Skip to Content

Submit your nominations for the Luxist Awards' Best in Decor
AOL Tech

google-translate posts

Filed under: Web services, Google, Web

Google launches universal translation tool for web publishers

Google Translate Widget
Google Translate certainly isn't the first machine-based translation engine that lets you translate text or entire web pages from one language to another. But it's certainly one of the most prevalent. And something tells me it's about to get even more ubiquitous, as Google has just launched a gadget that web publishers can use to let users translate pages to any language with the click of a button.

For instance, if you publish a web site in English but notice that a significant portion of your traffic comes from Germany, Japan, or elsewhere you can add a box to your sidebar (or anywhere on your web page) that lets readers choose their language from a drop-down menu. Google wil go to work translating the page and a small toolbar will pop up at the top of the page alerting readers tot he fact that the page has been translated. There's also a button to restore the site to its original language.

The most obvious benefit is that readers can translate your page without copying and pasting the URL into Google Translate. But there are a few other advantages as well. First, the tool adds a few letters to the end of the URL for any translated page, but it doesn't append "translate.google.com" to the start of the page, thereby robbing you of page views.

Second, if your site is in English and a visitor's browser settings are set to, say, Estonian, the toolbar should pop up automatically prompting them to translate the page. This could make your site a heck of a lot more attractive to international traffic.

Of course, the results are only as good as Google Translate's normal translations, which is to say, not very. While you can usually get the gist of articles translated by the service, you wouldn't really want to read literature converted from Russian to English via Google.

Filed under: Google, Web

Oy gevalt! Google Translate adds 9 new languages, including Yiddish

Google Translate
Google has added 9 new languages to its web-based translation service. That means Google Translate now supports 51 different languages, and 2550 language pairs.

Google Translate already had dozens of widely used languages including English, French, German, Japanse, Chinese, and Russian as well as some more obscure languages. The latest 9 probably fall into the latter category. We're talking, Afrikaans, Belarusian, Icelandic, Irish, Macedonian, Malay, Swahili, Welsh and Yiddish.

Of course, while users can suggest translations and help make the service better, the bulk of the work is still done by machines. And that means that most translations are a bit less than perfect. If I spoke Belarusian or Icelandic I could probably tell you just how imperfect. But if you take an English phrase, translate it first into one language, then translate the resulting phrase into another and then try to convert it to English, you'll likely see what I mean. It's kind of like playing a long game of telephone.

On the other hand, machine translation is still better than no translation, and the latest addition makes it much easier to read foreign newspapers and communicate with people who speak other languages, even if your grammar is going to be a bit off.

Filed under: Internet, Office, Google, Web

Google Docs now supports translation into 42 languages

Google Docs translate
Google has added a "translate document" option to the tools area of Google Docs. This lets you translate the text of any document to 42 languages. You can either replace the original file with the translation or copy the translation to a new document which you can share with collaborators or export as a DOC, HTML, PDF, RTF, TXT, or OpenOffice.org file.

You could also use the tool to import documents written in another language and translate them to one that you speak. Of course, the machine translations won't be any better than what we've come to expect from the Google Translate web service. But garbled machine translation is better than no translation... usually.

Translation is available for documents, but not for spreadsheets or presentations.

Filed under: Security, Utilities, Web services, Microblogging

Translate before you tweet, using Twinslator

As Twitter's worldwide growth continues, non-English-speakers are adopting it in larger numbers. And when we don't all speak the same language, it might sometimes be necessary to translate a tweet into something other than your native tongue. Twinslator makes that very easy, by providing what's essentially a mashup of Twitter and Google Translate. It's a translator you can tweet from.

If you don't translate very often, it might not thrill you to save a minute or so and a little copy-paste from the regular Google Translate site. If you do it frequently, though, Twinslator could be great for you. Twinslator also wisely gives you the option of double-posting the original tweet and the translation, so the maximum number of your followers will get the message. Even if it's not likely to be wildly popular, it's still nice to see someone acknowledging the global scope of Twitter and attempting to connect cultures

Filed under: Fun, Text, Time-Wasters, Web, Humor

Translation Party achieves hilarious results using Google Translate - Time Waster

Translation Party is a site that automates the old trick of running a sentence through machine translation until it's humorously unintelligible.

Instead of manually copy-pasting into Babelfish or Google Translate, you can just put in a phrase once, hit enter, and watch as Translation Party passes it back and forth between English and Japanese, getting further from your original meaning every time.

The translation doesn't stop until it reaches equilibrium, meaning that it repeatedly gets the same English result every time. Some phrases never achieve equilibrium, but Translation Party knows when that's happening and gives up after a while.

As an example of the strange results you might end up with, check out what came out when I put the first sentence of this post into Translation Party: "Party, machine translation, translation SAITOYUMORASU, perform the most common way to get to know me."

