Translation added to the forum!

[Gryzor]

I have been long fed up with copying/pasting text to Google translate when I don't understand something here, so today I decided to tackle the issue (well, actually yesterday, but it took some doing).


How this works? When the browser's set language doesn't match with user's language (on forum) then the user will see a "translate" link under messages. Translation will take place in-line (basically it will transform text on the page) and it uses Google Translate.


It's not the best solution in terms of coverage, but it's certainly the most discreet' other options involved flag buttons or drop-down menus. Please do use it and tell me if it works ok for you!

[TFM]

It seems to work, however the translations are rather crappy. Never mind. It can be helpful of course. 

[Gryzor]

Well I can always modify it so that when the user presses "Translate" an email message will be sent to you for translation, but you'll have to be online 24/7 :p


I think Google Translate does a pretty good job...

[Gryzor]

Update: I moved the "Translate" button to the button row above each message instead of having it just under the post's text. I think it looks better now.

[TFM]

Good idea, that's much more convenient.

Google may be a fair job when translating INTO English. So here..... everything IS English already. So I checked the translation into German. And that - sorry - still needs a lot of improovement.

[Gryzor]

Feel free to let them know.


Also, you do know there are German posts here, too, eh?

[TFM]

Not that much ... and usually not worth to read   But Google is - as you said in the first place - good for DE to ENG. So yes, it shall work fine.

[AMSDOS]

Update: I moved the "Translate" button to the button row above each message instead of having it just under the post's text. I think it looks better now.

I cannot seem to find it! 


English would probably be the biggest pain to translate, as numerous words contain numerous meanings and if we cannot say a certain word, we just pick another word.    Though I've seen Google Translate struggle on other languages and I think it maybe even struggle on the Latin words with the speech.

[ralferoo]

I think it maybe even struggle on the Latin words with the speech.

qui posset credere?

Translation is very difficult for a computer in general as it doesn't have the context to know what the text is talking about and if you're translating from your own language into a target language you don't know, you can't tell if it's made sensible choices for you, whereas you could fix up a bad translation into your own language if know had an idea what it was about.

I recently read a datasheet that a Chinese company had provided an English translation for which included such gems as talking about blood pumping around the chip, by which I assume they were talking about current consumption.

But yeah, I checked the German forums and couldn't find a translate feature, which would be useful, but I don't mind too much cut and pasting into google if I need a wall of text translating. To be honest, most of the time I prefer looking up individual German words on leo.org because then I'm forced to think about each one as I look it up and hopefully remember some of them for next time!

[Gryzor]

Here it is:
[attach=2]


Mind you, as I said it works by looking at your browser's language and comparing, but I haven't tested it extensively...

[robcfg]

I cannot see that button either...

[beaker]

Me neither - tried in Firefox and IE9

[Gryzor]

Yeah, guys, but you know I can't help you if you don't provide more details...

[ralferoo]

I use firefox (something old) under Linux at home and firefox 19.0.2 at work.

According to Environment Variables / Browser Headers from my work PC, I'm requesting only English:
HTTP Accept language: en-gb,en;q=0.5

The only buttons on any posts I have are "Like", "Quote" and "Add Multi Quote"

[Gryzor]

Cool, can you also tell me what post you looked?

[robcfg]

If you have english as language, no button appears.


If you switch the language in the profile to German, then, you get the translate button in the german posts, not the english ones.

[TFM]

Pretty right, but it tranlates English to German here. Look at the picture, a picture tells more than 100 words...

[Gryzor]

If you have English as your language then Translate should appear for German messages?? If not let me know...


@TMF: LOL...

[ralferoo]

Cool, can you also tell me what post you looked?

I assumed it apply to any of them, but the first non-sticky in the German section: CPC Artikel in der deutschen Retro Gamer
Having tried a few of the links they all seem to behave the same way.

[robcfg]

If you have English as your language then Translate should appear for German messages?? If not let me know...


@TMF: LOL...

I've checked it again. I have English as language, and I see no translate button in the German boards. However, changing the language to German, makes the button appear but only in the German forums.


I'd like to thank Herr Doktor TFM for the nice instructions 


Edit:BTW, before I forget, I'm using Chrome. Don't know if that could make a difference.

[AMSDOS]

Doesn't seem to appear next to the Like Link. 

[Gryzor]

Damn... here it appears on both my computers, Opera/IE/Chrome... Will have to look into it a bit


[EDIT] I can confirm FF doesn't work.

[robcfg]

Checked Again, Translate works when I set my language to German on both the English and German forums.


But it doesn't appear if I have my language set to English and I'm browsing the German forums.


Couple of screenshots following 

[AMSDOS]

Damn... here it appears on both my computers, Opera/IE/Chrome... Will have to look into it a bit


[EDIT] I can confirm FF doesn't work.

Maybe because I'm using Safari on my Mac, though I cannot be absolutely certain of this, or if it's just because my computer is set to English.

[Gryzor]

 I think its got to do with Google's APi -all these issues. The way it interpretes... still looking into it, but...