[linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Daniel Mierswa]

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Has anyone been working on the consistency problem in LVM wrt units
lately (http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=306200)? If not
i'm willing to come up with a patch that attempts to fix those
consistency issues, if patches are welcome.

-- 
Mierswa, Daniel

If you still don't like it, that's ok: that's why I'm boss. I simply
know better than you do.
               --- Linus Torvalds, comp.os.linux.advocacy, 1996/07/22


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Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Daniel Mierswa]

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Daniel Mierswa wrote:
> i'm willing to come up with a patch that attempts to fix those
> consistency issues, if patches are welcome.
So I did although noone gave me the permission yet!  :-)
Please let me know what you think, any kind of feedback is appreciated.
I attached a git format-patch against  revision 11f40b. (It's gzip since
otherwise the MTA of the list just absorbs my mail without any reply.)

-- 
Mierswa, Daniel

If you still don't like it, that's ok: that's why I'm boss. I simply
know better than you do.
               --- Linus Torvalds, comp.os.linux.advocacy, 1996/07/22


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Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Luca Berra]

On Mon, Jun 29, 2009 at 12:39:37AM +0200, Daniel Mierswa wrote:
>Daniel Mierswa wrote:
>> i'm willing to come up with a patch that attempts to fix those
>> consistency issues, if patches are welcome.
>So I did although noone gave me the permission yet!  :-)
>Please let me know what you think, any kind of feedback is appreciated.
>I attached a git format-patch against  revision 11f40b. (It's gzip since
>otherwise the MTA of the list just absorbs my mail without any reply.)
did not really check all of it, but 
+               {" Exabyte",  " EiB", "e"},
+               {" Petabyte", " PiB", "p"},
+               {" Terabyte", " TiB", "t"},
+               {" Gigabyte", " GiB", "g"},
+               {" Megabyte", " MiB", "m"},
+               {" Kilobyte", " KiB", "k"},
these units should be named
Exbibyte
Pebibyte
Tebibyte
Gibibyte
Mebibyte
Kibibyte

respectively,

L.

-- 
Luca Berra -- bluca@comedia.it
          Communication Media & Services S.r.l.
   /"\
   \ /     ASCII RIBBON CAMPAIGN
    X        AGAINST HTML MAIL
   / \

Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Daniel Mierswa]

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Luca Berra wrote:
> did not really check all of it, but
> +               {" Exabyte",  "EiB", "e"},
> +               {" Petabyte", " PiB", "p"},
> +               {" Terabyte", " TiB", "t"},
> +               {" Gigabyte", " GiB", "g"},
> +               {" Megabyte", " MiB", "m"},
> +               {" Kilobyte", " KiB", "k"},
> these units should be named
> Exbibyte
> Pebibyte
> Tebibyte
> Gibibyte
> Mebibyte
> Kibibyte

but of course, thank you
new f-p attached

-- 
Mierswa, Daniel

If you still don't like it, that's ok: that's why I'm boss. I simply
know better than you do.
               --- Linus Torvalds, comp.os.linux.advocacy, 1996/07/22

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Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Clyde E. Kunkel]

On 06/29/2009 01:50 AM, Luca Berra wrote:
> On Mon, Jun 29, 2009 at 12:39:37AM +0200, Daniel Mierswa wrote:
>> Daniel Mierswa wrote:
>>> i'm willing to come up with a patch that attempts to fix those
>>> consistency issues, if patches are welcome.
>> So I did although noone gave me the permission yet!  :-)
>> Please let me know what you think, any kind of feedback is appreciated.
>> I attached a git format-patch against  revision 11f40b. (It's gzip since
>> otherwise the MTA of the list just absorbs my mail without any reply.)
> did not really check all of it, but +               {" Exabyte",  " 
> EiB", "e"},
> +               {" Petabyte", " PiB", "p"},
> +               {" Terabyte", " TiB", "t"},
> +               {" Gigabyte", " GiB", "g"},
> +               {" Megabyte", " MiB", "m"},
> +               {" Kilobyte", " KiB", "k"},
> these units should be named
> Exbibyte
> Pebibyte
> Tebibyte
> Gibibyte
> Mebibyte
> Kibibyte
>
> respectively,
>
> L.
>

Translations obviously needed.....

Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Alasdair G Kergon]

Firstly, any *functional* changes in the patch need to be identified:
If, given identical data, any code reads in or writes out a different number as
a result of the patch we need to consider implications carefully and
document that change in release notes.

Secondly, in the man pages, where we list the units, it would be helpful to
add a sentence each time to explain the difference between MB and MiB, in
terms of multiples of 1000 vs multiples of 1024.

Perhaps lvm.8 could have a paragraph about how LVM2 uses units
throughout incl.  an external reference to something like
http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html (or the original standard
if you can track that down).

Alasdair

Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Jim Meyering]

Daniel Mierswa wrote:
> Luca Berra wrote:
>> did not really check all of it, but
>> +               {" Exabyte",  "EiB", "e"},
>> +               {" Petabyte", " PiB", "p"},
>> +               {" Terabyte", " TiB", "t"},
>> +               {" Gigabyte", " GiB", "g"},
>> +               {" Megabyte", " MiB", "m"},
>> +               {" Kilobyte", " KiB", "k"},

You might want to include "YiB" and "ZiB", too, for completeness.
Yobibyte, Zebibyte

Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Daniel Mierswa]

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Alasdair G Kergon wrote:
> Firstly, any *functional* changes in the patch need to be identified:
> If, given identical data, any code reads in or writes out a different number as
> a result of the patch we need to consider implications carefully and
> document that change in release notes.
Agreed. I was just initially wondering if there is any kind of interest
in that separation at all. What exactly do you want me to identify now?
Do you want me to document the source where functional changes happen,
write a summary and attach it to the source or mail? I'm not aware of my
task for this. :P

> Secondly, in the man pages, where we list the units, it would be helpful to
> add a sentence each time to explain the difference between MB and MiB, in
> terms of multiples of 1000 vs multiples of 1024.
Yes, When writing I always thought that a single place describing the
units makes much more sence than to repeat it over and over again. I
will definitely fix this once I know what to identify (see above).

> Perhaps lvm.8 could have a paragraph about how LVM2 uses units
> throughout incl.  an external reference to something like
> http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html (or the original standard
> if you can track that down).
Agreed aswell. The standard is ISO and not available for public viewing
online (ISO 80000). I bet we can find right prashing ourselves. :D

-- 
Mierswa, Daniel

If you still don't like it, that's ok: that's why I'm boss. I simply
know better than you do.
               --- Linus Torvalds, comp.os.linux.advocacy, 1996/07/22


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Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Alasdair G Kergon]

On Tue, Jun 30, 2009 at 02:05:26PM +0200, Daniel Mierswa wrote:
> Agreed. I was just initially wondering if there is any kind of interest
> in that separation at all. What exactly do you want me to identify now?
> Do you want me to document the source where functional changes happen,
> write a summary and attach it to the source or mail? I'm not aware of my
> task for this. :P
 
Identify functional changes and mention in email is simplest - the concern is
that existing scripts people have could behave differently, so we have to know
precisely what changes we are making, assess the impact, and if we decide to
proceed nevertheless, we have to document what people need to look for and
change in their scripts.

Alasdair

Re: [linux-lvm] S.I. and consistent units

[Daniel Mierswa]

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The functional changes are as follows:
- Users and programs currently checking the output of LVM have to
distinguish between either IEC or SI units. Currently LVM prints K, KB
and Kilobyte for SI and IEC units depending on what they passed in
--units. With the patch applied LVM prints K, KB and Kilobyte for SI
units and k, KiB and Kibibyte for IEC units.
- Users and programs currently passing LVM the uppercase size suffixes
are now telling LVM to treat that value as SI unit whereas now LVM
treats lower and uppercase suffixes as IEC (binary based unit).

Consider this as an improved version of my initial patch with the fixes
you wanted applied. Let's make another feedback session now. :-)

That's all I can think of now, I'm more than happy to investigate
further and react upon your requests and feedback.

-- 
Mierswa, Daniel

If you still don't like it, that's ok: that's why I'm boss. I simply
know better than you do.
               --- Linus Torvalds, comp.os.linux.advocacy, 1996/07/22

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