# Chinese / English translation software ? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 2, 2001, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinese-english-translation-software/70968 "2001-07-02T15:25:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinese-english-translation-software/70968/1 "2001-07-02T15:25:15Z")
I know it always used to be a total nightmare because of the variables (two bit, which Chinese dialect, nuances, etc.) but I was wondering if things have moved on recently. Anyone know of / had any experience with any software now does a passable job of translating any Chinese dialect into English and vice versa ? How about translating any Oriental character sets at all ? ---
**Author:** ![douglips](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@douglips](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/douglips)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinese-english-translation-software/70968/2 "2001-07-02T19:42:54Z")
Babelfish now does a lot more than just German, Italian, Spanish, and French. I was able to translate the Chinese government’s statistics page ([http://www.stats.gov.cn/](http://www.stats.gov.cn/)) using babelfish, and it sort of worked. Excerpts of the translation: > [@](#): > > In May national main > enterprise 载货汽车, > motorcycle output first 10 > … Detailed content… > [@](#): > > ``` > In 2000 national and various > provinces statistics bureau national > economy and the society develops > the statistical bulletin > > ``` and my favorite: [quote] [list][li]The Anhui 1-5 month signs the foreign capital cooperation item hundred (06 months on 22nd)[_]Zhejiang Province comes off sentry duty the personnel presents seven major characteristics (06 months on 21st)[_]The Jiangsu first five months main economic indicator maintains a quicker growth (06 months on 20th)[_]Shanghai house price in May again creates the rise record (06 months on 19th)[_]The Zhejiang city retail trade presents the multiplex operation pattern (06 months on 19th)Henan Province in May national economy stable growth (06 months on 18th) [/li][/quote] ---
**Author:** ![douglips](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@douglips](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/douglips)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinese-english-translation-software/70968/3 "2001-07-02T19:59:10Z")
Minus 10 points for not posting a link to [Babelfish](http://babelfish.altavista.com/). ---
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinese-english-translation-software/70968/4 "2001-07-02T22:20:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by douglips \* > [list] > [li]Zhejiang Province comes off sentry duty the personnel presents seven major characteristics (06 months on 21st)[/li] Well, it’s certainly inscrutable :eek: Thanks for the heads up on Babelfish, **douglips**. I didn’t know Altavista had expanded the…errr…portfolio. Got to give them credit for at least trying. OK, I’m off to give it a whirl ! ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinese-english-translation-software/70968/5 "2001-07-02T22:53:58Z")
The Chinese students I work with installed some software that translates English into Chinese. The icon said something like NJStar Communicator. Try a Google search for that; the first hit I got looked promising. A caveat, however, they did this on my office PC and when I would want to insert symbols into Microsoft docuements, they would print out as some Chinese character. (A list with the symbol for rainy beautiful dog instead of a bullet). The Chinese students also installed this on some computers in the department lab and the same problem occured. Pissed the shit out of the computer guy, because he had to uninstall it so people could print out docuements. And, every time he unistalled it, it would get reinstalled so they could browse the web. This was a while ago, so maybe there’s a better version now