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Subject:Re: Use of K (thousand) and M (million) From:Matt Hicks <matt -at- UNIDATA -dot- UCAR -dot- EDU> Date:Wed, 7 Dec 1994 10:10:47 -0700
On Tue, 6 Dec 1994, Montgomery, Kevin wrote:
> I frequently edit documents in which analysts list quantities and
> ranges of quantities using K to indicate thousands, e.g., 70K to mean
> 70,000. I am comfortable with that usage in these particular documents
> because it avoids long strings of zeros or the inappropriate formality
> of spelling out the numbers.
Shouldn't that be "k"? When I see "70K", I immediately think "degrees
Kelvin". I suppose if there was no mention of temperature in the document
that I would get the meaning from context, but without context it's
temperature. My American Heritage Dictionary lists six meanings for "K",
none of them "thousand". The second meaning of "k" is "kilo-". There is
no definition of either "M" or "M." that comes close to "million".
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