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Is it a common or accepted practice to specify measurement units directly in the formula?

Something like

enter image description here

where X is given in miles, Y in kilometers, and Z in millimeters.

john c. j.
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    That’s so ugly that it physically hurts to look at it. But seriously, don’t do that. In an equation the units of every term should be the same. Convert everything to $mm$ or $m$ or $Km$ and only then write an equation. – Adam Rubinson Feb 03 '22 at 00:53
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    Thanks, Adam. The real formula that I have is used to explain some typographic decisions that I made in my document template. I can explain it as follows: "To calculate the amount of padding you have to add on the Borders tab, use the formula p = (m*12 - b)/12, where m is the distance from the text to the left of the page text area, in picas; b is the border width, in points; and p is the amount of padding you have to add, in picas." The template uses picas (this was my own choice), but I cannot change the measurement units used for borders, it is always points. – john c. j. Feb 03 '22 at 01:01
  • So as you can probably see, I cannot simply convert all units to one. – john c. j. Feb 03 '22 at 01:02
  • In your formula $p=(m*12-b)/12$ you seem to have already included the conversion factor: $1$ pica = $12$ points. – GEdgar Feb 03 '22 at 01:19
  • I personally have not come across a situation like that arisen in your comment or question. Where the formula in the question came from? – Adam Rubinson Feb 04 '22 at 12:04
  • The formula in the question is simply an example. – john c. j. Feb 05 '22 at 20:05

1 Answers1

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enter image description here
where $x$ is given in miles, $y$ in kilometers, and $z$ in millimeters.

To some of us, there is a difference between “the distance is $x$ miles” and “the distance $x$ is given/expressed in miles”.

For example, $x$ is definitely a numerical value (e.g., $x=37)$ in the former, whereas it might equal $37\,\text{miles}$ in the latter.

I think enter image description here is fine if you wish to emphasise the differing units involved; otherwise, better to just write $$x=\frac{123y-z}{456}$$ then define $x,y$ and $z$ using the former description above.

ryang
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