Re: [tlug] Free program translates Euro languages to/from English

[Shin MICHIMUKO <smitimko@example.com>]

Translation is the big topic in AI, and it is still challenging which
requires many revolutions.

Drew wrote:
> > I'm still amazed at the ambiguity permitted in technical Japanese.  For

It means the engineers and scientists are not always writing technical
documents. I believe it's stil less ambiguity in scientific journals.
If it is not the article in the journals, most of the Japanese
documents are written to get the budgets, or for the advertizements.
That means the writer expects that the readers are not the engineers
or the scientists. 

In schools and discussion among engineers are still required to be
accurate and we're educated to use accurate words to use "IJOU" as the
meaning of "greater than or equal to". It's still common. So please
don't worry too much. :-)

And also sometimes the writers are avoiding some direct expressions to
express the politeness, as stated by some people here. 

In message <32951.221.83.45.6.1130968814.squirrel@example.com> you write:
> I second that. Considering that people's lives are on the line with
> factory manuals, it amazes me that they can be so vague. When I asked
> about it, the more seasoned, veteran engineers at the factory said that
> they read over the manual at the beginning and then don't touch it again.

Hm, it seems happening all over the world, not only in Japanese
engineering field. You might remember how thick the PC manuals were.
Not so many people in the world are reading the manuals before driving
the automobiles. So it means you don't have to read the documents if
you share enough backgrounds. 

> Basically, you read the manual as an intro to making your own set of
> procedures, the content of which is based on the manual + your own
> knowledge and reasoning. This is what I was told. When I asked why the
> manuals are not clearer and more complete, they said that the user will
> customize procedures and even the machine itself, so why bother?

I guess you feel the same thing in "man" documents on Linux machines,
am I wrong? I guess when we feel ambiguity with some documents or some
texts, that means we don't share the backgrounds with the writer. And
it doesn't imply it is always ambigous for readers.

> > between plural and singular is a constant headache.  And as far as
> > esthetics go, I don't think I'll ever understand how 300-character-long
> > sentences containing 5 or 6 dependent clauses could be considered
> > elegant.  And of  course the ambiquity problem is at least as bad with

The plural and singular difference is still depending on the Japanese
grammer, I guess. We Japanese doesn't recognize so much difference
between 1 and 2 or more, and sometimes it could be recognized by the
contexts only. 

> But about automated translation...

> Either way, I doubt it will happen in my lifetime.

That means it is still challenging, and there are both sides of the
challenge like 1) it is good research item, but 2) there are some
risks if you cannot improve it. 

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  Shin MICHIMUKO <smitimko@example.com> http://www.peanuts.gr.jp/
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