Mobile translation

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Mobile translation is any electronic device or software application that provides audio translation. The concept includes any handheld electronic device that is specifically designed for audio translation. It also includes any machine translation service or software application for hand-held devices, including mobile telephones, Pocket PCs, and PDAs. Mobile translation provides hand-held device users with the advantage of instantaneous and non-mediated translation from one human language to another, usually against a service fee that is, nevertheless, significantly smaller than a human translator charges.

Contents

Mobile translation is part of the new range of services offered to mobile communication users, including location positioning (GPS service), e-wallet (mobile banking), business card/bar-code/text scanning etc.

It relies on computer programming in the sphere of computational linguistics and the device's communication means (Internet connection or SMS) to work.

History

A translation system allowing the Japanese to exchange conversations with foreign nationals through mobile phones was first developed in 1999 by the Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International-Interpreting Telecommunications Research Laboratories, based in Kansai Science City, Japan. Words spoken into the mobile device are translated into the target language and then sent as voice to the other user's mobile phone [1]

Machine translation software for handheld devices featuring translation capabilities for user-input text, SMS and email, was commercially released in 2004 by Transclick and a patent was issued to Transclick for SMS, email and IM translation in 2006. [2]

In November 2005, another Japanese company, NEC Corporation, announced the development of a translation system that could be loaded in mobile phones. This mobile translation system could recognize 50,000 Japanese words and 30,000 English words, and could be used for simple translations when travelling. [3] However, it was not until January 2009 that NEC Corporation officially demonstrated their product. [4]

Technological advances within the miniaturization of computing and communication devices have made possible the usage of mobile telephones in language learning. Among the early projects were the Spanish study programs which included vocabulary practice, quizzes, and word and phrase translations. Soon after, projects were developed using mobile phones to teach English at a Japanese university. By 2005, they shifted their focus to providing vocabulary instruction by SMS. A similar program was created for learning Italian in Australia. Vocabulary phrases, quizzes, and short sentences were sent via SMS. [5]

Current technology

Google Translate is one of the most highly-utilized translation services. [ citation needed ]. See also Infoscope, which is a handheld device composed of a digital camera and wireless internet access, developed at IBM's Almaden Research Center.

The Ili is a handheld device that can provide instantaneous audio translation from one language to another; it only provides translation from English into Japanese or Chinese. [6] [7] [8]

One2One is a prototype that does not rely on Internet connectivity in order to function. It can provide audio translation in eight languages [9]

Pixel Buds is a device produced by Google which can provide real-time audio translation in over 40 languages. [10]

Technical functions

In order to support the machine translation service, a mobile device needs to be able to communicate with external computers (servers) that receive the user-input text/speech, translate it and send it back to the user. This is usually done via an Internet connection (WAP, GPRS, EDGE, UMTS, Wi-Fi) but some earlier applications used SMS to communicate with the translation server.

Mobile translation is not to be confused for the user-editable (talking) dictionaries and phrase books that are already widespread and available for many hand-held devices and do not normally require internet connectivity on the mobile device.

Features

Mobile translation may include a number of useful features, auxiliary to text translation which forms the basis of the service. While the user can input text using the device keyboard, they can also use pre-existing text in the form of email or SMS messages received on the user's device (email/SMS translation). It is also possible to send a translated message, optionally containing the source text as well as the translation.

Some mobile translation applications also offer additional services that further facilitate the translated communication process, such as:

may be transformed into human speech (by a computer that renders the voice of a native speaker of the target language);

will record the speech and send it to the translation server to convert into text before translating it;

device camera) of some printed text (a road sign, a restaurant menu, a page of a book etc.), have the application send it to the translation server which will apply Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology, extract the text, return it to the user for editing (if necessary) and then translate it into the chosen language.

combination and then get connected automatically to a live interpreter.

Supported languages

Recently, there has been a notable increase of the number of language pairs offered for automatic translation on mobile devices. While Japanese service providers traditionally offer cross-translation for Japanese, Chinese, English and Korean, others may offer translation from and into over 20 languages, or over 200 language pairs, including most Latin languages.

Speech generation is, however, limited to a smaller portion of the above, including English, Spanish, Italian, French, Chinese etc. Image translation depends on the OCR languages available.

Technological benefits and constraints

Advantages

Having portable real-time automated translation at one's disposal has a number of practical uses and advantages.

Challenges and disadvantages

Advances of mobile technology and of the machine translation services have helped reduce or even eliminate some of the disadvantages of mobile translation such as the reduced screen size of the mobile device and the one-finger keyboarding. Many new hand-held devices come equipped with a QWERTY keyboard and/or a touch-sensitive screen, as well as handwriting recognition which significantly increases typing speed. After 2006, most new mobile phones and devices began featuring large screens with greater resolutions of 640 x 480 px, 854 x 480 px, or even 1024 x 480 px, [11] which gives the user enough visible space to read/write large texts.[ citation needed ]

However, the most important challenge facing the mobile translation industry is the linguistic and communicative quality of the translations. Although some providers claim to have achieved an accuracy as high as 96%, [12] boasting proprietary technology that is capable of “understanding” idioms and slang language, machine translation is still distinctly of lower quality than human translation and should be used with care if the matters translated require correctness.

