Talk:Metric prefix

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Metric prefix article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: Index, 1, 2: 12 months

This article is written in British English, which has its own spelling conventions (colour, travelled, centre, defence, artefact, analyse) and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus.

A news item involving Metric prefix was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the In the news section on 24 November 2022.

Wikipedia

Engineering

	Engineering portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Engineering, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of engineering on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.EngineeringWikipedia:WikiProject EngineeringTemplate:WikiProject EngineeringEngineering
???	This article has not yet received a rating on the project's importance scale.

Measurement (defunct)

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Measurement, a project which is currently considered to be defunct.MeasurementWikipedia:WikiProject MeasurementTemplate:WikiProject MeasurementMeasurement

Science

	Science portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Science, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Science on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ScienceWikipedia:WikiProject ScienceTemplate:WikiProject Sciencescience
???	This article has not yet received a rating on the project's importance scale.

This article is based on material taken from prefix at the Free On-line Dictionary of Computing prior to 1 November 2008 and incorporated under the "relicensing" terms of the GFDL, version 1.3 or later.

FOLDOC WP:PLAGIARISM checked ~Kvng (talk) 18:17, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Footnote on table at § List of SI prefixes

I noticed that the footnote at the end of the table says that the reference is the first reference, but in the article, it's the third. (Am QuickQuokka on a public computer; see my talk page) --46.10.223.203 (talk) 17:44, 12 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Abbreviation for "micro-"

I see "mc" being used in place of "μ" very commonly.

Can I use this? -sqrt(e^i pi): beep boop 07:50, 28 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Not on Wikipedia, except to explain where it is used. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 09:31, 28 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

That is exactly what I meant. I will change the page then, to include this. -sqrt(e^i pi): beep boop 14:31, 30 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Jc3s5h: @-sqrt(e^i pi): It's not out of ignorance, nor because of limitations of the keyboard (these are real, but circumvented in other ways). Instead, I believe 'mcg' is widely used by medics when prescribing drugs in tiny doses, because they fear 'μg' can result in an overdose if mis-read as 'mg'. I think this is worth mentioning if we can find a reference to back it up. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 16:04, 30 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Here's one example that Google found straight away. I'm sure you can find more. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 16:07, 30 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I consider this to be typical US government behavior. One agency, the FDA, just defies the law and NIST (which is part of the Commerce Department) by unilaterally proposing a change to SI rather than working with NIST or lawmakers to fix the problem. This is much the same as when law makers, President H. W. Bush, and NIST required the federal government to go metric as much as possible, and most federal agencies just ignored it. See Metrification in the United States.

An issue as far as what we should write is, what is the reliability of any article we find, and how much influence does it have in the field the article is addressed to? Is it just one researcher writing an article that sits on a shelf, or is the article actually affecting what practitioners do? I wouldn't automatically give weight to an article just because it was published by a government agency. Jc3s5h (talk) 16:29, 30 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

This Scholar search found 23,800 hits. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 16:35, 30 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

If it there is an accepted exception to the SI style guide rule in common use in some situations, then surely that needs covering in the article, regardless of the reason for using it (ignorance, arrogance, safety concerns, typographical considerations, clarity, or whatever). -- DeFacto (talk). 17:16, 30 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The abbreviation "mcg" is in some situations an alternative for μg, but "mc" cannot be used in combination with other units. So "mc" is not a prefix, it has no place in this general article. The abbreviation "mcg" is mentioned specifically in the microgram article, that's enough. Ceinturion (talk) 23:22, 30 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

That's a good point. I hadn't thought of it that way, but I find myself agreeing with Ceinturion (talk · contribs). Dondervogel 2 (talk) 07:38, 31 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

It can be mentioned as being used as an alternative to μ in some situations - that is a prefix. -- DeFacto (talk). 07:40, 31 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I think the point is that mcg is an abbreviation of microgram. To claim that mc is a prefix would require a source stating that. Do you have one? Dondervogel 2 (talk) 08:52, 31 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

If we were going to add something to the article, it would be nice to find a good source that indicates whether this only occurs in the US, or if it is done in many countries. Jc3s5h (talk) 10:11, 31 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like it might be used by the UK NHS. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 10:31, 31 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Someone unfortunately added mcg to the article today. An additional problem is he did it in such a way that he claims without a source that the reason for using mcg was that typewriters are lacking a "µ" key. However, sources [1] state that the reason was that in handwriting, the symbol “µ” can look like an “m.” Ceinturion (talk) 12:37, 31 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Indian currencies

Should definitely add the Indian use of lakh (100,000) and crore (see Indian numbering system 2A00:23C8:B903:2601:ED15:A9EE:FA49:31F0 (talk) 07:22, 6 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I added Lakh to 'See also'. Not sure more is merited. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 09:48, 6 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I'd say that is all that's merited. Stevebroshar (talk) 13:28, 26 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ambiguous raising-to-a-power

I think this is either perfectly ambiguous and/or wrong: "1 km² denotes 1 km × 1 km = 10⁶ m², not 10³ m²"; I think it should be written more like "3 km² denotes 3 (km × km) = 3 × 10⁶ m², not 3 × 10³ m²" (and also not 9 of anything). An an example of "1×1" is ambiguous, and if you change the 1 to something else, say 3, I think you'll agree that it is erroneous to claim that 3 km² should be equal to 3 km × 3 km which would be 9×10⁶ m². I would request that someone more expert or confident than me update this example to at least be less ambiguous if not more correct. We are simply trying to convey that "prefixing" binds more tightly than exponentiation (which of course binds more tightly than multiplication). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.135.146.241 (talk) 19:16, 16 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Say hello to the four new metric prefixes

As of December 2024, brunta, bramto, agana, and azeko have became the official prefixes of the metric prefix. They will soon be adopted by BIPM soon. Please be patient, because this might take a while to be adopted. 2604:3D09:6B7B:C000:6864:2D29:37B6:572F (talk) 02:43, 10 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Verdo?

I saw in the table the prefix "verdo" as 10^33, however it lists a source that does not mention it: https://www.bipm.org/en/cgpm-2022/resolution-3

Is it legitimate or not? Codegrinder (talk) 20:19, 27 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It was removed as vandalism: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template%3ASI_prefixes_%28infobox%29&diff=1265622484&oldid=1265599102&variant=en Codegrinder (talk) 21:22, 27 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]