GiB vs. GB

[James Richard Tyrer]

Peter Penz wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> on the dot there is currently a discussion [1] because Dolphin shows "18,1 GiB 
> free" instead of "18,1 GB free". Dolphin uses KIO::convertSizeFromKiB() which 
> uses KLocale::formatBySize(). Inside the implementation of 
> KLocale::formatBySize() the following comment is given:
> 
> // If someone wants the SI-standard prefixes kB/MB/GB/TB, I would recommend
> // a hidden kconfig option and getting the code from #57240 into the same
> // method, so that all KDE apps use the same unit, instead of letting
> // each app decide.
> 
> Using GiB would be technically correct, but I'm not sure if the noise on the 
> dot represents only a minority or whether this is really a (minor) problem...

Does that stand for Girls in Black or Guys in Black (MiB = Men in Black).

> So the questions are:
> 1. Do we have a problem at all?
> 2. If the answer is yes: should we add such a hidden kconfig option?
> 3. If we provide such an option: which representation should be default?
> 
Well, this is a fine mess.

IIRC, it used to be that we didn't even use the 'b' or 'B'.  We spoke of 
'k' or 'K'.  The lowercase being 1000 and the uppercase being 1024.  I 
think that this is still in the standard (WikiPedia says that it is IEC 
60027-2).  This didn't seem to carry over to mega, giga, & tera. :-( 
Unfortunately, a standard is a standard and although I don't really like 
it, I see little choice but to follow it and simply "get used to it". :-|

It does have the advantage of fixing the ambiguity.

-- 
JRT