Your Battery Number Is a Guess

That battery number is a guess. Tag the friend who panics at ten percent. Your phone shows a battery percentage, a clean, exact-looking number sitting right there in the corner of the screen. It feels like a plain fact.

Taj postotak baterije samo je nagađanje. Označi prijatelja koji panično reagira na deset posto. Tvoj telefon pokazuje postotak baterije, uredan i točan broj u kutu ekrana. Djeluje kao čista činjenica.

It is not a direct measurement. There is no simple way to open up a battery and read how much power is left inside it. Instead, the phone checks the voltage and the flow of electricity moving through the battery, then runs those numbers through a small program that estimates the rest, based on how similar batteries usually behave.

To nije izravno mjerenje. Ne postoji jednostavan način da se baterija otvori i pročita koliko je energije još u njoj. Umjesto toga telefon provjerava napon i protok struje kroz bateriju, pa te brojke provuče kroz mali program koji ostatak procjenjuje na temelju toga kako se slične baterije obično ponašaju.

That is why the number can jump around strangely, dropping fast in cold weather or staying stuck at one percent for far longer than expected. The battery itself is not broken. The phone is only guessing, as carefully as it possibly can, and updating its guess every few seconds.

Zato broj zna čudno skakati, brzo padati po hladnoći ili ostati zaglavljen na jedan posto puno dulje nego što očekuješ. Baterija nije pokvarena. Telefon samo nagađa, koliko god pažljivo može, i svoju procjenu osvježava svakih nekoliko sekundi.