On Mon, Oct 27, 2003 at 02:34:00PM +0000, tarquin wrote:
<wiki>My
tool is [[unit:inch:12.4]] long.</wiki>
Renders "My tool is 12.4 inch long." and "My tool is 29.88 cm long.",
depeding on my settings. (With natural IQ, like write 23.5 km instead of
2350000 cm, etc.)
Syntax was just an example, not even a suggestion.
Two points (which have already been raised):
1. articles should be easy to write. Minimize complex markup.
Markup is like chocolate: you're not forced to use it.
Others will gladly fix it up after you. (eg. eat your chocolate.)
But, point taken.
2. How can a machine tell what level of accuracy is
needed?
Eg:
"A cat is an animal about a foot long"
"A cat is an animal about 30cm long."
You don't want the decimals!
I can create markup as complex as you just want to be. Decimals surely a
possible optional part (like, erm, let's say, [[unit:<measure>.<integer
precision>:<measure>]] like [[unit:inch.-2:199]] would
become "200 inch" and "280 cm", respectively, rounded to closest 10
(10^2)
and [[unit:inch.2:199]] "199 inch" and "282.58 cm"). No, it's not
user
friendly at all. Maybe it worths thinking about it.
If one deperately needed there could be a
"the damned cat is about [[unit:verbal:30cm|a foot]] long" form, giving
metric and english measures in text form.
Still I'm not satisfied with my own idea, oh well...
grin