Free Online Translations

Free Automatic Language Translators

When you make information available online, you find out that the Internet is truly a global resource. I can identify with your situation, and since I speak only English and a bit of French, I've had to find ways of communicating in Spanish and other languages. Fortunately, there are some excellent free online translations tools available.

Babelfish is the oldest and best-known online translation tool, created by the folks at Digital Equipment, and housed on the AltaVista search engine server. The term Babel fish began as a fictional species in Douglas Adams "Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy." It could instantly translate from one language to another. Babelfish (the web version) can translate words, paragraphs or entire web pages. The Babelfish translator can also be added to your toolbar or Website for easy access. Here are the languages supported by Babelfish:

Just remember that with computer aided translation, you can't be assured of a perfect result. Foreign languages often have a different syntax than English. So don't be surprised if words end up in the wrong order, if sentences read poorly, and in some cases don't make sense in context. And if you're not fluent in the other language, you may have no clue. To get an idea of how well a machine translation works, translate your text into the target language, and then back into English.

SDL has a similar service on a smaller scale. You can use it for those instructions that come with toys and electronics that may not be in English. They also offer translation for online businesses for a small fee and Click2Translate for larger projects available at fees starting at $30.00. They offer real humans for translation as well.

Try Microsoft's Beta Translator online, or add it to your tool bar, if you have Windows Live, for translating up to 500 words of text.

Not to be outdone, Google Translate also offers a similar service. This is the only one that handles Arabic language, as far as I know.

Foreignword is a great tool for the task. With over 265 dictionaries and 73 languages from which to choose, their Anadu is a free download. They also offer tips and articles concerning language itself.

im Translator is another free service. This one has the advantage of including a spell check before changing languages and the unique feature of a decode button for unreadable Russian text. This can be a handy thing if you want to catch the latest edition of Pravda.

WorldLingo is an alternative language tool. Aside from their free translation of up to 150 words, they offer paid services for such applications as Website placement, e-mail and chat translation, as well as a currency counter. This includes animation, voiceover, TV captions, and subtitles.

Finally, if you are confused with what language a Webpage contains, try this Translation Guide. They suggest sources for you to do that with sites such as TextCat. I've found that this can be a fun tool for checking derivation of names as well, with some fairly surprising results.

Oh, and speaking of fun and translation, try the Crapola Web Translator. It will translate your own text, or an entire web page, into Yoda, Bostonese, Canadian, Ebonics, Hax0r, Valley Girl, Martian, Pig Latin, or Smurfish. Another site in this genre is The Dialectizer, which will convert your text into Redneck, Jive, Cockney, Elmer Fudd, Swedish Chef (my favorite!) and others.

Robotic language translators are far from perfect. Still, in cases where you have no other way to communicate in a language that's not your own, automatic translations can be a big help.