If text can be entered as HTML, you can also use the following notations: However, in some programming languages, ' ~' is symbolic of NOT (Bitwise), and ' ~=' is therefore somtimes used as a variation of ' !=', which means NOT EQUAL TO.īecause of this potential source of confusion, '=~' is proposed instead. ' ~=' is a logical possible expansion of, which many people interpret as 'approximatley equals' (rather than as the useage of 'congrunet' in geometry).įurthermore, ' ~=' could be read as 'approximately equals'. '=~' is an easy to use and easy to remember alternative. Note: In HTML 4 '~' is defined as 'varies with' or 'similar to'.)

the ~ symbol is too often to indicate some other meaning (e.g.

≅ and ≈ are symbols that are not universally rendered correctly in web browsers (in fact, you may be seeing boxes instead of symbols right now) and are not commonly parsed correctly in web tools like commenting and forums.

≅ and ≈ are symbols that are not easy for people to enter in email, forums, etc.

The preferred way of symbolizing 'approximately equal to' is to use the ≈ symbol, the ~ symbol, or (in some cases) the ≅ symbol (see note 2). '7^2 = 50 (that should be an 'is approximately equal to' symbol, but I'm too lazy to figure out how to get one of them).' * email, comment forms, forums, message boards, et cetera Rationale 'One gigabyte equals approximately one billion bytes.' 'One gigabyte is approximately equal to one billion bytes.'

equals eight million, three hundred eighty-eight thousand, six hundred and eight bits, (which) equals approximately one million bytes.'

is equal to eight million, three hundred eighty-eight thousand, six hundred and eight bits, (which) is approximately equal to one million bytes.' This text can be read aloud as ' equals approximately' or ' is approximately equal to'.

Average speed symbol