Talk:Metric

Metric system vs. SI

I thought the "metric system" was properly referred to as "Systeme International" (in French, with an e-grave on the first e in "Systeme"), commonly abbreviated as "SI". Should there be a redirect?

--Bob Jonkman <bjonkman@sobac.com>

(never mind -- I see my mistake. I landed on the "Metric" page through a link meant to reference the "Metric System"; I'll fix that link myself.

--Bob.

Convert to disambiguation page

This page desperately needs to become a disambiguation page. These pages that treat multiple nearly unrelated topics on one page just because they bear the same name look really stupid. I've just taken care of another of these; maybe if no one beats me to it I'll do this one too. Michael Hardy 17:08, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Good edit, but you didn't move the information about musical meter to metre (music). Thanks. Hyacinth 20:27, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Primary topic

To editor DeFacto: Are you arguing that metric system is not the most common target? (I've apparently been using the word "primary" wrong; the operative guidance is MOS:DABORDER.) I'd guess, conservatively, 75% of users arriving here are looking for metric system, which is more than enough to justify it as the most common meaning. —swpb^{T go beyond} 12:50, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Hi swpb, no I wasn't arguing that, I was suggesting that it be discussed before it is changed. There are a lot of options on this page, do we have stats available to tell us which are the most frequent clicks from this page? -- DeFacto (talk). 14:21, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

So you don't think it's not the most common target, and I don't see anyone else here – so what's the hold up? If you were saying you don't think it's the most common target, then we'd have to go looking for statistics and arguing about their significance, or getting more editors to weigh in. But since you're not saying that, what are we discussing? I really hate this whole "we have to keep discussing this, even though no one disagrees, because we can't do anything without a discussion first". It's pointless. Unless you really do think it's not the most common target, there's nothing to discuss. —swpb^{T go beyond} 14:28, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't know whether it is the most common, or not - do you? I'd rather be sure before changing it and potentially causing controversy as I see from the article history that Dr Greg reverted your change too. -- DeFacto (talk). 15:34, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I do know it is beyond any reasonable doubt, and I think you do to, but more importantly, we don't need to prove it is (whatever that would mean), if no one here believes it's not! No one has even suggested it's not! You don't just revert things because you think some hypothetical person might think the edit was bad (which is what both of you did); you need to think so, and make that case. Until someone does, this is a waste of all our time. —swpb^{T go beyond} 15:41, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Per WP:BRD you should keep the status-quo until a consensus is reached. According to Oxford Dictionaries the primary meaning of 'metric' as a noun is a system or standard of measurement, so I think that the primary use here should be system of measurement. -- DeFacto (talk). 15:57, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

There, was that so hard? Doing BRD means owning your position from the start – you do positively believe it's not the most common meaning (even though you started off denying that), and now it's clear that there's no consensus on that point. Now there's a discussion to be had, now we have a reason to invite other editors and look for data. I'd agree right now to put system of measurement as a common meaning at the top with metric system. —swpb^{T go beyond} 15:58, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) (edit conflict) (edit conflict) Don't put words in my mouth - I confirmed I didn't know if it was the most common meaning, but would prefer it to be discussed before changing it, especially as another editor had reverted the original change. Looking in the dictionary I found their view of it and brought that here. -- DeFacto (talk). 16:15, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

You can't have it both ways. "I have no idea" isn't a strong enough reason to revert. Having an actual position is, even if you're not 100% on it. Which. Is. It. I've gone ahead and started an RFC, but know that you're deploying the R in BRD all wrong. It's moot now, but maybe you'll save everyone some time next time. —swpb^{T go beyond} 16:22, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

FWIW I agree the wrong standard was used for this reversion. You don't revert because the reverted edit isn't an obvious improvement; you use the same standard for a reversion as any other edit: you believe that the text is better after your reversion than before. If you don't believe one way or the other, you have to leave the article alone. Bryan Henderson (giraffedata) (talk) 03:41, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

RFC

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Is metric system the (or a) significantly more common meaning than most for metric, per MOS:DABCOMMON #1? —swpb^{T go beyond} 15:59, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

• Yes, I think so. Looking at the other articles listed, it seems to me that none of them even come close. —Granger (talk · contribs) 12:49, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• No. I think people nearly always refer to the metric system as the metric system and only occasionally use it in adjectival form as just "metric" and reserve the bare word metric for its more general meaning of measurement.

I'd like to point out that the question refers to MOS:DABCOMMON which means "significantly more common" is understood in terms of how likely a Wikipedia reader would be to type "metric" (alone) in the search box when looking for information on the metric system. Bryan Henderson (giraffedata) (talk) 03:57, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

To editor Giraffedata: So system of measurement is the #1 meaning – I don't disagree. I'm saying that metric system is definitely #2, far ahead and away of any of the other meanings. —swpb^{T go beyond} 22:22, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• No. In my experience by far the most common meaning is Metric (mathematics). I don't want to say that it is the common meaning for everyone, just that it is for me. More generally my feeling is that too many of these meanings are too widespread to declare one of them primary. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:27, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Yes. It's true that certain other meanings may be more common in specialized fields. But if you look at Metric (mathematics), there's just no way it's the more common meaning. Even the lead is impenetrable to folks without postsecondary education in mathematics (it's been a long time for me, so I zone out as soon as we hit the word "topology" and long before "differentiable manifold"). It's not at all surprising to me that it's the most common meaning that David Eppstein comes across, but I don't think it's going out on a limb to suggest that David's experience is not reflective of most people. The vast majority of the world's population a) aren't tenured professors of computer science at top research universities, b) don't live in the United States, and c) interact with the metric system every day. That's enough per MOS:DABCOMMON to redirect metric to metric system. agtx 14:51, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

