It was fifty years ago today (well, yesterday)

Feb 16, 2021 Last reply: 5 years ago 106 Replies

yerrbut that was a change introduced in the late 60s; all right for you youngsters but you can't expect wrinklies who grew up with degrees K to keep up :)

On a more serious note I have since switching from CGS to SI for A level deprecated the lack of clues in SI units to the type of quantity or to dimensions.

I can't remember if we were on MKS or SI for A levels. Can't recall a single electromagnetism issue from the time. And it may have been a bastard mix of the 2 as I do recall the head of physics complaining at one point about a temporary change at short notice. It was Oxford and Cambridge Board if anyone can help.

This article:

formatting link
the MKS system was adopted in 1889 and succeeded the CGS system. You're not really that old?

Exams were very definitely SI units when I took my O-levels. I can't find a date when exams boards changed from MKS to SI units. On the most part they are similar.

I have always disliked the idea that 1,000 of a quantity becomes a standard rather than a unit quantity. Perhaps that's just OCD.

<snip>

Banks never use floating point.

They get really upset if you take a million pounds, take off a percentage, and the resulting numbers don't add up to a million by a penny.

Andy

Grown up banking software uses integers plus an offset for the currency multiplier with an additional fiddle if you are delving into decimals (as some unit trusts can do).

If you want to sort the cowboys from the professionals when you're looking at software, that's one tip.

My thermodynamics lecture advocated the Furlong/Ferkin/Fortnight System. Some interesting derived units, such as fuel consumption.

Join the Discussion

Have something to add? Share your thoughts — no account required.

Didn't find your answer?

Ask the community — no account required