Do you have trouble visualizing sizes when doing digital design work or buying things online?
I sure do.
Best solution I've found is also hilariously simple: I keep a retractable tailor's tape within arm's reach of my desk, and whip it out for reference whenever I'm unsure (i.e. almost every time).
@starkatt This is such a common problem for electrical engineers that you can get these little pcb rulers with actual component footprints on them so you can see what they look like and how they compare to each other
they usually also have other useful stuff on them like trace widths and stuff, too
-F/R
@Felthry I love that ruler, have one myself.
@Felthry 'cause yeah there's no inherent size reference when looking at a PCB layout!
@Felthry ...looking at the picture I'm like "owo coin for scale isn't so useful when it's not a known coin", then realized wait, ruler for scale.
@starkatt I wonder just how recognised American coins are elsewhere in the world for exactly this reason?
A AA battery is probably a good option. They're used all over the world and have a specific fixed size by necessity. Lacking any other sense of scale though, you would have to make sure to note that it's a AA and not a AAA.
-F
@noiob @starkatt the smaller coins are so worthless that a lot of people want to get rid of them entirely (canada already did get rid of their 1¢ coins and it seems to have gone fine for them, so i don't see why we haven't other than that it's not a high priority)
the main reason we have a law against defacing currency, as we understand it, is that the metal content of both the 1¢ and 5¢ coins is worth more than the face value of the coin
-F
@Felthry @starkatt according to Wikipedia, burning money is mainly a form of protest. The laws also prohibit stuff like stamping advertising onto bills https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_burning
@Felthry I figure it is, yeah. Mostly noting that coins aren't a great scale reference.
(my go-to for that size range is an AA battery.)