Translator Program

[MikeXiao]

I have (had) a good translator program for my computer. But the subscription ran out and now they want $250 to renew for 6 months. It is the LEC's Translate program. Don't get me wrong, it worked very well. But with my wife here, I only use it about 2 times a month now. Soooo, $250 is too steep. Anyone know of another good program? Maybe one that does not charge a subscription?

 

Thanks

Mike

[chilton747]

I have (had) a good translator program for my computer. But the subscription ran out and now they want $250 to renew for 6 months. It is the LEC's Translate program. Don't get me wrong, it worked very well. But with my wife here, I only use it about 2 times a month now. Soooo, $250 is too steep. Anyone know of another good program? Maybe one that does not charge a subscription?

 

Thanks

Mike

 

MSWord has a great translator (world lingo). My SO says it is very good and it is free.

[MikeXiao]

The one for MSWord, is for Word XP. I have the 2003 edition. I just checked it out, and it works with it also. Thanks.

Edited January 28, 2007 by MikeXiao (see edit history)

[jim_julian]

You know, Babelfish ain't half bad ... and the price is right.

[Dan R]

Those translation programs can do some pretty weird interpretations. To test a program translate something then do it again back to the original language. See how close it gets.

[AmericanRooster]

You know, Babelfish ain't half bad ... and the price is right.

 

I have only used babelfish and google... can't speak for this Word XP program...

 

babelfish is free and good enough for simple communication; however, complex sentences or words that have different meanings in context are very annoying... even simple words like "hard" frequently don't translate well.

 

It is unreliable enough that I always wind up double-translating from English > Chinese > English multiple times while I tweak the sentence for the proper translation... frequently, I have to use bizarre or stilted English to get a coherent Babelfish translation. Further complicating the issue is the equally unreliable translation from Chinese to English.

 

I have found that Firefox's Chinese translation plugin is helpful... at least I can see the mistranslations when Babelfish goes from Chinese back to English.

 

The Firefox Plugin is here...

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/3349/

[Rakkasan]

For online translation I use http://us.dict.cn/trans. The accuracy is pretty good for the price (free). Give it a try before you spend money on other programs or software. Zhen and I have been using it for almost a year, for short sentances it works really well. When she uses it to write a letter some things get lost in the translation, mostly grammatical issues, but I have learned to read through those.

 

Good luck

[Colorado]

Those translation programs can do some pretty weird interpretations. To test a program translate something then do it again back to the original language. See how close it gets.

 

 

Yeah, I hear you!!!! Does anyone remember my "good news, bad news" post??? Used a translator online and got what I paid for (free) !!!! I almost blew up a a great relationship!!! If it wasn't for my Chinese aunt that I emailed a copy to, I would have blown off my SO after she sent me an email in Chinese by mistake and I tried to translate it by an online translator!! So, watch out!!! There are a few members here that can help lead you to some good ones. So take their advice seriously, even if you have to pay. It will be far more worth the money spent now than a Love lost later.

 

Jim

[chinchillax]

I used MDBG.net

 

It translates both traditonal and simplified chinese to english or vice versa.

 

oh and this site you can practice and learn chinese by taking a quiz.

Edited April 4, 2007 by chinchillax (see edit history)

[tywy_99]

Those translation programs can do some pretty weird interpretations. To test a program translate something then do it again back to the original language. See how close it gets.

 

 

Yeah, I hear you!!!! Does anyone remember my "good news, bad news" post??? Used a translator online and got what I paid for (free) !!!! I almost blew up a a great relationship!!! If it wasn't for my Chinese aunt that I emailed a copy to, I would have blown off my SO after she sent me an email in Chinese by mistake and I tried to translate it by an online translator!! So, watch out!!! There are a few members here that can help lead you to some good ones. So take their advice seriously, even if you have to pay. It will be far more worth the money spent now than a Love lost later.

 

Jim

Yeah, I remember that post!

I don't think there is a program capable enough to proficiently translate english to putonghua and vice versa. Look at the old CFL link showing some of the translations, for example; "beautiful collar" = the consulate.

[David&Wendy]

Babelfish is good but sometimes it gives me really weird translations.

Translating simple sentences is never a problem. Translating a webpage is where machine translation gets the words but missing the meaning of the sentence.

 

David

 

Those translation programs can do some pretty weird interpretations. To test a program translate something then do it again back to the original language. See how close it gets.

[dnoblett]

The only things I tend to translate are web pages, and Google Toolbar does a great job of it, and the price is right "FREE".

 

Just do two settings to the toolbar, Add page rank, and Page info Menu, the page info Menu has "Translate Page" only translates to English.

 

http://toolbar.google.com