Binary -> Decimal ?

[blue-j]

Hey all,

We raised the subject quite some time ago about moving from binary to decimal measures of file size.  Presently the default in ExifTool is to use binary, such as Mebibytes, (MiB), kibibytes, (KiB), etc.

I would like to suggest it is time to make decimal the standard.  I know binary makes the most sense computationally in some ways, but every drive company I know of uses decimal at this point, and almost no one knows what a mebibyte (MiB) even is.

Does anyone feel the same, or have a counter point to share?

- J

[blue-j]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byte#Multiple-byte_units

[StarGeek]

The only counterpoint I have is that Windows doesn't read file sizes that way.  For example


449,091/1,024=438
450,560/1,024=440

Other than that, I don't care either way.  I don't think I've ever had the need to get the file size using exiftool.

[blue-j]

They are using 1024 and displaying units for 1000.  Nothing to emulate!

-J

[Phil Harvey]

They are using 1024 and displaying units for 1000.  Nothing to emulate!

That is the historical way of doing things, and is how ExifTool did it before updating the units strings.

I don't see a real problem updating this since anyone who really cares about the file sizes would use the -n output.

I'll change this in version 12.42.

- Phil