diff --git a/man3/confstr.3 b/man3/confstr.3
index cc5c63375..ce832f849 100644
--- a/man3/confstr.3
+++ b/man3/confstr.3
@@ -76,7 +76,7 @@ copies the value of the string to
 .I buf
 truncated to
 .I len \- 1
-characters if necessary, with a null byte (\(aq\\0\(aq) as terminator.
+bytes if necessary, with a null byte (\(aq\\0\(aq) as terminator.
 This can be detected by comparing the return value of
 .BR confstr ()
 against
diff --git a/man3/strcasecmp.3 b/man3/strcasecmp.3
index 26d4146e0..6186a7e0d 100644
--- a/man3/strcasecmp.3
+++ b/man3/strcasecmp.3
@@ -48,7 +48,7 @@ respectively, to be less than, to match, or be greater than \fIs2\fP.
 The
 .BR strncasecmp ()
 function is similar, except it only compares
-the first \fIn\fP characters of \fIs1\fP.
+the first \fIn\fP bytes of \fIs1\fP.
 .SH "RETURN VALUE"
 The
 .BR strcasecmp ()
diff --git a/man3/strcat.3 b/man3/strcat.3
index a6ec1a1c1..d0899cbb2 100644
--- a/man3/strcat.3
+++ b/man3/strcat.3
@@ -52,18 +52,18 @@ The
 .BR strncat ()
 function is similar, except that
 .IP * 3
-it will use at most \fIn\fP characters from \fIsrc\fP; and
+it will use at most \fIn\fP bytes from \fIsrc\fP; and
 .IP *
 \fIsrc\fP does not need to be null-terminated if it contains
-\fIn\fP or more characters.
+\fIn\fP or more bytes.
 .PP
 As with
 .BR strcat (),
 the resulting string in \fIdest\fP is always null-terminated.
 .PP
-If \fIsrc\fP contains \fIn\fP or more characters,
+If \fIsrc\fP contains \fIn\fP or more bytes,
 .BR strncat ()
-writes \fIn+1\fP characters to \fIdest\fP (\fIn\fP
+writes \fIn+1\fP bytes to \fIdest\fP (\fIn\fP
 from \fIsrc\fP plus the terminating null byte).
 Therefore, the size of \fIdest\fP must be at least
 \fIstrlen(dest)+n+1\fP.
diff --git a/man3/strcmp.3 b/man3/strcmp.3
index 46d7266ec..6fed9a867 100644
--- a/man3/strcmp.3
+++ b/man3/strcmp.3
@@ -50,7 +50,7 @@ to match, or be greater than \fIs2\fP.
 The
 .BR strncmp ()
 function is similar, except it only compares
-the first (at most) \fIn\fP characters of \fIs1\fP and \fIs2\fP.
+the first (at most) \fIn\fP bytes of \fIs1\fP and \fIs2\fP.
 .SH "RETURN VALUE"
 The
 .BR strcmp ()
diff --git a/man3/strcpy.3 b/man3/strcpy.3
index ce72ad8be..ee3ded78b 100644
--- a/man3/strcpy.3
+++ b/man3/strcpy.3
@@ -108,7 +108,7 @@ the length of \fIsrc\fP, then
 can be used.
 
 If there is no terminating null byte in the first \fIn\fP
-characters of \fIsrc\fP,
+bytes of \fIsrc\fP,
 .BR strncpy ()
 produces an unterminated string in \fIdest\fP.
 Programmers often prevent this mistake by forcing termination
diff --git a/man3/strdup.3 b/man3/strdup.3
index b74f20179..c3878ead5 100644
--- a/man3/strdup.3
+++ b/man3/strdup.3
@@ -86,9 +86,9 @@ and can be freed with
 The
 .BR strndup ()
 function is similar, but only copies at most
-\fIn\fP characters.
+\fIn\fP bytes.
 If \fIs\fP is longer than \fIn\fP, only \fIn\fP
-characters are copied, and a terminating null byte (\(aq\\0\(aq) is added.
+bytes are copied, and a terminating null byte (\(aq\\0\(aq) is added.
