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Re: Measurements: Fraction, Decimals, or Both

Subject: Re: Measurements: Fraction, Decimals, or Both
From: "Peter Neilson" <neilson -at- windstream -dot- net>
To: tech2wr-l <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>, "wondersofone -at- gmail -dot- com" <wondersofone -at- gmail -dot- com>
Date: Fri, 07 Oct 2016 07:24:24 -0400

Unless you are writing strictly for an audience who expect nothing but SI units (metric system) you must find a way to represent fractions properly. It seems that you have gotten boxed into an inadequate system for authoring and presentation. With more information about your situation we might be able to give you some better help. Why can't you format fractions correctly?

One standard way to prepare scientific papers or anything else requiring unusual typography is to use Tex or LaTex. Some people find that emacs's "Org Mode" front end to LaTex is helpful.

On Fri, 07 Oct 2016 04:01:05 -0400, wondersofone -at- gmail -dot- com <wondersofone -at- gmail -dot- com> wrote:

I can't make a decision. This is the first time I'm working heavily with
measurements. I'm writing home-product descriptions for nontechnical
customers. The descriptions will include measurements that I get from
multiple manufacturers. Each manufacturer writes it either in fractions or
decimals. My options are to just reflect how they write it or to pick one
method and do conversions to adhere to that one method I choose (convert
the fraction to decimal or vice versa). Pricision is not an issue.

Though, I am leaning towards using only decimals since I can't use
superscripting and subscripting to format fractions. So I could get
measurements like 5 1/4' x 11 3/4' x 1 1/8' that might annoy customers
because the numbers could seem to run into each other making it more
difficult to read.

I've also considered using hyphens between the mixed numbers, but am not
sure if that might cause other confusion when reading. E.g., 5-1/4' x
11-3/4' x 1-1/8'.

These types of measurements could appear in bulleted lists or in
narratives.

Anyone have an opinion one way or another? Or know of any "industry"
standards, unspoken rules, or no-nos about converting someone's
measurements?
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References:
Measurements: Fraction, Decimals, or Both: From: wondersofone -at- gmail -dot- com

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