On Tue, 17 Mar 2009 17:50:18 +1300, Malcolm Moore
wrote:

Many europeans express a decimal point by using a comma. In your
example above 1,6 is the same as 1.6

It's not 'Europeans' it's an ISO standard, ISO being the
*International* Standards Organisation, ANSI (and Standards New
Zealand) being member bodies of ISO

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countries_in_International_Organization_for_Standa rdization

Yes, using commas for decimal points is loopy but the rest of the
metric planet (outside the USA) in the Engineering profession have
been doing it that way and have been for many, many years - The ISO
standard has been in place for around 20 years although places like
the UK only adopted it as a national standard in 2002.

Along with other number formatting principles inherent in the standard
there should be no ambiguity, nor misreading of a drawing due to a
speck of ink or a badly placed fold.


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