The issues which bring us here are getting attention in many places around the world -- and what just about all of them have in common is that, by their very nature, they are very local undertakings. All these initiatives are also very absorbing and a lot of hard work for those who are trying to make them work. Which does not leave those who are most directly involved -- i.e., those who know most about our topics -- the time to do a great deal of general writing. And when they do, it is usually for utilitarian reasons, which invariably means in the language of the place.
Thus we have today a situation in which a good number of initiatives along the lines that interests us in the Forum are taking place in different places and different language cultures. On the other hand, the common language of the Net, for better or for worse, is, for the time being at least, English… or at least some approximation thereof.
Which brings us to our immediate problem. How are we, in the modest framework which constitutes our regional forum, ever going to be able to bridge this gap? One option of course is just to ignore anything that is going on outside of our language group (And that of course is what most of us have done pretty much up to now). Another is to find a lot of money and do real translations of everything out there that comes onto the screen (but indeed, can we be sure that there is anyone who will in fact wish to read them?). Our choice is to see what we can do with all this by way of low cost machine translations. We are taking this in small steps as you will see in the section that follows.
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Using AltaVista's Systran Utility
Starting in early 1999, we began the practice of placing direct on-menu links to AltaVista's Systran Translation Utility, as you will see from the Translate Text button that appears to your immediate left here.
This little utility (it's free!) is showing us the direction in which
we are heading. To use it to translate web pages or text between 5 major languages, just click the
Translate Page link to your left. It's not perfect but the page will be much more understandable if you aren't fluent in French, German, Italian, Spanish or Portuguese... or English, if any of those is your starting point Might as well start taking advantage
of it now.
Once the small Systran window appears, all you have to do is either to place the address (URL) of the Web page you wish to translate into the indicated box, or type in your plain text for translation. At that point you then select the language pair and the direction in which you wish to work, and to wait t see what Systran has to offer. (When you work with frames, as is the case with The Commons, you may have to negotiate another intermediate step. The Systran box will indicate at that point that there is a "Frame Error", and ask that you select from a list of three which of the frames it is you wish to translate. Your choice in our case will normally be that address which does not indicate either TITLE or MENU, that being the content of the main text frame. At that point all you have to do is click your preference and your rough translation will shortly appear.
What do you then do at that point? Well, if you really wish to dig into your topic, we propose that you then save the page, which can then be read in parallel with the original language version. We find that by keeping the two before our eyes at the same time, we are able to get best value out of the rough machine translations. (AltaVista offers has a useful page TRANSLATE HELP, which we recommend that you check out before undertaking your first translation.)
Linking the AltaVista Utility Directly to Your Browser
If you find that this is useful, you may want to consider attaching this translation utility to your browser. Once you have done that you can then access AltaVista Translation directly as a button or bookmark in your browser. (It will look like the icon to your right here, which you could already use, for example, to translate this page.) The great advantage of having direct access to the icon on your browser is that it will automatically select the Web page you or on for translation. Since it is so easy to use, you may find that you use it more often and to greater effect.
Right-Click Translation: AltaVista's Babel Fish can also be used to translate segments of text within web pages. Simply highlight text that you wish to translate, right-click and select "AV Translate Selection". A pop-up window will appear with the text for translation. Choose a language and click the translate button. Et voila! You have translated text.
Lernout & Hauspie Power Translator
Back here at The Commons, we also work with
Lernout & Hauspie Power Translator Pro 6.4 with some satisfaction.
It is an English-centric, bi-directional engine, which means that you can translate to and from English to the five available languages: Spanish,
German, French, Italian, and Portuguese. It also links quite handily to our word processors, email and Web browsers, and has configurable dictionaries and capabilities that allow you to configure them so that they get better at handling your materials as you go along. As an indication of the speed with which it works, it averages around 1000 words per minute on a Pentium 90 computer.
We use Power Translator Pro not only for our own work at The Commons, but from time to time to give a hand to colleagues who prepare newsletters in other languages that we feel provide useful information for English langue audiences. In those cases, we simply use the software to crank out its best translation and turn over the file via email to our distant colleagues who them take a bit of time to fine tune to render the final product acceptable. Nobody aims for perfection -- just good enough communication, aimed at people who care enough to make an effort to put all this into context. Some of us think that it's great.
Intertran
The following information on this commercial software package is provided by way of information, and in reponse to the fact that our present machine tranlsation caabilty at The Commons is presently limited to the six languages indicated above. InterTran by contrast offers capabilities in Bosnian, Brazilian Portuguese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, and Welsh. For details go to their home page at InterTran Web Site Translation Server.
We cannot yet however vouch for the quality or speed of their translations, though by way of trial we have their agreement to draw the following to your attention, which you can use as indicated. (And if you have any reactions to or suggestions on this, we would be pleased to hear from you. We can then share your comments with the others on this site and, if you wish, the InterTran team.)
Translation Experts Ltd. is pleased to provide this link to the InterTran (tm) multi-language translation system for webpages and text. The translations are not perfect but they can give you a general idea of what is being communicated. Some of the languages have more limited lexicons then others so the quality of translation can vary between the languages. We always suggest that if you need critical translations hire a translator or take the time to learn the language that you want to communicate in. Any text or webpages that are translated will appear within this webpage frame. Some of the languages will need additonal support for specific fonts.
Working with Machine Translations
Here in closing is a small suggestion that will take you just a few minutes and may help you to get a feel for how you can make this work, aller/retour as we say her in downtown Paris France:
1. Have a look at the rather good hints that are set out on the GlobaLink page on "Preparing English Source Text" at www.lhsl.com/mt/powertrans/glinksourcetext_eng.asp2. With those in mind (put 'em aside for a moment actually) compose a paragraph in your usual writing style and submit it to the free Systran Free On-line Translation link -- and inspect versus your original.
3. Then go back and rewrite in tighter declarative sentences with rather better attention to clear phrasing.
4. Try that and inspect the result. It will surely change the way you go about writing for a multi-lingual audience the next time around -- translation or no.
Your Comments, Suggestions
Have a comment or observation on this language business? This is the place to make it. Better yet, why not send your reply direct to the @Forum so that your comments and ideas can get to the others immediately?
 AB2010
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Fecha de creación: 16 Octubre 1999