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[on:]

I just put a new fan up in my bathroom, one with humidity sensor and timer in.

The manual told me that the red pot was timer, and the blue humidity... But the way it started and stopped made absolutely no sense...

Turned out that the red is humidity, and the blue timer... To top that, the + for humidity is higher, and - is lower... While for the timer + is shorter and - is longer...

What an awesome manual that was...

Only thing it actually said right, was that it was a 230V fan, and it needed a neutral and a live wire... (drawing of the two was actually mirrored to how they were on the board inside the fan)

[Reply #1 on:]

Wife used to put logos on stuff for the tech companies. She got a batch of little MP3 players in and the instructions had gems something along the lines of "Please to be putting insert to USB for charge."

[Reply #2 on:]

I love these.  You really can see how they try... but really somehow manage to *miss* the intended goal.

[Reply #3 on:]

Over here (USA) many documents like that are infamous for their language (Engrish).

http://engrishfunny.failblog.org/

[Reply #4 on:]

I bought a back-up DMM on eBay last week, the VC97+.  It's not a Fluke, but it's a nice meter for the price.  

Everything except the manual, that is.  Here are a few gems, exactly as written:

• hFE hole: to measure hFE of triode
• The completely measurement includes forward and backward measurement, if the result can not meet with the above, it means the diode is workless.
• Handle the multiyear gently and carefully. Dropping it can damage the circuit boards and case and can cause the multi-meter to work improperly although the holster can provide  enough protection,and case and can cause the multi-meter to work improperly although the holster can provide enough protection.
• The function stated for this User Manual cannot be the reason of special usage.
• The content of the manual is regarded as correct, error or omits Pls. contact with factory.

[Reply #5 on:]

•hFE hole: to measure hFE of triode
•The completely measurement includes forward and backward measurement, if the result can not meet with the above, it means the diode is workless.
•Handle the multiyear gently and carefully. Dropping it can damage the circuit boards and case and can cause the multi-meter to work improperly although the holster can provide enough protection,and case and can cause the multi-meter to work improperly although the holster can provide enough protection.
•The function stated for this User Manual cannot be the reason of special usage.
•The content of the manual is regarded as correct, error or omits Pls. contact with factory

;D ;D

well this is something i noticed
 

[Reply #6 on:]

As I work for a Korean company, and are in the presence of Korean citizens all day every day and deal with a factory in Indonesia constantly, it honestly took me a second read to find the faults

but when you hear crap like "a good riddance party" (farewell) daily and try to explain why men in the US do not wear pink V neck sweaters ... I guess you start to interpret unknowingly

[Reply #7 on:]

What I don't understand is why don't they hire somebody to read the text and straighten it out.

Any student would probably do it for lunch money.

______
Rob

[Reply #8 on:]

To be fair, the film industry in the US (Hollywood) has the same issue with many foreign languages (well, I can vouch only for Russian). They brutalize russian, it's just pathetic that multimillion $ productions can't get a russian speaking (w.o an accent) person to voice over those scenes where there is foreign dialog (I assume it would be harder to find a fluent bilingual actor that can pull both languages without any accent that would also fit a role in a given movie).

[Reply #9 on:]

What I don't understand is why don't they hire somebody to read the text and straighten it out.

Why bother?  You already own the device and they already got their money.

[Reply #10 on:]

What I don't understand is why don't they hire somebody to read the text and straighten it out.

Actually, there is a reason why this isn't done.  With technical product documentation, you have to have a working knowledge of the language, the technology, and the product.  Take, for example, the line I quoted from the DMM manual:

hFE hole: to measure hFE of triode

There's nothing wrong from a language perspective with triode, but it's horribly wrong from a technology perspective.  How many people outside of the engineering field would know that hFE is a transistor parameter?

I have to correct the work of tech writers all the time.  Their English is great, but they often change the meaning of the original material because they don't understand software terminology.