One method that has been utilized to mitigate the lack of accuracy in mobile translation, is ontology learning combined with terminology extraction to identify frequently-used phrases, semantic interpretation to determine the correct context and meaning of a given phrase, and implementation of a data structure to store the nuances found in the prior multi-meaning terms and phrases. This combination of basic translation structures in conjunction with machine learning algorithms is what makes this multi-phase method so accurate, and also gives it the ability to progressively become more accurate. [13] The caveat is that this method is extremely difficult to automate; implementing this structure in a user-friendly fashion remains a major challenge facing translation app developers.

A disadvantage that needs mentioning is the requirement for a stable Internet connection on the user's mobile device. Since the SMS method of communicating with the translation server has proved less efficient that sending packets of data – because of the message length limit (160 characters) and the higher cost of SMS as compared with Internet traffic charges – Internet connectivity on mobile devices is a must, while coverage in some non-urban areas is still unstable.

See also

General concepts

Specific translating concepts

Specific computing concepts

Specific devices and software

Related Research Articles

Machine translation, sometimes referred to by the abbreviation MT, is a sub-field of computational linguistics that investigates the use of software to translate text or speech from one language to another.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SMS</span> Text messaging service component

Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text messages. An intermediary service can facilitate a text-to-voice conversion to be sent to landlines.

Speech synthesis is the artificial production of human speech. A computer system used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or hardware products. A text-to-speech (TTS) system converts normal language text into speech; other systems render symbolic linguistic representations like phonetic transcriptions into speech. The reverse process is speech recognition.

A universal translator is a device common to many science fiction works, especially on television. First described in Murray Leinster's 1945 novella "First Contact", the translator's purpose is to offer an instant translation of any language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Text messaging</span> Act of typing and sending a brief, digital message

Text messaging, or texting, is the act of composing and sending electronic messages, typically consisting of alphabetic and numeric characters, between two or more users of mobile devices, desktops/laptops, or another type of compatible computer. Text messages may be sent over a cellular network or may also be sent via satellite or Internet connection.

M-learning, or mobile learning, is a form of distance education where learners use portable devices such as mobile phones to learn anywhere and anytime. The portability that mobile devices provide allows for learning anywhere, hence the term "mobile" in "mobile learning." M-learning devices include computers, MP3 players, mobile phones, and tablets. M-learning can be an important part of informal learning.

A voice-user interface (VUI) makes spoken human interaction with computers possible, using speech recognition to understand spoken commands and answer questions, and typically text to speech to play a reply. A voice command device is a device controlled with a voice user interface.

Mobile content is any type of web hypertext and information content and electronic media which is viewed or used on mobile phones, like text, sound, ringtones, graphics, flash, discount offers, mobile games, movies, and GPS navigation. As mobile phone use has grown since the mid-1990s, the usage and significance of the mobile devices in everyday technological life has grown accordingly. Owners of mobile phones can now use their devices to make photo snapshots for upload, twits, mobile calendar appointments, and mostly send and receive text messages, listen to music, watch videos, take mobile pictures and make videos, use websites to redeem coupons for purchases, view and edit office documents, get driving instructions on mobile maps and so on. The use of mobile content in various areas has grown accordingly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Electronic dictionary</span> Dictionary whose data exists in digital form and can be accessed through a number of different media

An electronic dictionary is a dictionary whose data exists in digital form and can be accessed through a number of different media. Electronic dictionaries can be found in several forms, including software installed on tablet or desktop computers, mobile apps, web applications, and as a built-in function of E-readers. They may be free or require payment.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Google Translate</span> Multilingual neural machine translation service

Google Translate is a multilingual neural machine translation service developed by Google to translate text, documents and websites from one language into another. It offers a website interface, a mobile app for Android and iOS, and an API that helps developers build browser extensions and software applications. As of 2022, Google Translate supports 133 languages at various levels, and as of April 2016, claimed over 500 million total users, with more than 100 billion words translated daily, after the company stated in May 2013 that it served over 200 million people daily.

The Phraselator is a weatherproof handheld language translation device developed by Applied Data Systems and VoxTec, a former division of the military contractor Marine Acoustics, located in Annapolis, Maryland, USA. It was designed to serve as a handheld computer device that translates English into one of 40 different languages.

