Re: Standards wrt paper and standards

[Arlen -dot- P -dot- Walker -at- jci -dot- com]

>``I was more concerned when I spotted that ghostscript rounds the A4
default
>paper size to the nearest 1/10 inch (resulting in odd paper dimensions
being
>displayed by acroread), Acroread for Unix having completely broken scaling
>A4 support for the first four versions (I filed half a dozen bug reports
on
>A4 handling alone so far), and so on and so on.''

Hmmm. So instead of 210mm x 297mm it's 210.8mm x 297.1mm, is that it? Or
did he round down to 208.3mm x 294.6mm? Your problem with getting this
fixed is that the A4 spec comes with 2mm tolerances, so the first is
completely within spec. Even some of the nation-specific tighter tolerances
will pass the first spec (DIN476, for example, gives 1.5mm tolerances). If
it's within tolerances, you'll have trouble getting someone's attention to
fix it.

>Why is that?

Social intertia. It's taught in schools, but since it's not used in the
"real world" (AKA what the students see around them) it's not reinforced,
and there's a marked resistance to the cost involved in switching over by
the taxpayers, who really don't see what it would gain them, hence it never
shows up in the "real world." Catch-22.

>And standardising would make sense in the long run, since you would
>understand how it works across the entire earth.  [Yes, I am a dreamer by
>heart. :)]

Speaking for the other POV, "Why should *I* care how they measure distance
in France or the Netherlands? I'm not going there any time soon." It's hard
to argue with them on that score. If you can figure a way to make it cost
them visible money to remain on their current system, you'll get their
attention. Until then, it won't matter. That's why industry here has
adapted to both systems, and many use the metric dimensions internally.

>Interesting, especially given the number of global
companies/multinationals.
>Standardising on this sort of thing would only make sense, at least to me.

Speaking from (but decidedly not for) one of those global companies, it
hasn't impacted much of anything. We work in whatever format we need for
the job at hand. Most design is done in metric units (a couple of diehards
still use inches, but the drawings are all in metric) but office
documentation is done in 8.5x11, simply because we can't get A4 for even
close to the same price. Give us a steady supply of A4 paper for less than
"standard" paper, and I bet we'd switch by the end of the month.

Have fun,
Arlen
Chief Managing Director In Charge, Department of Redundancy Department
DNRC 224

Arlen -dot- P -dot- Walker -at- JCI -dot- Com
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Opinions expressed are mine and mine alone.
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