[ale] [Waaaay OT] Low volume website translation?

[Geoffrey]

The problem with translating English to any other language is the lack 
of consistency in rules and particularily words that have the same 
spelling but mean entirely different things, such as the following sentence:

I LEAD a team of experts in the research on LEAD poisoning

Unless the translation engine is very good at recognizing the context in 
which the word is used, it fails, and most of them do (how well does M$ 
word do grammar checking???  terrible).  The best way to see if you're 
getting a reasonable translation is to reverse your translation and see 
what you get (English->Spanish->English).

If you're putting up a real commerce site, I'd recommend you get 
professional translation.  I was going to put up a Spanish version of my 
wife's classroom website, but every translation engine I used provided 
inconsistent results, and none were close enough for me to publish it.

cforsell wrote:
> I have used http://freetranslation.com/ .  Cut and paste your text to their
> site and within a few seconds you get the translation (French, Spanish,
> German, Italian, Norwegian, Portuguese).
> 
> I had a few paragraphs translated and had them checked for accuracy.  The
> translations were not perfect, but were close enough that the translator
> knew what I was saying... and it is free.
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Christopher Bergeron" <christopher at bergeron.com>
> To: <ale at ale.org>
> Sent: Thursday, November 07, 2002 6:47 PM
> Subject: [ale] [Waaaay OT] Low volume website translation?
> 
> 
> 
>>Guys I apologize that this is sooo way OT, but I can't think of who else
>>I could ask.  I'm looking for a low volume (about a page per month)
>>website translation.  I want my new eCommerce venture to be in German
>>and Spanish.  I'm not sure who can offer this kind of service.  Would I
>>look online for this or should I try to find a translator in the local
>>phonebook?  I know about babelfish; but I'd like a professional
> 
> translation.
> 
>>Does anyone know of such a beast/company/organization?
>>
>>thanks,
>>CB
>>
>>
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-- 
Until later: Geoffrey		esoteric at 3times25.net

I didn't have to buy my radio from a specific company to listen
to FM, why doesn't that apply to the Internet (anymore...)?


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