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Google Translate is way, way better than it used to be (at least German > English which I suppose is probably an easier task than many languages).

by crummy 8y ago

lispm 8y ago
Google Translate of Goethe: Have now, ah! Philosophy, Law and medicine, And unfortunately also theology Thoroughly studied, with great effort. Here I am, I poor gate! And I'm as smart as before word for word not completely bad, but then it breaks when we have to translate 'Tor'. Google Translate is clueless because it is unable to derive that here the 'fool' is meant. It's unable to 'understand' that 'I poor gate' makes no sense at all. Google Translate is the 'poor gate'.
- fvdessen 8y ago
  On the other hand Deepl gives translations for news articles that are of such quality that it allows me to read international news as if it were local. Definitely useful.
  - lispm 8y ago
    DeepL is better, but it basically has the same problems. I understand both German and English - and I can easily detect where DeepL also shifts the meaning of sentences, sometimes even to mean the opposite. DeepL like Google Translate has no concept for 'is the meaning preserved?'. You may think that you can now read German news, but in fact you would not know if the sentence meaning has been preserved in the English translation. The words itself might look as if the sentence makes sense - but the meaning is actually shifted - slight differences, but also possibly the complete opposite. The translation also does not give you any indication where this might be and where the translation is based on weak training material or where there is some inference needed for a successful translation.
dx034 8y ago
Not sure if I agree. If you have some knowledge of the language is still mostly easier to translate the words you don't understand. Easy texts work, anything more complicated (e.g. science articles) not really.

Google Translate is way, way better than it used to be (at least German > English which I suppose is probably an easier task than many languages).

by crummy 8y ago

Google Translate is way, way better than it used to be (at least German > English which I suppose is probably an easier task than many languages).

lispm 8y ago

Google Translate of Goethe: Have now, ah! Philosophy, Law and medicine, And unfortunately also theology Thoroughly studied, with great effort. Here I am, I poor gate! And I'm as smart as before word for word not completely bad, but then it breaks when we have to translate 'Tor'. Google Translate is clueless because it is unable to derive that here the 'fool' is meant. It's unable to 'understand' that 'I poor gate' makes no sense at all. Google Translate is the 'poor gate'.

fvdessen 8y ago
On the other hand Deepl gives translations for news articles that are of such quality that it allows me to read international news as if it were local. Definitely useful.
- lispm 8y ago
  DeepL is better, but it basically has the same problems. I understand both German and English - and I can easily detect where DeepL also shifts the meaning of sentences, sometimes even to mean the opposite. DeepL like Google Translate has no concept for 'is the meaning preserved?'. You may think that you can now read German news, but in fact you would not know if the sentence meaning has been preserved in the English translation. The words itself might look as if the sentence makes sense - but the meaning is actually shifted - slight differences, but also possibly the complete opposite. The translation also does not give you any indication where this might be and where the translation is based on weak training material or where there is some inference needed for a successful translation.

dx034 8y ago

Not sure if I agree. If you have some knowledge of the language is still mostly easier to translate the words you don't understand. Easy texts work, anything more complicated (e.g. science articles) not really.