Filed under: Office, Web services, Google

Google Translate now handles uploaded documents

Google Translate documents
Google Translate already provided tools that let users translate snippets of text or entire web pages by entering a URL and choosing the source and output languages. Now you can also upload documents to translate.

Google quietly added the option sometime int he last few days. there's not a ton of information about the new feature available, but it appears to handle TXT, HTML, XLS, DOC, and PDF files reasonably well. It choked on an OpenOffice Sheet ODS file I tried to upload.

The results are spit out in HTML format, so if you upload a spreadsheet you won't get a translated, downloadable spreadsheet in return. Instead you'll get an HTML table. But this isn't a bad start. I wouldn't be surprised if Google eventually adds the ability to open translated documents in Google Docs.

[via Google Operating System]

Filed under: Internet, Google, Education

Google's Translator Toolkit helps humans improve machine translation

Google's automated translation service, Google Translate, is one of the most popular language tools on the web, but Google has other ambitions in the translation field. The recently-launched Translator Toolkit is aimed at helping people create better translations of web pages, Wikipedia articles and Google Knol articles. These improved translations feed back into Google Translate, making it more accurate for everyday users.

If you're a translator, you can upload a file or enter a URL, and use the Translation Toolkit to improve on Google's automated translation results. Available tools include dictionaries and previously-saved user translations. Once you're done working on your translation, you can download it, or - for Wikipedia and Knol articles - publish it back to the source page.

Filed under: E-mail, Google

Gmail adds email translation features: Is this helpful?

Gmail translate
Google has a lot of different services under its roof. And sometimes it makes a lot of sense to combine them. For example, Google Docs is an online office suite. And people often send Office documents as email attachments. So it's kind of a no-brainer to let users open or preview PDF, DOC, and other file sent to their Gmail addresses.

Google also has a web-based language translator. It comes in handy if you're trying to read a news item on a web site in a language you don't speak. But I'm not sure I really need this feature in my email. I don't tend to correspond with people who speak languages that I can't understand via email. But maybe that's just me. Because Google just rolled out a new Gmail labs feature that lets you add a translation button to messages in your inbox in a foreign language.

I suppose there is one area where this could be useful. If you have a friend who speaks German as their first language, but who also speaks English, you may find yourself corresponding most frequently in English. But while he might be able to keep up with a little work, he may find it easier to hit the translate button. Unfortunately, computer translations are usually bad enough that even if his English isn't great, he may find them harder to understand after they're translated.

Filed under: Internet, Utilities, Windows, Freeware

Fried Babelfish takes Google Translate out of your browser

Fried Babelfish
Fried Babelfish is a desktop application for Windows that lets you translate text from one language into another. Despite its name, the program is powered by Google Translate, not Babelfish (an older version used the Babelfish web translation service).

You need an internet connection to use Fried Babelfish, but you do not need a web browser. This makes it easy to translate text in one window while typing in another without having to flip back and forth beween browser tabs or windows. It can come in handy if you're instant messaging someone who speaks a different language or if you just need to translate a few words on a web page you're reading.

Fried Babelfish was created as one of 35 freeware applications as part of the Donation Coder New Apps for the New Year challenge.

Filed under: Internet, Google, Web

How to say where is the bathroom in 34 languages at once

NiceTranslator
Planning a trip around the globe and need to make sure you know how to ask for directions to the train station in two dozen languages? Nice Translator can help.

Nice Translator is powered by Google Translate, so you get the same results from Google. But the interface is incredibly easy to use. Just select the languages you want to translate text into and start typing. Nice Translator will convert your words as soon as you type them.

The site also works on mobile devices like the iPhone if you happen to need to ask a passing stranger if you're getting a good price on that souvenir you've been haggling over. The answer, by the way, is probably no.

[via WebWare]

Filed under: Utilities, Productivity, Web services, Education

Frengly does translation, but does it beat Babelfish?


The biggest players in the online translation game are Yahoo! Babelfish and Google Translate. They both have their unique charms, but a site called Frengly might offer a little competition. Its selection of languages isn't quite as extensive as Google's -- you won't find Hindi, Latvian or Catalan, for example -- but it does offer more languages and more combinations than Babelfish. Frengly's killer feature is auto-detection, though.

Frengly's language detection is even cooler than Google's, for a couple of reasons. First, you don't have to select auto-detection from a language list, like you do in Google Translate. If it's automatic, why should it take an extra step?
Second, you don't have to select a target language from a menu. You can just click it, and the original text remains on screen. If you want another language, just click again.

Frengly doesn't do webpages, and doesn't have a bookmarklet. If that's the bulk of what you want to do, stick with Google for now. On the other hand, it does save a list of your translations. If you're looking for a translator to help you do homework or understand a few words in a book you're reading, look no further.

