Painless Japanese Translation!

[Carmen]

For those of us that *still* can't read our kana, there is hope: SysTran!

I used to struggle through Japanese web sites using Babel Fish:

world.altavista.com/

Babel Fish isn't bad, mind you and I guess the best thing about it is that it's free. However, if the page is really huge (as in lots of KB) it sometimes won't completely translate the page. It's also a little flakey at times, translating Japanese into---Japanese! Sometimes it just errors and tells you to try again later.

I finally broke down and bought SysTran Personal 4.0.

www.systransoft.com/Products/Personal.html

It's much faster and convenient to use than Babel Fish. It includes a plugin for Internet Explorer. Click a button and just watch how fast it burns through those Yahoo! Japan auction pages! (yay!) The only drawback is that it will NOT translate text in images (impossible to do) and it doesn't translate the text on form buttons (seems like it could be done). I've also found that once I've translated an email on my Yahoo! Japan account, for some reason the "Reply" button doesn't work and the page says I'm not logged in. Oh well...

The software costs $59, but if you start the order process and then close the window before actually submitting your order, you'll get a pop-up window that practically begs you to continue and gives you a $3.00 discount. whoo hoo! $59 might seem like a lot, but I've spent WAY more than that on my little kimono habit...

The translation is completely literal and can be a little wierd if you're unfamiliar with Japanese grammar (like verbs at the end of the sentence) but it can also be amusing. I was goofing around on a retail site the other night and it said, "Your cart is the sky." How poetic!

I've registered for a Japanese class that starts in January, but until I'm at least semi-literate, I'll just use my happy little SysTran crutch!

Carmen

[sg715]

Haha, I 've got my kana down but that's about it.

Thanks for the link, that can really come in handy! ;D

[fraise]

This online translator works much better than Babelfish:
www.nifty.com/globalgate/
"Japanese to English" is the second choice in the drop-down menus. I really like how when you translate a URL, it doesn't replace the Japanese with English, but puts the English translation beneath the Japanese. It's quite nice!

[Meiji]

Those sound cool, I really should check it out sometime....... whenever I need it that is. Babelfish is not that good from my experience, I suggest that nobody uses it, unless you are really desperate and at last resort. It's too far off and very awkward to me.


Obviously, a dictionary and just common experience and knowledge is the best way to avoid using cheap online translators that aren't exactly accurate. I've been learning Japanese for a little over a year now and still learning new things. That's the joy about learning a new language, there are so many different things to learn and experience.

[sg715]

Thanks Fraise!

Because it's Free, I can use it right away. That'll come in handy