding on a convention for this on Wikipedia... --Rlandmann 00:07, 1 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Units of length in ellipsometry

Hi, I'm sorry by I dont agree with your statement about ellipsometry. The fact that the technique and modern equipment is capable of determining differences of the order of amstrongs is NOT the same as nanometers (ten times less accurate).

Please if you have doubts about the technique or the physics involved ask away. Askewmind 16:17, Feb 19, 2005 (UTC)

I know that a nanometre is 10 times different. I did not simply convert the value, I did a web search and some sites quote nanometre precision. There is also a reference to nanometre thickness on the same page. Perhaps I should have put the precision change in the comment field, I can see why you thought it was merely an incorrect conversion. Thanks for noticing and mentioning it. Bobblewik  (talk) 17:53, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Units of length for human height

Could you please stop converting proper cm person heights to m? —Lakes 11:58, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback. Which ones do you mean? Bobblewik  (talk) 15:17, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

You edited Bryan Danielson and converted his metric height from 178 cm to 1.78 m. Person height is never measured in meters, always in centimeters.

—Lakes 20:19, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

The assertion 'height is never measured in metres' is not true. And I am unable to understand the meaning of 'proper' in the phrase 'proper cm person heights'. I can't tell you the frequency of the various formats but 'cm' is not 100% and 'm' is not 0%.

However, if you look at my edit of Bryan Danielson you will see that I corrected the typo '10 tin' to '10 in'. That was my main motivation. The edit of cm to m was incidental because I replaced the whole line. My default happens to be 'm'. I don't mind if you have a different default. If you want to replace 'm' with 'cm', that is fine by me.

There are lots of articles that have no metric values at all. So there is plenty for us both to do. I appreciate that you care about this issue. Add metric units in whatever format you prefer, Wikipedia will be better off as a result. Thanks for raising this with me and keep up the good work. Bobblewik  (talk) 01:12, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

No. When measuring people height cm is 100% and m is 0%. Any time you put a person's height in meters it's an error. Can you explain why and how you chose the default of meters for person heights? The only places I've found that meter is used for person height is where the height was converted using a calculator by a person who grew up not using the SI system. For example in Europe (with the exception of Great Britain of course, who use the imperial system) person height is measured in cm. Same with Japan. So please when you add SI heights when related to people please use cm.

You seem to be using somewhat of an automated system since you edited Masanori Murakawa and added the height incorrectly and did nothing for weight?

—Lakes 08:24, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

I don't know why you think cm is 100% and m is 0%. What % for each format did you see on the web?

I am not using an automated system. I do everything manually. Bobblewik  (talk) 09:10, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

I see you mentioned earlier that you're from GB. It's great that you've taken interest in the metric system, but this is certainly a subject where you're wrong. I learned to use cm for person height in school, as did everyone else in Europe (except for GB) and Japan. cm is used in every country that uses metric units.

Once again. How did you decide on meters for person height? I would still like to hear the answer. Now don't take this personally; I have nothing against you. It's just that I really think it would be better if you wrote it correctly from the beginning and other people wouldn't have to correct you.

—Lakes 09:26, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

To add to my point. I have life my whole life in a country that uses metric units (22 years). I have browsed the internet over ten years, encountering pages written by people from various cultures that use the metric system. The first time I ever encountered a person's height being measured in meters was one of your edits.

—Lakes 09:45, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

I did not choose between cm and m. I just started using m. Perhaps it was because I see it around me. I know that the UK is a newcomer to metric units and may be different to everybody else. I really had not thought about it till you asked me. I don't take the debate personally at all, I am always willing to be challenged and change if I am wrong. It is interesting. I am prepared to stop using m for height if it is never used.

Perhaps you have not had a chance to look on the web. To inform our debate, here are some statistics:

• www.google.co.uk ('pages from the UK' option) 23 200 results for "178 cm" and 9 620 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.fr ('Pages francophones' option) 11 200 results for "178 cm" and 5 320 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.de ('Seiten auf Deutsch' option) 120 000 results for "178 cm" and 6 240 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.it ('pagine in Italiano' option) 7 330 results for "178 cm" and 4 430 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.dk ('sider på dansk' option) 792 results for "178 cm" and 677 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.es ('páginas de España' option) 879 results for "178 cm" and 701 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.co.za ('pages from South Africa' option) 71 results for "178 cm" and 1 120 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.com.au ('pages from Australia' option) 523 results for "178 cm" and 795 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.com.nz ('pages from New Zealand' option) 199 results for "178 cm" and 765 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.ru ('Искать в русском' option) 1 680 results for "178 cm" and 1 210 for "1.78 m".
• www.google.com.br ('páginas do Brasil' option) 434 results for "178 cm" and 725 for "1.78 m".