Filed under: Web services, Google, web 2.0

Google adds instant translation to Google Reader

Google Reader translate
Google Reader, Bloglines and other RSS readers make it easy to keep on top of the latest news from dozens, or even hundreds of web pages without actually visiting those pages. But if you want to read a web site that constantly covers news you're interested in, and just happens to be in a language you don't speak, in the past you've needed to exit your RSS reader and load the page in Google Translate or Windows Live Translate or a similar service.

Or you could use a service like Mloovi to translate the RSS feed, but Mloovi has a few limitations, like the inability to show pictures or full feeds. Now it looks like Google is taking things into its own hands, by combining Google Reader with Google Translate.

Here's how it works. Just subscribe to a blog or news site in another language (assuming you can find the subscribe button). Then go to the feed settings in Google Reader and select "Translate into my language." That's it. You only have to do this once per feed and Google Reader will automatically translate that page until you tell it to stop.

Keep in mind, these are machine-generated translations, so they're far from perfect. But if you don't have time to learn French just to read a few articles from Le Monde from time to time, this could be the next best thing. Or maybe the thing after that.

Filed under: Internet, Web services, Google

Google Translate becomes even more useful

Google TranslateGoogle has udated its language translation page, adding support for Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Finnish, Hindi, Norwegian, Polish, and Swedish. That brings the total number of language you can translate to and from to 24.

But the most useful feature of the new Google Translate is the automatic language detection feature. You no longer have to select the language of a web page in order to translate it to English. Just choose "Detect language" and Google will attempt to figure out the source language for you and translate the page or text to the language of your choice.

Of course, the machine translation is still far from perfect. But awkward phrases and baffling idiom translations are a small price to pay for being able to read Norwegian newspapers.

[via Google Operating System]

Filed under: Internet, Blogging, Google, Microsoft

Add a translation widget to your web page

Translate widgetsThe beauty of the web is that your personal homepage could have an international audience. Of course, visitors from Russia, Korea, or Japan might have a hard time reading your English-only website.

There are plenty of tools out there that let proactive internet users translate a web page. But you can also make it easy on visitors by adding translation widgets to your blog or web site.

This week Microsoft released a widget for Windows Live Translator. And it's pretty slick. All you have to do is copy a tiny bit of code to your web page, and a drop down box will show up on your site letting visitors know that they can "translate this site" in a variety of languages including German, Spanish, Portuguese, and Chinese.

If you're more of a Google person, we also dug up a widget that uses Google Translate, but it's a bit less elegant. This widget will simply add a series of links to your page that let visitors know they can translate the site into Arabic, German, Portuguese, Chinese, and so on.

What tricks do you have for making your web site internationally friendly?

Update: Google has launched an official translation widget for your web page as well. Their widget doesn't blend into all web sites very well just yet (it assumes you have a white background), but does offer a faster translation.

[via Bink.nu]

Filed under: Internet, Web services, Google, Microsoft

Google Translate changes its translation engine

Google translates us into Japanese
Google has dumped Systran, the company that had been powering much of Google's web-based language translation service. Google had developed its own machine translation skill, but until recently, Google was only using its own technology to translate Arabic, Chinese, and Russian text and web sites. Now Google is using its own engine to translate 25 different language pairs.

Machine translation is an imperfect science. The computer translates most words literally and doesn't do a great job of capturing nuance or proper sentence structure. It doesn't appear that Google Translate is any more accurate today than it was a few weeks ago. But the move should help Google set its service apart from competing offerings from Babel Fish and Microsoft. Both companies' translation services are powered by Systran.

[via Google Operating System]

Featured Time Waster

Graveyard Shift - zombie-busting Time Waster

With Halloween fast approaching, it's a great time to get in some practice defending your territory against zombies. In Graveyard Shift, you take aim at zombies and other creepy-crawlies, blasting them into splatters of cartoony green guts. It's a casual first-person shooter, and it's very easy to get the hang of - use the mouse to aim, click to fire. Graveyard Shift has at least 15 levels, and it might even have some secret stages I haven't unlocked yet. They key to getting good at Graveyard Shift is learning to use ...

View more Time Wasters

Featured Galleries

Defective by Design, London: Protest Pictures
Microsoft Security Essentials
Chromium Pre-Alpha on CrunchBang Linux
Safari 4 Beta
10 Firefox themes that don't suck
IE8 RC1
Download Squad at the Crunchies After-Party
Download Squad at the Crunchies
WordPress 2.7
Cooking Mama: Mama Kills Animals
Windows 7 Hands On
Comodo Internet Security
Android First-look: Amazon.com MP3 Store
Android First-look: Twitroid
Google Reader Android
Android Hands-On
Twine 1.0
Photoshop Express Beta
Mozilla Birthday Cake
Palm stuff
Adobe Lightroom 1.1

 


Follow us on Twitter!

Flickr Pool

www.flickr.com

More Tech Coverage

AOL Radio

Joystiq

TUAW

Daily Finance

Autoblog

Urlesque

Engadget

WoW

Switched.com

FanHouse