As the world continues to get smaller as more and more services are introduced by the internet, it is only natural that various methods are being implemented to help people from various cultures and societies to communicate with each other. Translation involves interpreting the meaning of a text. It also requires the creation of a text of equivalent meaning which conveys the meaning of the text in another language.
The source text is the original text and the target language is the language it is to be translated into. The Target Text is the final product. Humans are often trained to carry out the task themselves, but machines (such as computers) can be used instead. Machine Translation is defined as a computer programme which takes a source text and produces a target text, theoretically without any human intervention. Clearly, humans are involved in the process as the source text must first be created and edited by a human and a human must proof read the target text.
MT essentially substitutes words in one language into words in another. As a result, machine translation has had limited success. There are, however, some popular machine translation tolls on the internet such as Babel Fish by Yahoo! These software tools give rough translations. The steps to using this involve typing in the source language text using correct spelling, grammar and punctuation. Only when effective human intervention is involved can machine translation produce useful results, or when the grammar of the source text is very simple.
A major criticism of Machine Translation is that it cannot take into account context. Linguists are constantly pointing out that human language is entirely governed by context. Only a person could interpret a text and take context into account. Another way, however, in which computers can assist translation is via Computer-assisted translation (CAT) or machine-aided human translation (MAHT). This is where the computer assists a person in creating the original source text to ensure effective results. The computer then assists the human interpreter in translating the text. The computer in this case is effective as it checks for grammatical errors in the text to ensure the target text is usable.
There is also an increase in Interactive translations with pop-up windows. These can show various translations of a word or phrase as a source text is written. A tool used by many Web Developers and Web Design Companie.
PROMOTION
ADVERTISE YOUR WEB SITE BY CHOOSING FROM A RANGE OF PROMOTIONAL MOUSE MATS AND GIVE THEM TO YOUR CUSTOMERS. YOU WILL BE AMAZED AT THE AMOUNT OF TRAFFIC IT CAN BRING. YOU GET LARGE DISCOUNTS FOR ORDERS OVER 1000 SO VISIT MOUSEMATS.CO.UK TODAY