[haiku-development] Re: [haiku-doc] Re: Machine translation (was: Re: Wiki for translation/localization teams)
- From: Sean Healy <jalopeura@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: haiku-development@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:28:20 +0100
Humdinger wrote:
I too, strongly refuse restricting authors and translators to
simplistic language. The writers do what they do out of love of Haiku
and of writing and language itself. Me at least...
Minimizing the usage of language to improve a computational process of
a semi-automatic/whatever translation service is out of the question.
It would be like restricting a chef to only use the same 5 ingredients
Well, it would really be more like restricting a chef to a maximum of
five ingredients - but not necessarily always the same ones.
In any case, it's something most people do on a regular basis. I do when
I talk to a user about developer stuff, or to a normal speaker about
linguistic stuff. And I would imagine most people have a similar kind of
experience; words mean one thing in one context and another thing in a
different context. I would imagine that if you are a writer, "modern" or
"Freudian" mean something completely different to you than to the world
in general. At least, the English majors I knew as an undergrad had a
specialized meaning for them. But computers are not yet good at figuring
out linguistic context.
And I agree, it's not fun to limit yourself that way. Writers and
editors don't like it. But it does have its uses. And often you can't
even tell if something has been machine translated. Next time you read a
blender manual, you very well may be reading a machine translated text
(unless you're reading the English, which was probably the source). And
chances are you'd never know the difference.
But a blender manual can be simplified to such an extent. Most things can't.
Other related posts:
