4 ms·

In my limited experience, LLMs can have issues with translation tone — but these issues are pretty easily fixed with good prompting. I want to believe there wi

In my limited experience, LLMs can have issues with translation tone — but these issues are pretty easily fixed with good prompting. I want to believe there will be even more translators in the future. I really want to believe it.

alganet 1y ago
> easily fixed with good prompting Can you give us an example of a typical translation question and the "good prompting" required to make the LLM consider tone?
- simonw 1y ago
  There was a great thread about that here four months ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42894215#42897856 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42894215#42897856
  - alganet 1y ago
    Good, but not exactly what I expected for "easily fixed". It includes a lot of steps and constant human evaluation between them, which implies that decisions about tone are ultimately made by whoever is prompting the LLM, not the LLMs themselves. > "If they are generally in the style I want..." > "choosing the sentences and paragraphs I like most from each..." > "I also make my own adjustments to the translation as I see fit..." > "I don’t adopt most of the LLM’s suggestions..." > "I check it paragraph by paragraph..." It seems like a great workflow to speed up the work of an already experienced translator, but far from being usable by a layman due to the several steps requiring specialized human supervision. Consider the scenario presented by the blog post regarding bluntness/politeness and cultural sensitivities. Would anyone be able to use this workflow without knowing that beforehand? If you think about it, it could make the tone even worse.
    - nottorp 1y ago
      > It seems like a great workflow to speed up the work of an already experienced translator, but far from being usable by a layman due to the several steps requiring specialized human supervision. Just like programming. And anything else "AI" assisted. Helps experts type less.
      - alganet 1y ago
        Most of my time as a programmer is not spent typing.
        nottorp 1y ago
        Do you like typing that boilerplate though?
        alganet 1y ago
        Of course not. I don't like boilerplate code _at all_. I worked with Java for a couple of years. Lots of boilerplate required. The IDE handled them just fine. I never felt I needed something smarter in order to write verbose stuff. My style is completely different though. Whenever I can, I will choose languages and technologies that don't require boilerplate. https://wiki.c2.com/?BoilerPlateCode https://wiki.c2.com/?BoilerPlateCode However, this is deviating from the subject (look at the original post again). We're not talking about dumb, automated boilerplate code. The discussion is much deeper, drawing parallels with tone in translations. We're obviously talking about non-boilerplate.

alganet 1y ago

> easily fixed with good prompting Can you give us an example of a typical translation question and the "good prompting" required to make the LLM consider tone?

simonw 1y ago
There was a great thread about that here four months ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42894215#42897856 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42894215#42897856
- alganet 1y ago
  Good, but not exactly what I expected for "easily fixed". It includes a lot of steps and constant human evaluation between them, which implies that decisions about tone are ultimately made by whoever is prompting the LLM, not the LLMs themselves. > "If they are generally in the style I want..." > "choosing the sentences and paragraphs I like most from each..." > "I also make my own adjustments to the translation as I see fit..." > "I don’t adopt most of the LLM’s suggestions..." > "I check it paragraph by paragraph..." It seems like a great workflow to speed up the work of an already experienced translator, but far from being usable by a layman due to the several steps requiring specialized human supervision. Consider the scenario presented by the blog post regarding bluntness/politeness and cultural sensitivities. Would anyone be able to use this workflow without knowing that beforehand? If you think about it, it could make the tone even worse.
  - nottorp 1y ago
    > It seems like a great workflow to speed up the work of an already experienced translator, but far from being usable by a layman due to the several steps requiring specialized human supervision. Just like programming. And anything else "AI" assisted. Helps experts type less.
    - alganet 1y ago
      Most of my time as a programmer is not spent typing.
      - nottorp 1y ago
        Do you like typing that boilerplate though?
        alganet 1y ago
        Of course not. I don't like boilerplate code _at all_. I worked with Java for a couple of years. Lots of boilerplate required. The IDE handled them just fine. I never felt I needed something smarter in order to write verbose stuff. My style is completely different though. Whenever I can, I will choose languages and technologies that don't require boilerplate. https://wiki.c2.com/?BoilerPlateCode https://wiki.c2.com/?BoilerPlateCode However, this is deviating from the subject (look at the original post again). We're not talking about dumb, automated boilerplate code. The discussion is much deeper, drawing parallels with tone in translations. We're obviously talking about non-boilerplate.