Automatic Translation of Product Title, Description, etc.

[hostricity]

I see that I can enter the product name and description in each language.

 

Is it possible to have automatic translation when I have not entered the translation for that language into the catalog?

 

In other words, in French, if there's a French description, display it. If there's not a French description, then automatically translate it from English into French.

[Radu]

There are payed modules for this, I think prestochangeo sells something similar.

 

You need to use some external API to make the translation. Microsoft has something on the azzure marketplace with 2mil free characters per month. Google has some widgets to automatically translate the whole page on each visit.

 

Anyway you need to create custom code to make a nice solution

[Bill Dalton]

Machine translation only provides a literal translation. It can't translate the phrase, or proper meaning.

 

 

Here is a good example from,

http://www.translationjm.com/machine-translation-how-bad-is-it/

 

This is the French:

 

Bob travaille pour une petite entreprise au centre-ville. Le travail de Bob consiste dans la réparation d’ordinateurs et l’installation de nouveaux logiciels. Durant ses temps libres, il aime lire, regarder des films et jouer au poker avec ses amis. Bob a 30 ans et vit dans une grande maison avec sa femme et ses enfants.

 

This is English Human Translation:

 

Bob works for a small company downtown. Bob’s job consists of repairing computers and installing new software. In his spare time, he likes to read, watch movies and play poker with his friends. Bob is 30 years old and lives in a big house with his [spam-filter] and kids.

 

This is English Machine Translation:

 

Bobsled works for a small business to the center city. The work of Bobsled consists in the repair of computers and the installation again software. During its free time, it likes to read, look at films and to play poker with its friends. Bobsled is 30 years old and lives in a big house with his woman and its children.

[Bill Dalton]

Wow! Google is getting real good.

 

Google English Translation:

 

Bob works for a small business in the city center. Bob is working in computer repair and installation of new software. In his spare time, he enjoys reading, watching movies and playing poker with his friends. Bob is 30 years old and lives in a big house with his [spam-filter] and children.

 

This is English Human Translation:

 

Bob works for a small company downtown. Bob’s job consists of repairing computers and installing new software. In his spare time, he likes to read, watch movies and play poker with his friends. Bob is 30 years old and lives in a big house with his [spam-filter] and kids.

Edited March 9, 2013 by Bill Dalton (see edit history)

[Radu]

I use Microsoft services for my website, google doesn't offer free access to it's API anymore

[tomerg3]

You can use http://www.presto-changeo.com/en/prestashop-modules/19-website-translator.html

 

I worked in the field of Machine Translation before making the switch to e-commerce.

 

While machine translation is still not in human quality, and it won't be for many many more years, it is getting much better, especially for non technical terms.

 

Google offers the best translation (it has been wining the DARPA MT test for the last 6+ years), the amount of data and processing power they have is unparalleled, however the method and approach are still flawed, which is why they are making very little improvement.

 

Anyway, I can go on and on, but it comes down to offering customers from overseas an easier way of finding your site by getting your website indexed in additional languages.

[hostricity]

Bill Dalton:

 

It's a shame that Bob doesn't have any cats.

[hostricity]

You can use http://www.presto-ch...translator.html

 

...

 

Anyway, I can go on and on, but it comes down to offering customers from overseas an easier way of finding your site by getting your website indexed in additional languages.

 

Are you saying that your tool could be used to translate the Prestashop shopping cart itself into additional languages?

 

Also: How does the product catalog translation work? Does it populate the other languages in the catalog from the English version and then allow us to go back and clean up the translation?

[tomerg3]

That is exactly what I am saying, we used it on our site, if you go to the product page I linked, you can see a video showing how it works.

 

It populates all the PS translation fields so you can go in and edit any of them.

[Radu]

Hello Tomerg, I noticed your module uses Bing translate which is working pretty well.

Too bad google stopped offering free access to it's API. Do you know any reason they did this?

[tomerg3]

Yes, it costs them money, a lot of money to run all those translation servers.

 

The quality is not good enough to sell to any publishing company or for any serious money, so they sell it for very little for large quantities.