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Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

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Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#141

Post by nephanth »

ghaff wrote: post #129
katbyte wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither of those are as important as “when water freezes” (ice snow weather effects), boils, and having a nice 100d in between

The freezing point of water is indeed one reasonable origin point but the temperature at which water boil (at sea level) isn't very relevant to most people's day to day experiences much less having a nice interval between the two points. You have to use Kelvin as an absolute scale for a lot of scientific and engineering calculations anyway although it would be pretty silly for day-to-day use.

I'd argue that boiling water (or water-based liquids) is something we encounter pretty often in day to day life (eg. while cooking, brewing tea, ), making it a reasonable reference

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#142

Post by nephanth »

sgarland wrote: post #103
dontlaugh wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s even worse, the US has different gallons from the rest of the world.

To be fair, imperial gallons are based on 10 lbs of water (with very specific atmospheric conditions), which while a nice round number, isn’t as easy to recreate as the U.S. gallon, which is 231 cubic inches. Of course, liters make way more sense than either of these.

Out of curiosity, how dit it end up being that weird 231 number? Why not 230? Or a nice 200?

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#143

Post by [deleted] »

aib wrote: post #96
quintussss wrote: post #32

One thing that really annoys me is youtube translating video titles - why would I ever want the title of an english language video to be translated?

At least you get English videos. A couple of times I've gotten videos in... Hindu, I think, by searching in English and clicking on a video with an English title. And it was a technical video, not much language-independent content.

[deleted]

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#144

Post by nephanth »

orlp wrote: post #59
quintussss wrote: post #32

One thing that really annoys me is youtube translating video titles - why would I ever want the title of an english language video to be translated?

If I didn't speak English, I'm sure I would appreciate it. E.g. to swap the roles, while I'm sure some wouldn't mind but I'd guess that the majority of people who watch anime appreciate the anime titles have English translations, even if they watch in Japanese (with subtitles).

Um, not sure it has any point except if there are available subtitles in your language though

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#145

Post by brucedawson »

katbyte wrote: post #121
shalmanese wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do frameworks deal with the miles/gallon -> liters/100km conversion? I've always found that one particularly interesting as one that requires inverting the units also.

Which gallon? There are two different ones (and for even more fun Canada and us don’t use the same)

I blogged about that also:

https://randomascii.wordpress.com/2016/03/01/cars-in-canada-...

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#146

Post by brucedawson »

recursive wrote: post #124
pests wrote: post #61

Isn't ths following incorrect.... somehow? Something doesn't line up. ---- Reading the article I found this: parts of Malawi saw a maximum temperature of 43C (109F), compared with an average of nearly 25C (77F) As I expected the actual temperature increase was 32 °F, not 68 °F. --- Except the error should have been 32 (which you go on to explain, because we add 32 to start a conversion) and the correct temp differenc…

The original article started by rounding an 18 degree difference up to 20.

Yeah, I was a bit imprecise there. I didn't expect a difference of exactly 32, but I did expect something of that magnitude.

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#147

Post by brucedawson »

ginko wrote: post #36
matsemann wrote: post #16

A bit related, but I hate how many errors I get because I want my system language to be English instead of my native language (Norwegian) on my laptop, phone etc. Because I don't want a badly translated experience. However, I still want units in meters, Celsius, dates written sensibly, time in 24h format etc. But not all apps understand this, which is quite annoying. It's like they only look at the language and make…

IMO the worst is that cal starts weeks on Sundays for some weird reason.

Blame the bible. God created the world in six days, and rested on the seventh, which was Saturday.

The real question is why the weekend was defined as straddling the last and first days of the week. Weird.

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#148

Post by alpaca128 »

meithecatte wrote: post #78
alpaca128 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MS Visio refused to run in anything other than English on a PC I used because Windows was set to a specific flavor of German which Visio didn't have in its language list. As far as I could tell there was no way to change the program's language other than changing the OS language and reinstalling Visio. Now Firefox added stupid popups offering translating websites written in my native language because the OS is set to…

Pretty sure you can just click the dotted menu button on that popup and select "do not translate from $LANG".

But it still shows an icon on every non-english page despite me disabling the entire feature. Like back then with the unremovable Pocket button. What's the point of the program letting me unclutter the UI with the "customize toolbar" feature when it's constantly blocked for Mozilla's annoying feature of the month?

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#149

Post by benhurmarcel »

mikewarot wrote: post #5

If you want "twice as hot" to be meaningful, you have to use an absolute scale, either Kelvin or Rankine. (1 K = 1.8 °R) Doubling absolute temperature doubles the pressure (at constant volume) or volume (at constant pressure) of an ideal gas. This gets really important when it comes to compressing and expanding air and other gasses. Room temperature is approximately 293 K, twice that is 586 K / 595 °F / 313 °C. Hotte…

The Python package "pint" (to manage units) implements that with different units for absolute temperature vs delta temperatures.

https://pint.readthedocs.io/en/stable/user/nonmult.html

Re: Localization Failure: Temperature Is Hard

#150

Post by wink »

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #106
odiroot wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I usually set my system to English / Ireland. I get English but with normal units and € as a default currency.

I think en_IE is a rather undersold/underpromoted "international/european english" locale that more people should know about!

I was recently recommended English (Canadian) for that reason but I've not yet managed to get Google Maps on my mobile to show me km instead of miles, no matter what setting. (It's not the account, because a desktop browser on a Windows with en_US and accept-language en/US will show km with English text). It is indeed infuriating.
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