From: Hugh Sasse Staff Elec Eng <hgs@...>
Date: 2003-02-24T07:15:20+09:00
Subject: Re: Internationalization

On Mon, 24 Feb 2003, Brian Wisti wrote:

> On Sunday 23 February 2003 12:15 pm, Hugh Sasse Staff Elec Eng wrote:
> > automatic translation.  This (machine translation) is still difficult.
>
> I've worked briefly at a company that prepared tools for translators.  My time
> there was short (several months of contract work), but long enough to get the
> idea that automated translation was not to be trusted.  For a real

Agreed.  That's why I suggested using two engines, and translating
back to be sure.  Even that won't be perfect.  I think distributing
the documentation in an auxilliary language alone would be a
weakness, but if distributed with the original language there is
scope for people to improve the translation.  Also, with ruby code
(rather than binary applications) there is another source of
semantic information to support the translation.  This solution is
sub-optimal, but it will help others to some extent greater than
having no translation.

> translation of ideas and idioms, a human brain was needed.  A human brain
> aided by their tools, of course ;-)
>
> I looked quickly at Lojban and Esperanto sites.  Esperanto seems easier to
> learn from first glance.  You mentioned that people on this list were

Yes, I think so, too. Having very regular verbs is a great help.
I'm finding that keeping track of the suffices difficult, though.
But I've not been able to put much time in to this.

> familiar with some of the artificial languages.  If they notice this
> exchange, I would love to hear from them about which might make the easiest
> to translate documentation to and from.
>
> -Brian W
>
        Hugh