Matthew Woehlke:

> Everybody uses kibibytes. Some (KDE, GNU) actually call them that;
> many mislabel them (if they ever mention the full name at a

As a translator of KDE, let me chime in.

First, I’m very happy to see that KDE (at least Konqueror and Dolphin) has 
finally changed to properly labeling the units as KiB, MiB, etc.

For us translators, this has been a continuing source of frustration. We 
wish to provide the correct translations of the units (KiB if it’s a KiB, kB 
if it’s a kB, kb if it’s a kb, etc.) as a service to the users, even if the 
original strings are incorrect. However, the inconsistent use of the letters 
make this very time-consuming, and sometimes very difficult.

Basically, for every every time we encounter a KB, a kb, or a similar 
string, we have to look up the source for the file containing the string, 
figure out where the string is used (which may be in a completely different 
source file), and what it means (dividing by 1024 or 1024 * 1024 indicates a 
KiB and a MiB, respectively).

How big is this problem? Quite big. Here are just some of the different 
strings used in various official KDE apps (I have not included strings for 
MiB, GiB, etc.):

KB
kB
kb
kBytes
kBi
kbit

Do you know what all of these means? Always? Do the author (frequently not). 
Do the user?

We have a similar issue when the units are used to measure speed or 
frequency. I have found all of the following in various KDE apps:

kbps
Kbps
kbs
kb/s
kB/s
KB/s
kbits/s
kbit/sec
kb/sec

Each time I have to look up to see if the author meant a 1000 bytes, 1024 
bytes, 1000 bits, 1024 bits, and then provide the correct translation, e.g., 
KiB/s or kb/s (which both follow the official SI system for derived units, 
where ‘ps’ or ‘/sec’ or ‘/secs’ is never used).

So, I’d ask the KDE developer to *please* clean up this mess.

Follow SI consistently. Preferably also use kibi and mebi units instead kilo 
and mega units (exceptions where decimal units are ‘standard’ is OK).

And if possible, please include comments with each string showing that you 
have done so (example: ‘Note: MiB = 1024 × 1024 bytes’, ‘Note: b = bit’, 
‘Note: B = byte’, ’Note: kb/s = 1000 bits per second’), so we don’t have to 
double-check the source code to ensure the author got it right.

Thanks.

-- 
Karl Ove Hufthammer
Translator for Norwegian Nynorsk


 
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