Talk:Oman

Omani rials

 * I have moved this from my talk page to open the discussion up to other editors, and v to create a record of any decision we reach. Ground Zero (talk) 18:06, 21 January 2017 (UTC)

Hi, I see you've been making lots of changes to Oman articles. The copy editing is much appreciated, but I do have some concerns with your currency notations.

I understand your wish to avoid the official ISO notation; however just as with writing out 'pesos' in Mexican articles, writing out rials for every price is, I think, far from ideal. In Oman prices are commonly listed in Arabic with 'ر.ع.', or in English with 'OR', and not written out with 'rials'. This can be especially problematic with some prices which may include fractions of a rial, and as the rial is an especially high-value currency, rounding up is not always a good idea.

Can we please come to an agreement on this before you proceed further with wholesale currency edits? –StellarD (talk) 14:58, 21 January 2017 (UTC)
 * D, I'm always happy to work out a consensus on something. I found the " OMR0.500 " notation to be very unclear because it uses "O" and "0" in one string. But " 0.500 rials " is grammatically correct, just as we'd say " 0.5 metres ". Yes, each of those can be converted to smaller units to avoid using b the final place, but it isn't required. "Rials" is consistent with what WV:$ says. If "OR" is commonly used, I'm okay with that, but can we leave a space between the symbol and the number for clarity, i.e., " OR 100 "? Or is it more common to see " 100 OR "? (Seeing both of those, I still think "rials" is the least confusing, but I won't stand in the way of common practice.) Ground Zero (talk) 16:37, 21 January 2017 (UTC)


 * I also find using OMR clunky, but I'd added it to Omani articles as that was my understanding of policy, as outlined at the top of the page. As in Mexico, where 'peso' is rarely spelled out, in Oman 'rial' is also rarely spelled out. (There's also the side issue of whether it should be spelled 'rial' or 'riyal' – I've seen both used in Oman.) To be clear, I've seen prices in Oman listed as '100 OMR', 'OMR 100', 'OMR100', 'RO100', '100RO', and also as 'OR 100' or '100 OR'. At the moment though I can't find any examples of these last two styles online, so it appears that OMR is now more common (I last visited Oman three years ago). I'd be okay with 'OR 100', which is clean and unambiguous, but now on reflection I'm leaning more toward 'OMR 100', as that seems to be possibly more common online.


 * While we're talking about Omani currency, perhaps we should also address other regional currencies as well, including the Saudi riyal (SR?), Qatari riyal (QR?), the Bahraini dinar (BD?), and the UAE dirham (AED?). –StellarD (talk) 17:34, 21 January 2017 (UTC)


 * , where the abbreviated form is not standard, we should pick one and stick with it to make it easier for the reader to follow. I saw mostly OMR in the articles, but also OR and RO. I would go with one of the shorter versions, rather than the ISO code. I think we should take up the other Gulf states on their respective talk pages. Ground Zero (talk) 18:06, 21 January 2017 (UTC)


 * After looking at a few more hotel websites, it now seems to me that OMR is definitely more common than other formats. –StellarD (talk) 18:21, 21 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I would expect hotel's sites to use the ISO code because many people would be accessing the site from outside of the country. Unfortunately, cafes, restaurants, souks and shops tend not to have websites. The Central Bank of Oman uses " RO ## " (and spells it "rial"). So does the government's Oman News Agency. That wouldn't be a bad reason to choose that format. Ground Zero (talk) 19:49, 21 January 2017 (UTC)
 * 'RO 100' seems to me to be a good solution. It would be helpful if another editor could also voice his/her opinion, though, as I'm not sure this follows standard protocol. –StellarD (talk) 10:10, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * WV:$ does not answer every question for us when there are various notations used within a country. It starts off by saying, "Ideally, we want something that is easily readable by an English speaker, conveniently short, and easy for an editor to use; of course those goals sometimes conflict." So I think we have to use some judgement, and input from other editors would help use get there. Ground Zero (talk) 19:19, 23 January 2017 (UTC)