On Aug 24, 10:20�pm, Erik Max Francis <m...@alcyone.com> wrote: > Steven D'Aprano wrote: > > On Mon, 24 Aug 2009 09:14:25 -0500, Derek Martin wrote: > > >> Assuming I'm right about that, then the use of a leading 0 to represent > >> octal actually predates the prevalence of using 0 in dates by almost two > >> decades. �And while using leading zeros in other contexts is "familiar" > >> to me, I would certainly not consider it "common" by any means. �Thus I > >> think it's fair to say that when this syntax was selected, it was a > >> rather good choice. > > > Except of course to anyone familiar with mathematics in the last, oh, > > five hundred years or so. Mathematics has used a positional system for > > numbers for centuries now: leading zeroes have been insignificant, just > > like trailing zeroes after the decimal point: > > > 9 = 09 = 009 = 9.0 = 9.00 = 0009.000 etc. > > Trailing zeroes are quite important when you're indicating the > significance of a figure. �9 is not the same as 9.0 or 9.000.
Tell me about it. Unfortunnately, Microsoft doesn't understand the difference between precision and significance. Makes my job a nightmare when I have to convert ug/kg to mg/kg. > > -- > Erik Max Francis && m...@alcyone.com &&http://www.alcyone.com/max/ > � San Jose, CA, USA && 37 18 N 121 57 W && AIM/Y!M/Skype erikmaxfrancis > � �If the sky should fall, hold up your hands. > � � -- (a Spanish proverb)- Hide quoted text - > > - Show quoted text - -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
