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List:       kde-devel
Subject:    Re: How to configure konqueror to show KB and MB instead of KiB and
From:       Gary Greene <greeneg () tolharadys ! net>
Date:       2009-07-01 7:38:59
Message-ID: 200907010039.09722.greeneg () tolharadys ! net
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On Tuesday 30 June 2009 10:53:39 pm Michael Pyne wrote:
> On Wednesday 01 July 2009 01:38:02 Sven Burmeister wrote:
> > Am Mittwoch, 1. Juli 2009 00:42:28 schrieb Michael Pyne:
> > > It's not fuzzy.  Everyone knew what MB, KB, etc. meant with regards to
> > > computers, otherwise they wouldn't have been the units used for
> > > decades.
> >
> > Everyone? I claim that most computer users on this planet only have a
> > very vague/abstract knowledge of what a byte or kilobyte is. The
> > conclusion that just because something has been used for a long time
> > means that it is understood is very brave in my opinion.
>
> And if they don't have more than a vague knowledge of what a kilobyte is,
> what does it matter (and more importantly, gain) what a kibibyte is?  Who
> else uses kibibyte?  Nobody!
>
> I would certainly feel confident in assuming that a unit which has just
> been devised a few years ago and is not in any kind of large usage would be
> far less understood than the binary units we had preceding it.  Which begs
> the question again, why are we the ones switching?  From what I can tell
> GNOME doesn't, and various GNOME apps which do are patched in Debian not to
> for consistency.  We at least are consistently right or wrong from what I
> can tell.
>
> But please don't try to convince me that *kibibytes* are the term that is
> understood by more people.  All that it does is make some persons feel like
> some kind of weight has been lifted off their shoulders, like the metric
> police were about to break down their door because they've been "mis-using"
> kilo, mega, etc. for decades.  It doesn't actually clear up any confusion,
> instead it creates more.
>
> Regards,
>  - Michael Pyne

Besides which, (and yes, I know the example I'm going to use isn't indicative 
of what is right, but it _is_ the dominant majority....) Windows, including 
Windows 7 uses KB, MB, GB, TB. They've not changed over, which means that you 
WILL be confusing end users regarding this. Sure, the ones that know about 
KiB, etc. will be fine with them, but the end user that doesn't know about 
the marketing nuts that caused this mess won't know what KiB is, which is the 
point that Michael is trying to make here.

Personally, I like his patch, since it gives users/vendors/etc the option, and 
is fairly unobtrusive (it's a hidden option for crying out loud....). If a 
distribution likes KB or KiB this gives them the option of changing this 
without having to deviate from upstreams source to make this change.

-- 
Gary L. Greene, Jr.
Sent from: peorth.tolharadys.net
 00:32:16 up 57 days, 16:58,  4 users,  load average: 0.67, 0.74, 0.67
==========================================================================
Developer and Project Lead for the AltimatOS open source project
Volunteer Developer for the KDE open source project
See http://www.altimatos.com/ and http://www.kde.org/ for more information
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