On Tuesday 22 March 2011 10:30:15 mech...@illinois.edu wrote: > Bob, Tim, and Ron, > > Here is an even better acronym for units "Outside the SI" (OSI). > > OSI is shorter than USC, and shorter than inch-pound. Even if, by a typo > error, OSI appears as 0SI (The zero "0 " is directly above O on most > keyboards.) it still conveys the same "0utside SI" meaning, and OSI can be > construed to exclude the units isted in Table 10 and Table 11 of NIST SP > 811, on Page 11, such as erg, dyne. gauss, torr, kgf, calorie, etc. as "not > accepted for use with the SI by this Guide" SP 811.
Outside the SI also includes units of quantities that the SI has no unit for, such as the bit and the shannon (which are the same size, but units of information capacity and information). If I buy a hard drive, I want to know both its width (in millimeters) and its information capacity. For the collection of units including the US gallon, the foot, and the pound, I prefer the term "colonial units". That distinguishes the US gallon from the UK gallon (an imperial unit) and excludes the SI units except that of time (the second is used with feet just as with meters). Pierre -- The Black Garden on the Mountain is not on the Black Mountain.