Thread: Translator link
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Old May 12, 2007, 01:12 PM
bleak-uk bleak-uk is offline
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Join Date: May 2007
Location: West Midlands, UK
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There are a lot of online translators around now, and the truth is that none of them will work all the time. Even big internet services like AltaVista and Google can't make a translator that could possibly compete with a bilingual human, so it's not really worth trying to do. Some things don't translate literally, and some words have multiple meanings, so there'll always be problems with such translators. They're normally ok if you're translating into a language you're confident with because you can tweak things to make sense and so get the general idea of the original text, but if you're hoping to translate into a language you don't understand, especially on a professional level, you really do need a person.

Besides, there's nothing wrong with the good old dictionary on the bookshelf. All good dictionaries will give an example context so you know you're choosing the right word, therefore if your grammar's up to scratch and you watch what you're doing with metaphors and proverbs and the like, you're ok.

On the same topic, check this out:

http://www.tashian.com/multibabel/

It may provide some amusement, at the same time as understanding of the problems with electronic translators.
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