Precisely because we interact with the system every day, we don't use the word "metric" to refer to it. This word is used in the generic meaning of "System of measurement". Diego (talk) 09:10, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

• No. A general system of measurement, the current top entry here is prominent enough in everyday English usage (e.g. "By what metric are you...") that the Metric system would not be primary. ---- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 18:40, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

• No - metric meaning metrics or a Measurement of how one is measuring items in questions(such as rating by profitability or by PEG) or metric as in centimeters seems strongly dominant over metric meaning 'the metric system' of whole array of metric terms and structure of them. No usage seems heavily dominant enough to be the redirect, I think a Measurement is a bit more common but really it should go to a DAB. Markbassett (talk) 20:03, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

• No In line with the previous noes. It would in any case be ridiculous to redirect a to a disambig page from one of the many things metric could refer to, when the list of items pulled down in the Wikipedia search entry shows metric system anyway as soon as you get to metri, never mind Metric system. The proposal would do no one any favours anyway and would do most rational users a disfavour. JonRichfield (talk) 10:04, 7 November 2017 (UTC)

• No, but To me, "metric" with no further qualifiers means "system of measurement" (which is not the same thing as "metric system"). "Metric system" is definitely not the most common meaning, but it is one of the more common meanings to me. That said, it's clear that this question is really asking what the DAB page should look like. I prefer the current version which disambiguates "system of measurement" from other uses. Ca2james (talk) 21:31, 12 November 2017 (UTC)

• Yes. I think many of us would like a reader, who's encountered the term, to find the article describing the term as they encountered it. Here are the rates (readers/day) at which readers encounter the most important articles:
  • Metric (disambiguation) — 340
  • Metric (mathematics) — 440
  • System of measurement — 540
  • Metric system — 2,220

There might be different interpretations of these numbers. My sense however is that people end up where they meant to, and that they generally mean to go to the Metric system at least four times more often than the next most plausible page. Called by bot. -Darouet (talk) 23:56, 14 November 2017 (UTC)

• No. That's a US / UK bias, but it doesn't reflect a world-wide view. Wikipedia is meant for a global audience, and the current disambiguation page best serves the largest amount of readers. (Someone looking for that topic would know to search for "metric system" anyway, not just the adjective.) Diego (talk) 09:15, 15 November 2017 (UTC)
• Yes. The en.wikipedia does not address a global audience, it only addresses an English speaking audience. It is primarily read by people who are linked to European and North American cultures. The numbers may indicate how popular the links are in articles rather than what was typed into the search bar. When working with manufactured items using metric measurements, the word "system" is left off as metric is a singular characteristic, a mechanic would say "a Honda civic is metric", not "a Honda civic uses (the) metric system". Dougmcdonell (talk) 21:12, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

English is spoken worldwide and most countries, even in Europe, do not use imperial units like the USA and UK do. It's uncommon that articles are named after adjectives, and even more uncommon that an adjective is made primary topic over the name. Editors writing sentences like "a Honda civic is metric" may very well create a piped link to metric system. This way the name used in the search box can guide readers to the DAB page, or we could even make system of measurement the primary topic, which is more likely - since that's the literal meaning of the word. Diego (talk) 21:55, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

@Diego Moya: I'm puzzled by your reply that "English is spoken worldwide" that does not mean that en.wikipedia's has a large audience in Russia. Our primary readership is easy to identify, I'm sure the foundation has statistics on where the bulk of editors and readers are located. My point being that there is a target audience in a handful of countries, our readership is not evenly distributed around the world.

My comment referred to "metric" being used without being associated with "system". "The temperature is in metric" is another example of this. The usage occurs when only when a single measurement is the topic, there is no reference to a system of measurements, only one. I am aware that this is not the best use of language eg:"a Honda civic uses millimeters" and "The temperature is in Celsius" would both be more accurate, I'm simply reporting common usage, the kind of thing people type in a search bar. Dougmcdonell (talk) 18:39, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

I'm a native Spanish speaker, and here I am speaking English, just like people all over the world in non-anglo countries. My home country uses the metric system, and I would be completely bewildered by the "metric" title linking to the metric system article directly as a primary topic. Even a single measurement needs to be related to the unit of its measurement system, so "temperature in metric" may link to "metric system" with a pipe link. But if people type "metric" in the search box we cannot be sure they intend that meaning, as there is not enough context.

Now I think it's good that "metric system" is linked at the top section per MOS:DABORDER, but not as the most common, nor "significantly more than the rest". The most common meaning is obviously the definition of "metric" as a name, i.e. "a measure of something". Diego (talk) 22:48, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

• No. Best to leave this as a dab page. If someone is looking for the metric system, she's as likely to get there directly or via SI as here. There's also a decent chance of a reader wanting metric (sense n.1) who wouldn't be well-served by any of these articles. Furrykiller (talk) 03:31, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

• Yes, but there may be enough per-country usage differences to justify keep this as a DAB rather than a redirect to metric system. Metric system is more common than the other usages. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:52, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.