 
 .BR strdupa ()
 and
diff --git a/man3/strftime.3 b/man3/strftime.3
index 14d88e4d9..396295bfe 100644
--- a/man3/strftime.3
+++ b/man3/strftime.3
@@ -308,7 +308,7 @@ See also
 .SH "RETURN VALUE"
 The
 .BR strftime ()
-function returns the number of characters placed
+function returns the number of bytes placed
 in the array \fIs\fP, not including the terminating null byte,
 provided the string, including the terminating null byte, fits.
 Otherwise, it returns 0, and the contents of the array is undefined.
diff --git a/man3/strlen.3 b/man3/strlen.3
index 24778991e..ec57e8429 100644
--- a/man3/strlen.3
+++ b/man3/strlen.3
@@ -25,7 +25,7 @@
 .\"     Lewine's _POSIX Programmer's Guide_ (O'Reilly & Associates, 1991)
 .\"     386BSD man pages
 .\" Modified Sat Jul 24 18:02:26 1993 by Rik Faith (faith@cs.unc.edu)
-.TH STRLEN 3  2011-09-28 "GNU" "Linux Programmer's Manual"
+.TH STRLEN 3  2012-05-04 "GNU" "Linux Programmer's Manual"
 .SH NAME
 strlen \- calculate the length of a string
 .SH SYNOPSIS
@@ -42,7 +42,7 @@ function calculates the length of the string
 .SH "RETURN VALUE"
 The
 .BR strlen ()
-function returns the number of characters in \fIs\fP.
+function returns the number of bytes in the string \fIs\fP.
 .SH "CONFORMING TO"
 SVr4, 4.3BSD, C89, C99.
 .SH "SEE ALSO"
diff --git a/man3/strnlen.3 b/man3/strnlen.3
index a5b50dd70..75863ac96 100644
--- a/man3/strnlen.3
+++ b/man3/strnlen.3
@@ -39,20 +39,20 @@ _GNU_SOURCE
 .SH DESCRIPTION
 The
 .BR strnlen ()
-function returns the number of characters in the string
+function returns the number of bytes in the string
 pointed to by \fIs\fP, excluding the terminating null bye (\(aq\\0\(aq),
 but at most \fImaxlen\fP.
 In doing this,
 .BR strnlen ()
 looks only at the first
-\fImaxlen\fP characters at \fIs\fP and never beyond \fIs+maxlen\fP.
+\fImaxlen\fP bytes at \fIs\fP and never beyond \fIs+maxlen\fP.
 .SH "RETURN VALUE"
 The
 .BR strnlen ()
 function returns \fIstrlen(s)\fP, if that is less than
 \fImaxlen\fP, or \fImaxlen\fP
 if there is no null byte (\(aq\\0\(aq) among the first
-\fImaxlen\fP characters pointed to by \fIs\fP.
+\fImaxlen\fP bytes pointed to by \fIs\fP.
 .SH "CONFORMING TO"
 POSIX.1-2008.
 .SH "SEE ALSO"
diff --git a/man3/strpbrk.3 b/man3/strpbrk.3
index 95682e29c..97388ee57 100644
--- a/man3/strpbrk.3
+++ b/man3/strpbrk.3
@@ -27,7 +27,7 @@
 .\" Modified Sat Jul 24 18:01:24 1993 by Rik Faith (faith@cs.unc.edu)
 .TH STRPBRK 3  2010-09-20 "" "Linux Programmer's Manual"
 .SH NAME
-strpbrk \- search a string for any of a set of characters
+strpbrk \- search a string for any of a set of bytes
 .SH SYNOPSIS
 .nf
 .B #include <string.h>
@@ -38,13 +38,13 @@ strpbrk \- search a string for any of a set of characters
 The
 .BR strpbrk ()
 function locates the first occurrence in the
-string \fIs\fP of any of the characters in the string \fIaccept\fP.
+string \fIs\fP of any of the bytes in the string \fIaccept\fP.
 .SH "RETURN VALUE"
 The
 .BR strpbrk ()
-function returns a pointer to the character in
-\fIs\fP that matches one of the characters in \fIaccept\fP, or NULL
-if no such character is found.
+function returns a pointer to the byte in
+\fIs\fP that matches one of the bytes in \fIaccept\fP, or NULL
+if no such byte is found.
 .SH "CONFORMING TO"
 SVr4, 4.3BSD, C89, C99.
