scale bars

[GRAHAM MULLAN]

Erin Lynch, in passing, said:

| I'd also appreciate it if you could revert the scale bar to its
| original all-outline appearance.  The new version with alternating
| black and white boxes looks nicer but it uses an awful lot of
| unneccessary ink.

Not only that but it can lead to inaccuracies when using a drawing (as 
opposed to one of these new-fangled computer thingies). A scale bar drawn as 
alternating boxes always has the dark boxes longer than the light boxes as a 
consequence of the way that they are drawn; this is because the dividing 
line becomes included within the dark box when only half its width actually 
should be as the mark is the centre of that line. Thus if you only have 
access to the drawings and you try to use the scale bar to measure widths or 
distances or whatever, you have an unnecessary error creeping in.

Graham Mullan