Those results are not all human height. But some are. We could get more sophisticated in our search. But to disprove the 'never' claim, there are plenty of examples visible in the results. Here is one: http://www.el-mundo.es/eurocopa/2004/html/jugadores/espana/etxeberria.html

Bobblewik  (talk) 10:19, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

Interesting. We can't really take into account those google results since there's, like you said, lots are of non-human height measurements. Anyway I'll take back the 'never' claim since you produced an example. However, cm is generally used for person height, and is the tradition. I don't know where the usage originally came from, but I'd assume it's because saying a child is 0.65m long would be ankward.

I think the reason why you see it in the UK more is because you're switching away from the imperial system. At least in my opinion 1.78 m looks more imperial than 178 cm.

—Lakes 10:45, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

The proportions vary by region. That might explain our differing impressions. We could treat the UK as an exception. Would we extend the exception to former British colonies? It may be that cm is the most common (i.e. >50%) outside former British colonies. So that is a good starting point for you to question my default format. But I am not sure that discounting the experiences of UK and/or former British empire readers on the English language Wikipedia is reasonable. And look at Spain, Brazil, Argentina. Bobblewik  (talk) 11:58, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

I also can give you much more than one example. See for example the several I listed, specific to Canada, when a claim that it is always centimetres in Canada was made on [User talk:Gene Nygaard#cm for height of people|my talk page].

There are several other factors that come into play,

• The prefixes which are not powers of 1000 are more and more falling out of favor
• For your child example, some switch from centimeters to meters when the height goes over 100 cm.
• This is more pronounced in places fairly recently changing to metric; they have less excess baggage to carry around. For example, deciliters/decilitres and centiliters/centilitres are almost totally unknown in Canada or the United States, and are becoming less used in Europe where they used to be common.

It is height in meters which is used in the Body Mass Index formula.

Both centimeters and meters are very often used for this purpose. It is a silly thing to start revert wars over. Both of you should adopt a rule of leaving these as you find them, and for any additions you make keeping it consistent with any previous usage in the article. Gene Nygaard 12:15, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

In Finland deciliters is very commonly used, usually with cooking. Centiliters is pretty much gone. Milliliters is also commonly used, mostly with medicine though. Anyway, I'll probably convert person heights to cm when I encounter them, at least with articles about people that are Japanese or continental Europeans.

—Lakes 14:04, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

I don't mind if you convert those that you encounter. I have learned from what you have told me. I am mainly interested in metrication of articles and not so worried about whether the format is cm or m. I still think I have a marginal preference for m rather than cm. But here is a suggestion that I hope will suit us both:

If you metricate heights, I will not need to do them. I can concentrate on weights. We will then both be adding something meaningful for metric readers that did not previously exist. The articles that you metricate will, of course, have cm format. The way I was working was as follows:

• Do a search for articles containing 'height' and '6-1'. That particular Google search seems the best way of finding them.
• Open each one into edit mode in a Firefox browser tab.
• Paste the text '6 ft 1 in (185 cm)' into each one.
• Save and close each one.
• Start another search with '6-2'.

It only took me about 11 minutes to do all 47 articles with the search key '5-9'. You can now see why the edits only did one value. It also had the advantage of standardising the various non-metric formats into one. Tackling individual heights seemed the most productive method. You may not want to do this work but if you do, that would be most welcome. Regards. Bobblewik  (talk) 15:57, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

I'm not that interested on working on random articles. I'll probably do work on articles I otherwise work on or have interest in. But please continue your work, it is important.

—Lakes 16:18, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

I understand. This sort of task is more my thing. Thanks for an interesting discussion. I am now more aware and less certain than I was. That is a good thing. Thanks the positive thoughts. I wish you well on your work too. Bobblewik  (talk) 16:29, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

Units of length in cricket

Hi, Bobblewik. You recently changed "four inches (10 centimetres)" to "4 inches (100mm)" on The Ashes. I think it is a little unnecessary to always use SI units in preference to their commonplace equivilents outside science articles. Apart from anything, it is unusual for the measurement to be that accurate anyway. In addition, is there a reason that you changed four to 4? Cheers, smoddy 15:48, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I usually put units in parentheses entirely in symbol form. This partly keeps it compact, makes the job of translators easier and simplifies the text for those not familiar with English. Thus '(ten centimetres)' -> '(10 cm)'. That was why I chose to edit the article. Whilst I was there, I chose to change it from cm to mm and I also changed 'four' -> '4'. That edit is not a big deal for me. Feel free to put it the way you think is best. Thanks for mentioning it. Bobblewik  (talk) 16:22, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Cheers for the explanation – you seem to be doing a great job with units! smoddy 16:26, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Ambiguous unit of length 'mile' in air/sea articles

