DimensionfulAngles.jl
March 9, 2026 · View on GitHub
DimensionfulAngles.jl
Extends Unitful.jl to include angle as a dimension and allow dispatching on angles.
The full documentation can be found at https://JuliaOceanWaves.github.io/DimensionfulAngles.jl.
Basic Usage
Use DimensionfulAngles.jl for units containing angles and Unitful.jl for all other units.
The units in DimensionfulAngles.jl are differentiated from their dimensionless counterparts with a superscript ᵃ.
Simply add this superscript to any angle units to make it dimensionful.
In Julia environments this can be typed as \^a<tab>.
julia> using Unitful
julia> using DimensionfulAngles
julia> dimensionless_angle = 1u"rad"
1 rad
julia> dimensionful_angle = 1u"radᵃ"
1 rad
julia> typeof(dimensionless_angle)
Quantity{Int64, NoDims, Unitful.FreeUnits{(rad,), NoDims, nothing}}
julia> typeof(dimensionful_angle)
Quantity{Int64, 𝐀, Unitful.FreeUnits{(rad,), 𝐀, nothing}}
When defining quantities with units from DimensionfulAngles.jl you can use the ua string instead and omit the superscript ᵃ.
But when defining quantities with units from both it is more convenient to use the u string.
julia> dimensionful_angle = 1ua"rad"
1 rad
julia> typeof(dimensionful_angle)
Quantity{Int64, 𝐀, Unitful.FreeUnits{(rad,), 𝐀, nothing}}
julia> angular_velocity = 1.2u"radᵃ/s"
1.2 rad s⁻¹
julia> typeof(angular_velocity)
Quantity{Float64, 𝐀 𝐓⁻¹, Unitful.FreeUnits{(rad, s⁻¹), 𝐀 𝐓⁻¹, nothing}}
A third alternative is to directly import only the units you will be using and renaming those from DimensionfulAngles.jl to remove the superscript ᵃ.
julia> using Unitful
julia> using Unitful: m, s, kg
julia> using DimensionfulAngles: radᵃ as rad, °ᵃ as °
julia> angular_velocity = 1.2rad / s
1.2 rad s⁻¹
Default Symbols
Another way of doing this is to import all default units, which includes SI base and derived units from Unitful.jl with angle units from DimensionfulAngles.jl.
This is done as
julia> using DimensionfulAngles.DefaultSymbols
julia> angular_velocity = 1.2rad / s
Converting to/from Unitful.jl
To convert a quantity to or from Unitful.jl use the uconvert function with first
argument either :Unitful or :DimensionfulAngles.
For example:
julia> using Unitful, DimensionfulAngles
julia> ω = 3.2u"radᵃ/s"
3.2 rad s⁻¹
julia> ω̄ = uconvert(:Unitful, ω)
3.2 rad s⁻¹
julia> dimension(ω)
𝐀 𝐓⁻¹
julia> dimension(ω̄)
𝐓⁻¹
Contributing
Contributions are welcome! 🎊 Please see the contribution guidelines for ways to contribute to the project.
Acknowledgments
Some portions of this software are adapted from:
- UnitfulAngles.jl: Copyright (c) 2017: Yakir Luc Gagnon.
- UnitfulUS.jl: Copyright (c) 2017, California Institute of Technology. All rights reserved.