[sldev] Futzing with SNOW-93 (autotranslate) today

[Melinda Green]

The question is not whether a machine translated UI can ever be good 
(I'm sure it can't), but whether it can be "good enough". When I imagine 
using a Second Life client with the Chinese characters (which I don't 
understand at all) and compare that with even the worst of the machine 
translations you gave below, I'd take the MT version any day because 
that would mean I'd have a chance to succeed in using it whereas with a 
quality Chinese version that would clearly be impossible. The language 
voting idea probably only works well with one or two word phrases, but 
that includes nearly all buttons, menus, menu items, etc. so I'd love to 
see how good it could be. None of that means we'd commit to using it but 
I'm open minded about the idea.

-Melinda

Kakurady Drakenar wrote:
> Oh no, please don't.
> A high quality interface translation is a work with a lot of effort 
> and require someone well versed in both languages. Machine translation 
> just doesn't cut it. And definitely not when Second Life has its own 
> jargon!
>
> "Verifying" it with multiple translations doesn't work either. 
> Translating is not as simple as replacing one word with another. 
> Indeed, translators of Second Life sometimes need to paraphrase to 
> obtain a more elegant translation. In addition, each language have 
> their own ways to express ideas, and Google Translate, while having a 
> large corpse, is far from infallable - even more so since it uses 
> English as an intermediate language, which means the accuracy largely 
> depends on the language's similarity with English. I'll demonstrate 
> this in a minute.
>
> (Please note that I oppose the autotranslate feature to begin with.)
>
> Kakurady / Geneko Nemeth
>
>
> The text used is the tooltip of the check_fly checkbox of 
> floater_about_land.xml.
> (I'm favoring Chinese because I re-translated the client into Chinese.)
>
> Original: If checked, Residents can fly on your land. If unchecked, 
> they can only fly into and over your land.
> Translating into English:
> zh If selected, then, residents can fly on your soil. If not selected, 
> they can only fly in or fly over your land.
> da If elected, residents can fly to your country. If not selected 
> residents can only fly into your country and to your country.
> de If enabled, people can fly to your country. If not activated, 
> residents can simply fly to your country and there (then again, 
> continues to land but not), or fly over your country to come.
> es If checked, residents will fly in their field. If not, can only fly 
> to the cross or even landing on it.
> fr If this option is checked, residents can steal your land. If 
> unchecked, they can fly only when they arrive and pass over your field.
> hu If it was turned on, the flight allowed to land. If not, then it is 
> only possible outside the area.
> it If checked, the other residents can fly on your soil. If unchecked, 
> it can only get on a plane or fly over the ground.
> ja The flight will be checked in this land. Be able to fly only when 
> you enter the land and pass unchecked.
> pt If enabled, the residents can fly on their land. If disabled, they 
> can only fly into and over their land.
> ru If checked, residents can fly on your soil.
> tr If you are selected, members can fly on your land. If it is not 
> selected, then you can fly and land in your land
> uk If checked, the resident can fly on your land.
>
> Translating through English into Chinese:
> en (Original) If checked, Residents can fly on your land. If 
> unchecked, they can only fly into and over your land.
> zh (Original) 如果选中的话，居民可以在您的土地上飞行。如果不选中的话， 
> 他们只能飞入或飞过您的土地。
> en-zh 如果选中，居民可以乘坐自己的土地。如果任其发展下去，只能飞入，并 
> 在你的土地。
> zh-en-zh 如果选中，那么，居民可搭乘您的土壤。如果没有选择，只能在飞行 
> 或飞越你的土地。
> da-en-zh 如果当选，居民可以前往贵国。如果没有选中，则只能飞入贵国和贵国。
> de-en-zh 如果启用，市民可以前往贵国。如果没有激活，居民可以直接飞到你 
> 的国家和有（然后再继续土地，但没有），或飞越贵国来。
> es-en-zh 如果选中，居民将飞往在各自的领域。如果没有，只能飞往两岸，甚 
> 至在它降落。
> fr-en-zh 如果这个选项被选中，居民可以窃取你的土地。如果不加以控制，它 
> 们的飞行只有当他们到达，在你的领域通过。
> hu-en-zh 如果是打开，飞机可以降落。如果没有，那么它只能在禁区外。
> it-en-zh 如果选中，其他居民可以乘坐您的土壤。如果任其发展下去，它只能 
> 在飞机上获得或飞越地面。
> ja-en-zh 这次飞行将检查在这片土地。能够飞行只有当你进入该土地，并通过 
> 选中。
> pt-en-zh 如果启用，市民可以乘坐自己的土地。如果关闭，他们只能飞入和对 
> 自己的土地。
> ru-en-zh 如果选中，居民可搭乘您的土壤。
> tr-en-zh 如果你被选中，会员可搭乘自己的土地。如果没有选中，然后你可以 
> 在你的土地和土地
> uk-en-zh 如果选中，居民可以乘坐自己的土地。
>
> 于 2009/9/15 18:34, Nexii Malthus 写道:
>> That does bring a thought though, could the User Interface strings be 
>> able to be translated into unknown/unsupported languages? Would just 
>> need to send all english strings and converted into target language 
>> once. It would be cool, seems a bit over the top though. One could 
>> ensure accuracy of 'context' by converting several supported 
>> languages into target unknown language and comparing the words for 
>> which is the most likely word by which word was the most returned.
>>
>> - Nexii
>>
>> On Tue, Sep 15, 2009 at 8:29 PM, Rob Lanphier <robla at lindenlab.com 
>> <mailto:robla at lindenlab.com>> wrote:
>>
>>     Hi everyone,
>>
>>     I'm futzing around with SNOW-93 today (the translation patch).  A
>>     couple of suggestions for changing the API:
>>     1. Change "lljson" to "llstringtrans" ("lltranslate" is already
>>     taken.)
>>     2. Change " LLJSON::parseGoogleTranslate" to
>>     "LLStringTrans::remoteStringTranslate"
>>
>>     One comment that Techwolf made was: "Please remember to update the
>>     patch cmake files to look for system or LL supplied libraries for
>>     STANDALONE and NOT STANDALONE".  I'm hoping someone here can make a
>>     "FindJsonCpp.cmake" file to help out with that effort.
>>
>>     https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SNOW-93
>>
>>     Rob
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