Thread

1. miffy900 · 1789683723 · focus · HN ↗

   I really wish people would stop saying N times smaller than something when making a comparison; that makes no sense - it's 1/9th (11.11%) the size. You don't get a smaller quantity by multiplying by a number greater than 1.0. You could instead reverse the subjects being compared - "the original model is 9x bigger than this new smaller, efficient model" or some such. That makes sense.

   I keep seeing this being used when people talk about efficiency or performance gains and it's just very unintuitive language.

   1. hamandcheese · 1789684149 · focus · HN ↗

      If we were talking about speed instead of size, i think it would be perfectly reasonable to say 9x faster. I'm not sure I agree that 9x smaller is unintuitive. It makes sense to me.

      1. _carbyau_ · 1789687989 · focus · HN ↗

         "faster" relates to speed. Speed is related to time and speed of a thing is usually defined by time. 9x faster speed translates to time/9. There is an extra step of related conversion there.

         Conversely, 9x [filesize/natural number] is bigger. Every time. At least in the basic maths used by most people. There is no conversion into other units.

         Therefore "9x smaller" when talking about a natural number like filesize is a nonsense statement in logic terms. If you strive for unambiguous phrasing - which is a significant part of the programming experience - this logical nonsense might well perturb you.

         But english language is a flexible thing and if the phrase communicates your intent to your audience then that's fine by me.

         1. jonhohle · 1789706623 · focus · HN ↗

            I think more intuitively for speed - you are multiplying the things per period. If I’m making widgets 9x faster I have 9 x the previous number of units per period of time. To get the amount of time, you invert the ratio to period over units.

            Multiplying some scale by units per period makes sense and is both linguistically and mathematically sound.

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