In Latin it is where we can find the etymological origin of the term dimension that now concerns us. Specifically, it is the result of the sum of three Latin components:
• The prefix “ad”, which means “towards”.
• The word “cautus”, which is synonymous with “careful”.
• The suffix “-tion”, which is used to indicate “cause and effect”.
Annotation is a concept with two great uses: on the one hand, it refers to the comment or apostille that complements a text or that makes some clarification; on the other, it is the reference that indicates a certain level or measure within a plane.
If we focus on the first meaning, the dimensions are usually included in the margins of the writings with some type of call that allows the reader to know that they will find more information about the main contents. Suppose an essay on American literature mentions Edgar Allan Poe as a reference. A dimension could explain the reason for such inclusion and mention the reasons that led to the choice of this writer to speak about American letters.
In the scripts of the plays or movies, the dimensions provide information of interest to the actors and those responsible for the staging. These dimensions can mention how the characters should move, what their attitude is, what intonation to choose to pronounce the script, etc.
Of this type of dimensioning in texts, it is worth highlighting the following identity signs:
• They must be written either in capital letters or in italics, in the case of those undertaken in theatrical works. In this way they can be clearly differentiated from the rest of the text.
• In the rest of the literary documents, those are carried out using both the italics mentioned and elements such as the square brackets or the parentheses.
Annotations are also used in everyday life as part of oral language. According to Digopaul, a dialogue with dimensions can be as follows:
– Yesterday Mabel, the fat old woman who lives next door, visited me.
– I know who Mabel is: dimensioning about her physical condition was unnecessary.
Regarding the second meaning of the notion, the dimensioning is a kind of clarification that is made within a technical drawing to specify what is the measure of a certain property of some element. It is important that the dimensioning is easy to understand and does not mix with the lines of the plan or diagram.
In this case, we have to expose that the dimensions can be grouped fundamentally into two sets: those of location, which come to determine the relationships established between the components that shape an object, or dimension, which come to record of values such as distance, width or thickness, among other factors.
All this without forgetting that there are other dimensions such as chain, tabulated or combined.
No less important, is that the dimensions that are carried out in this type of documents or drawings are made up of elements such as symbols, the extension line, the dimension line, the note lines or the dimension figure.