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› April 19, 2002

A Question for Multi Lingual Readers

  • Reported by Nate

I have a question for any readers who speak languages other than english, or multiple languages: Do you read this site through a translation service? If so, which one? Do you have a prefered method of translation that you have seen on other websites? Anyone with thoughts on this should feel free to leave comments or contact me directly. I would like to provide the information from this site in other languages if it can be done so automatically, and if it would be seen as a worthwhile feature.

Comments

1. April 19, 2002 03:38 PM

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Nate Posted…

For instance, do you prefer google's translation services, or altavista's translation, or perhaps there's something better for any one particular language?

2. April 19, 2002 06:56 PM

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Michael Facius Posted…

Apart from all the translation services being bullsh*t at best, who does not understand English? Don't litter your page with translations that don't work. For now, translating the page yourself is the only reasonable way to get your message (and your style, which might be even more important for a personal web page) across. It's really not worth the effort, anyway.

Regards, Michael (from Germany)

3. April 19, 2002 07:11 PM

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evan Posted…

Michael, thanks for your comment - It's about time the rest of your European bretheren (especially the French ones) came to the same conclusion.

i'm joking by the way. In all seriousness though, Zeldman has pointed at more than one translation service (or perhaps they're just pages that've been translated by individuals?), but I'd never be able to find them. I am curious to find out what services are out there.

4. April 19, 2002 07:24 PM

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Michael Facius Posted…

What can you expect from a country with a governmental language department controlling the "import" of foreign words and such ;) Anyway, google's just as bad as babelfish. Try translating some Goethe poem into English and back into German and have a good laugh. Really, think about it - people who are able to understand your RFC understand English well enough. They won't need a translation, Jeffrey's links or not ;) Regards, Michael

5. April 19, 2002 07:42 PM

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Nate Posted…

Point taken about the google/babblefish solutions, the reason I brought it up was because I've found what looks like a few interesting related blogs in other languages, and I thought it might be easier for them to read this (and visa versa) if there was an auto-translate button somewhere. To test your point, I went to the trouble to re-find one of them, and run the site through the google translator... clearly not very handy. Maybe I'll start posting in Esperanto. ;-)

6. April 19, 2002 07:55 PM

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Michael Facius Posted…

Or, while we are at it, Klingon? It's quite simple to learn (on the other hand, it has no word for "web services"). I'm seriously thinking about something like that for my own page. Or language introductions like the ones at catcode.