Fun_People Archive
14 Feb
Talking about specs that live forever...

Date: Mon, 14 Feb 94 15:55:28 PST
To: Fun_People
Subject: Talking about specs that live forever...

[Since we in the U. S. of A. have apparently forgotten that we were planning
 on adopting the metric system and are instead still celebrating the sizes of
 various body parts of some ancient English king (inch = first finger joint,
 foot = heel to toe, yard = nose to tip of middle finger (arm outstretched),
 hand = width of palm, willie = hand + a bit [that's a joke, son], and so on),
 I thought that it might be worth reminding ourselves of a few of the benefits
 of a rationally devised system... -psl]

 From: sr@rdbois.fdn.org (serge_ruby)
 Subject: Re: Problems printing envelopes with NeXT printer.

... [Text relating to envelopes and NeXTPRiNTeRS deleted here. -psl] ...

Second I think you are getting confused by the international paper sizes:
standard A4 does *not* measure 22cm by 11cm, it does 21cm by 29.7cm.  22cm
by 11cm envelopes are the correct ones to send A4 paper folded in 3, but
they are not A4 themselves.  Therefore you must set the paper size manually
to 11cm by 22cm (*not* 22cm by 11cm) and choose landscape orientation.

By the way, let me remind you the origin and interest of A4 standard to help
you finding your way into other A standard format:

A0 is one square meter in surface with a length/width ratio of square root
of 2.  This ensure to keep the same lenght/width ratio when you cut it into
two.  Therefore A0 is 118.92cm by 84.09cm.

A1 is A0 cut into 2. Therefore 84.09cm by 59.46cm with a weight per sheet
equal to exactly half of the weight of a A0 sheet, wich is the major
interest of this standard, as the "strength" of a given paper is given in
g per square meter (80g / m2 for normal printer paper), then 40g for A1 and
common 80g / m2 paper.

A2 is A1 cut into 2. Therefore 59.46cm by 42.04cm and 20g for common 80g / m2  
paper.

A3 is A2 cut into 2. Therefore 42.04cm by 29.73cm and 10g for 80g / m2 paper.

A4 is A3 cut into 2. Therefore 29.73cm by 21.02cm and 5g for 80g / m2 paper.
This is very useful to estimate the weight of a letter to determine what
price of stamp to put on it: a letter of 3 pages (3 sheets) weighs precisely
3 * 5g = 15g for common paper (this is much more precise than any domestic
weighing scale) plus the weight of the enveloppe, which is approximatively
the same as a sheet of paper ie 5g.  Then 3 sheets + envelope = 20g.

A5 is A4 cut into 2. Therefore 21.02cm by 14.87cm and 2.5g for 80g / m2 paper.

There is also a Bn standard format which I wonder what it is, Perhaps it is
the format of envelopes to put An format in? Does any body know about it?

Hope that this can be of interest to you.

Serge

© 1994 Peter Langston