page_title: Ruler
section_title: Types
hierarchical_section_title: Ruler / Types
caption_attribution_description: English: I took this photo at the Shaanxi History Museum, Xi'an in 2011
context_page_description: A ruler, sometimes called a rule or line gauge, is a device used in geometry and technical drawing, as well as the engineering and construction industries, to measure distances or draw straight lines.
context_section_description: Rulers have long been made from different materials and in multiple sizes. Some are wooden. Plastics have also been used since they were invented; they can be molded with length markings instead of being scribed. Metal is used for more durable rulers for use in the workshop; sometimes a metal edge is embedded into a wooden desk ruler to preserve the edge when used for straight-line cutting. 12 in or 30 cm in length is useful for a ruler to be kept on a desk to help in drawing. Shorter rulers are convenient for keeping in a pocket. Longer rulers, e.g., 18 in (46 cm) are necessary in some cases. Rigid wooden or plastic yardsticks, 1 yard long, and meter sticks, 1 meter long, are also used. Classically, long measuring rods were used for larger projects, now superseded by tape measure, surveyor's wheel or laser rangefinders.
  Desk rulers are used for three main purposes: to measure, to aid in drawing straight lines, and as a straight guide for cutting and scoring with a blade.  Practical rulers have distance markings along their edges.
  A line gauge is a type of ruler used in the printing industry. These may be made from a variety of materials, typically metal or clear plastic. Units of measurement on a basic line gauge usually include inches, agate, picas, and points. More detailed line gauges may contain sample widths of lines, samples of common type in several point sizes, etc.
  Measuring instruments similar in function to rulers are made portable by folding (carpenter's folding rule) or retracting into a coil (metal tape measure) when not in use. When extended for use, they are straight, like a ruler. The illustrations on this page show a 2 m (6 ft 7 in) carpenter's rule, which folds down to a length of 25 cm (10 in) to easily fit in a pocket, and a 5 m (16 ft) tape, which retracts into a small housing.
  A flexible length measuring instrument which is not necessarily straight in use is the tailor's fabric tape measure, a length of tape calibrated in inches and centimeters. It is used to measure around a solid body, e.g., for a person's waist measurement, as well as for linear measurement, e.g., for the inside leg length. It is rolled up when not in use, taking up little space.
  A contraction rule is made having larger divisions than standard measures to allow for shrinkage of a metal casting. They may also be known as a shrinkage or shrink rule.
  A ruler software program can be used to measure pixels on a computer screen or mobile phone. These programs are also known as screen rulers.
caption: Gilded bronze ruler. 1 chi = 23.1 cm (9.1 in). Western Han (206 BCE – 8 CE). Hanzhong City, China
exif: {"Image Make": "Panasonic", "Image Model": "DMC-FH25", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image Software": "Ver.1.0", "Image DateTime": "2011:06:29 11:12:43", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "2268", "Image SensitivityType": "Standard Output Sensitivity", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 50, 53, 48, 0, 0, 14, 0, 1, 0, 22, 0, ... ]", "Image Tag 0xC6D2": "[0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, ... ]", "Image Tag 0xC6D3": "[0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, ... ]", "Image Padding": "[]", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/15", "EXIF FNumber": "4", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "1600", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2011:06:29 11:12:43", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2011:06:29 11:12:43", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "4", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "48/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "4608", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3456", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "54", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "High gain up", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF Padding": "[]", "EXIF OffsetSchema": "3768"}