 .SH "SEE ALSO"
diff --git a/man3/strspn.3 b/man3/strspn.3
index d65f6f442..5ae0859e8 100644
--- a/man3/strspn.3
+++ b/man3/strspn.3
@@ -27,7 +27,7 @@
 .\" Modified Sat Jul 24 17:57:50 1993 by Rik Faith (faith@cs.unc.edu)
 .TH STRSPN 3  2010-09-20 "" "Linux Programmer's Manual"
 .SH NAME
-strspn, strcspn \- search a string for a set of characters
+strspn, strcspn \- search a string for a set of bytes
 .SH SYNOPSIS
 .nf
 .B #include <string.h>
@@ -39,25 +39,25 @@ strspn, strcspn \- search a string for a set of characters
 .SH DESCRIPTION
 The
 .BR strspn ()
-function calculates the length of the initial
-segment of \fIs\fP which consists entirely of characters in
+function calculates the length (in bytes) of the initial
+segment of \fIs\fP which consists entirely of bytes in
 \fIaccept\fP.
 .PP
 The
 .BR strcspn ()
 function calculates the length of the initial
-segment of \fIs\fP which consists entirely of characters not in
+segment of \fIs\fP which consists entirely of bytes not in
 \fIreject\fP.
 .SH "RETURN VALUE"
 The
 .BR strspn ()
-function returns the number of characters in
-the initial segment of \fIs\fP which consist only of characters
+function returns the number of bytes in
+the initial segment of \fIs\fP which consist only of bytes
 from \fIaccept\fP.
 .PP
 The
 .BR strcspn ()
-function returns the number of characters in
+function returns the number of bytes in
 the initial segment of \fIs\fP which are not in the string
 \fIreject\fP.
 .SH "CONFORMING TO"
diff --git a/man3/strtok.3 b/man3/strtok.3
index f5e4fc6c8..539ff3080 100644
--- a/man3/strtok.3
+++ b/man3/strtok.3
@@ -58,7 +58,7 @@ specified in \fIstr\fP.
 In each subsequent call that should parse the same string,
 \fIstr\fP should be NULL.
 
-The \fIdelim\fP argument specifies a set of characters that
+The \fIdelim\fP argument specifies a set of bytes that
 delimit the tokens in the parsed string.
 The caller may specify different strings in \fIdelim\fP in successive
 calls that parse the same string.
@@ -67,14 +67,14 @@ Each call to
 .BR strtok ()
 returns a pointer to a
 null-terminated string containing the next token.
-This string does not include the delimiting character.
+This string does not include the delimiting byte.
 If no more tokens are found,
 .BR strtok ()
 returns NULL.
 
-A sequence of two or more contiguous delimiter characters in
+A sequence of two or more contiguous delimiter bytes in
 the parsed string is considered to be a single delimiter.
-Delimiter characters at the start or end of the string are ignored.
+Delimiter bytes at the start or end of the string are ignored.
 Put another way: the tokens returned by
 .BR strtok ()
 are always nonempty strings.
@@ -123,7 +123,7 @@ These functions modify their first argument.
 .IP *
 These functions cannot be used on constant strings.
 .IP *
-The identity of the delimiting character is lost.
+The identity of the delimiting byte is lost.
 .IP *
 The
 .BR strtok ()
@@ -136,9 +136,9 @@ The program below uses nested loops that employ
 .BR strtok_r ()
 to break a string into a two-level hierarchy of tokens.
 The first command-line argument specifies the string to be parsed.
-The second argument specifies the delimiter character(s)
+The second argument specifies the delimiter byte(s)
 to be used to separate that string into "major" tokens.
-The third argument specifies the delimiter character(s)
+The third argument specifies the delimiter byte(s)
 to be used to separate the "major" tokens into subtokens.
 .PP
 An example of the output produced by this program is the following:
diff --git a/man3/strxfrm.3 b/man3/strxfrm.3
index b3b080aa1..898538d85 100644
--- a/man3/strxfrm.3
+++ b/man3/strxfrm.3
@@ -46,7 +46,7 @@ been transformed with
 is the same as the result of
 .BR strcoll (3)
 on the two strings before their transformation.
-The first \fIn\fP characters of the transformed string are placed in
+The first \fIn\fP bytes of the transformed string are placed in
 \fIdest\fP.
 The transformation is based on the program's current
 locale for category \fBLC_COLLATE\fP.  (See