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| ruskivyetr Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5483 days ago 769 posts - 962 votes  Speaks: English*, German Studies: Spanish, Russian, Polish, Modern Hebrew | Message 2 of 8 02 February 2011 at 4:04am | IP Logged | ||
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I don't mean to be a downer on Google Translate, but...
It's interesting, but it doubt that it would ever be more efficient than a tourist learning a few shopping phrases from a phrase book or the clerk using English (which would be more likely in Germany). Now in a country where not many people speak English, it would be somewhat of use, but I must admit, if I saw someone using that in a store with a clerk or at a public office to get a visa or something, I'd probably laugh. It just looks silly to me. Plus I doubt a conversational translator would pick up mumbles (as exemplified here when it mistranslates "Welche Farbe"). The language in the conversation would also probably become a bit more complex, and I don't think that it would produce very comprehensible sentences in those cases, as spoken language is very fragmented and not as "translator ready" as written language (as in you don't say things in a way that an electronic translator would be able to translate). For example, when you're talking, you usually have endless connections of different independent clauses, subordinate clauses, etc. You just go on and on, with the occasional "vocal period", although you still wouldn't pause for that long. This would just be too much for the translator. Think also about regional accents. If he were to ask a Bavarian person or a Swiss person to say something in Standard German, it wouldn't be able to make heads or tales of it, whereas someone who speaks rudimentary German would (albeit missing a lot, but getting the important details). And this only applies to standard German, don't even get me started on the dialects. This is interesting technology, but I don't see this ever becoming practical for use in conversation. Now speech giving and diplomatic conversation, perhaps. In those cases, the speech is usually prepared or much more refined/correct. I could see it being used for something like that, but not something like the store clerk situation. So that's just my little rant about this for the technology at the moment. I'm sure it will get better over time, and therefore make my argument invalid, but I still would rather speak German in a shoe shop :). Edited by ruskivyetr on 02 February 2011 at 4:18am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| zekecoma Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5346 days ago 561 posts - 655 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 3 of 8 02 February 2011 at 9:10am | IP Logged | ||
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It does sound interesting. But Google Translator sucks for English <=> German.If you
translate it from English to German, it doesn't put it in the correct sentence order 100% of the time. Luckily I am learning the language so I shouldn't really worry about using this, plus I'd be too embarrassed to use something like that. I would use that one app that translated pictures of things. Normally for me, I'd learn phrases if I planned to go to a foreign country or make friends with some so they could help me instead of wondering at it alone. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| translator2 Senior Member United States Joined 6921 days ago 848 posts - 1862 votes Speaks: English* | Message 5 of 8 02 February 2011 at 3:10pm | IP Logged | ||
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See these links:
Google translate not ready for serious debates Google translators Edited by translator2 on 02 February 2011 at 3:10pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tommus Senior Member CanadaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5868 days ago 979 posts - 1688 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Dutch, French, Esperanto, German, Spanish | Message 6 of 8 02 February 2011 at 3:15pm | IP Logged | ||
Don't take this comment as a criticism. It is just to point out how difficult it is for Google Translate to translate all the many subtle variations of our 'human' sentences. For example: Would Google Translate translate your sentence into something that meant: 1. It doesn't ever get the word order correct. 2. It doesn't ever get the word order 100% correct. 3. It doesn't always get the word order 100% correct. I find that if I construct simple sentences, keeping in mind the word patterns, etc. in the target language, GT does very well. It takes some learning and attention to use GT effectively, and to recognise, interpret and correct its errors. This learning comes from practice and attention. But when you give it a good chance, GT can do quite well, at least in some language pairs. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6584 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 7 of 8 02 February 2011 at 3:24pm | IP Logged | ||
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Of course it's not very reliable or accurate. It's the first version! It's experimental at this stage. But we have to think about where this technology was ten years ago. Now imagine what it will be like ten years from now. Words like "never" should never be used in discussions about technology.
3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| zekecoma Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5346 days ago 561 posts - 655 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 8 of 8 02 February 2011 at 7:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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Well there was one thing I would like to see in Google Translator, is an option to use
Impolite/Informal or Polite. Most of the time it is polite version but I'm looking for informal/impolite. But the others. I'm not relying on it for everyday things or anything. Just for a few things. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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