On a miter saw, when you're cutting a 90 degree cut, the miter saw reads zero. On a protractor, it reads 90. So it's an unending source of confusion for people. RON HAZELTON: So Mark, show me how it works.
A ruler is used to measure units of length, inches, feet and yards. Standard rulers have inches on one side and centimeters on the other. A typical ruler measures up to 12 inches, and is equivalent to 30.48 centimeters. This is also equivalent to 1 foot. Each inch on a ruler has markings in between that are a fraction of an inch.
Generally, the bigger measurement is listed first, and so many times this ends up being the length or height. For instance, if someone is measuring a rectangle, the longer sides tend to be regarded as the length, which are then listed first before the width measurement.