Voice portals are the voice equivalent of web portals, giving access to information through spoken commands and voice responses. Ideally a voice portal could be an access point for any type of information, services, or transactions found on the Internet. Common uses include movie time listings and stock trading. In telecommunications circles, voice portals may be referred to as interactive voice response (IVR) systems, but this term also includes DTMF services. With the emergence of conversational assistants such as Apple's Siri, Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, Microsoft Cortana, and Samsung's Bixby, Voice Portals can now be accessed through mobile devices and Far Field voice smart speakers such as the Amazon Echo and Google Home.

Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) is a technical standard for accessing information over a mobile wireless network. A WAP browser is a web browser for mobile devices such as mobile phones that use the protocol. Introduced in 1999, WAP achieved some popularity in the early 2000s, but by the 2010s it had been largely superseded by more modern standards. Almost all modern handset internet browsers now fully support HTML, so they do not need to use WAP markup for web page compatibility, and therefore, most are no longer able to render and display pages written in WML, WAP's markup language.

Indic Computing means "computing in Indic", i.e., Indian Scripts and Languages. It involves developing software in Indic Scripts/languages, Input methods, Localization of computer applications, web development, Database Management, Spell checkers, Speech to Text and Text to Speech applications and OCR in Indian languages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mobile phone</span> Portable device to make telephone calls using a radio link

A mobile phone is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link while the user is moving within a telephone service area, as opposed to a fixed-location phone. The radio frequency link establishes a connection to the switching systems of a mobile phone operator, which provides access to the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Modern mobile telephone services use a cellular network architecture and therefore mobile telephones are called cellphones in North America. In addition to telephony, digital mobile phones support a variety of other services, such as text messaging, multimedia messagIng, email, Internet access, short-range wireless communications, satellite access, business applications, video games and digital photography. Mobile phones offering only basic capabilities are known as feature phones; mobile phones which offer greatly advanced computing capabilities are referred to as smartphones.

Mobile-assisted language learning (MALL) is language learning that is assisted or enhanced through the use of a handheld mobile device.

Image translation is the machine translation of images of printed text. This is done by applying optical character recognition (OCR) technology to an image to extract any text contained in the image, and then have this text translated into a language of their choice, and the applying digital image processing on the original image to get the translated image with a new language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Microsoft Translator</span> Machine translation cloud service by Microsoft

Microsoft Translator is a multilingual machine translation cloud service provided by Microsoft. Microsoft Translator is a part of Microsoft Cognitive Services and integrated across multiple consumer, developer, and enterprise products; including Bing, Microsoft Office, SharePoint, Microsoft Edge, Microsoft Lync, Yammer, Skype Translator, Visual Studio, and Microsoft Translator apps for Windows, Windows Phone, iPhone and Apple Watch, and Android phone and Android Wear.

Skype Translator is a speech to speech translation application developed by Skype, which has operated as a division of Microsoft since 2018. Skype Translator Preview has been publicly available since December 15, 2015. Skype Translator is available as a standalone app and, as of October 2015, is integrated into the Skype for Windows desktop app.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yandex Translate</span> Translation web service by Yandex

Yandex Translate is a web service provided by Yandex, intended for the translation of text or web pages into another language.

References

  1. Archived November 6, 2008, at the Wayback Machine
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  3. "People's Daily Online - Mobile phone and translation machine: two-in-one". English.peopledaily.com.cn. 2005-11-30. Retrieved 2016-01-25.
  4. "develops Speech Interpretation Software for Mobile Phones(January 5, 2009): News Room". Nec.co.jp. 2009-01-05. Retrieved 2016-01-25.
  5. "LLT Vol 10 Num 1: EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES Going to the MALL: Mobile Assisted Language Learning". Llt.msu.edu. Retrieved 2016-01-25.
  6. Ili (Semi-) Universal Translator Preview: Almost Real-Time Translation, Geoffrey Morrison Forbes, May 31, 2017.
  7. Automatic translator will make travelling the world so much easier, Ashitha Nagesh for Metro.co.uk, Thursday 9 Feb 2017.
  8. Standalone translator comes closer to the marketplace, Ben Coxworth, May 31st, 2017.
  9. Lingmo language translator earpiece powered by IBM Watson WEARABLES, Rich Haridy June 13th, 2017.
  10. Pixel Buds translates voice, but it's not the first. The headphones announced along with Google's Pixel 2 phone promise nearly-seamless futuristic voice translation. We've been promised this before BY IAN SHERR, OCTOBER 4, 2017
  11. "SoftBank homepage". Mb.softbank.jp. Retrieved 2016-01-25.
  12. "Vasco M3 features". Vasco Electronics. Retrieved 11 May 2021.
  13. Navigli, R.; Velardi, P.; Gangemi, A. (2003). "Ontology learning and its application to automated terminology translation". IEEE Intelligent Systems. 18: 22–31. doi:10.1109/MIS.2003.1179190.

Further reading

Overview of current technology