Douglas DWC I noticed your comment "nautical or statute?". All the sources I could find quote an unqualified "27,553 miles". I was assuming that if they meant nautical miles, someone was bound to mention it. Also, 44,342 km is sufficient to travel around the globe, 51,000 km (with nautical miles) would border on excessive. So I'm fairly confident the number is correct. ... I am more concerned that the related Douglas DT article talks only about the DT-1. I seem to remember I even saw a DT-2 mentioned somewhere, but I forgot on which page. Rl 20:39, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your response. It would be nice if we could assume the version of mile intended in aviation references. Unfortunately, we can't. Unfortunately, there are examples of both in source text, particularly for old references. If you suspect it is nautical, then perhaps you can add a comment to that effect for other editors, or in the talk page of the article.

I previously raised this ambiguity in air/sea articles in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Aircraft. Feel free to join in the discussion there. For conversions, I have taken an arbitrary decision to default to statute unless specifically stated. Bobblewik  (talk) 20:51, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

Sorry if I was unclear. I fully agree with your defaulting to statute. Rl 21:34, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

SI units rollup into one article

I don't think this was discussed widely enough. I've reverted your edit on kilometre. Please discuss more widely, perhaps a proper vote. Im not sure the changes are for the better. - SimonLyall 21:28, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

angstroms

Hi Bobblewik, I reverted your last edit to Cucurbituril let me explain why: the references itself makes use of angstroms and I want Wiki to be able to to help readers to understand that article when they access it. Now you have the scientific article mentioning angstroms but the Wiki page does not help the reader.

I also note that you remove picometer links and replace them with meter links. I stongly oppose this: one of the nice things you van do with wiki is to see on the meter page what processes or objects are on the picometer level and what lets say on the micrometer level or kilometer level, with your actions you destroy this useful information.

(comment added: 15:02, 15 October 2005 V8rik)

OK. Thanks for mentioning this here. Bobblewik 15:16, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

National varieties of English

Advice: English dialects on Wikipedia: Wikipedia has millions of readers; some use American English, or British English, or International English, or any of numerous other local forms from Australian English to Canadian English. Because of this, Wikipedia has a policy of respecting articles written in whatever form of English the original author of the article used.

The guidelines are simple. For subjects exclusively related to Britain (for example, a famous British person), use British English. For something related to the United States in the same way, use American English. If it is an international topic, use whatever form of English the original author used.

In view of that, please don't change articles from one version of English to the other, even if you don't normally use the version the article is written in. Respect other people's versions of English. They in turn should respect yours. Other general guidelines on how Wikipedia articles are written can be found in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style. If you have any queries about all this, just ask anyone on Wikipedia and they will help you. Enjoy your time on the internet's fastest growing encyclopædia (or encyclopedia, if you write it that way!). Thank you.

This notice is in regard to this edit. This article is written in American English, and you inappropriately converted units to the European form. If you're going to bulk convert "microns" to the SI form, pay attention to which national variety of English is being used in the article.--Srleffler 22:53, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

You are quite right. I should have paid attention to that issue. Thank you for identifying and correcting it for me. bobblewik 14:01, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Frankly I'd rather have "micrometre" than "micron", even though "micrometer" would be more proper American English. Micron is just an old outdated measurement that doesn't have proper SI prefixes in the name. Micrometer is vastly preferable. --Cyde Weys 18:19, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Strange, whom in the US actually use micron these days? David D. (Talk) 18:24, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

One I use is wool grading which is in microns - and that usage is not restricted to the U.S. [1] Rmhermen 18:39, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

I use micron a lot (in biology) when talking about distances/areas within cells. It's much easier to say micron than micrometre. Then of course, that's in talking not in writing. :) Talrias (t | e | c) 18:57, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

I agree, i have heard it being used to describe the size of organelles. But I have never seen it written in recent texts or papers (wrt biology). David D. (Talk) 19:10, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Seconded. I remember seeing microns in old biology textbooks and slides, but nothing recent. When I actually worked in a laboratory (and this was about five years ago), everything was done in strict SI. No "microns" were anywhere to be seen. --Cyde Weys 19:17, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Microns are still commonly used in optics, particularly for describing wavelengths. It's just a shorthand: "micron" is quicker to say and to write than "micrometers". Especially for people working on infrared optics, that small convenience is worthwhile. When mechanical engineering is done in metric units, one hears "micron" a lot more often than "micrometer", particularly for describing machining tolerances.

In general, I applaud Bobblewik's project to metricate Wikipedia. I'm less comfortable with conversion of convenient metric units to pure SI units (e.g. mass-converting cm to mm or km), and with elimination of non-SI standard names for metric units, like microns and angstroms. I don't see such metric but non-SI units as a problem.--Srleffler 16:48, 21 April 2006 (UTC)