The idea that you could speak into a device in one language and it would emerge in another has long been a sci-fi fantasy. But this week that kind of automated translation came a step closer to reality when Skype launched the beta version of its Translator service.
For now it’s an invitation-only trial and the only languages that it can handle are English and Spanish. I tried it out, talking to Maria Romero Garcia, a Spanish professor in Seville, who works with Skype.
What I found is that you have to use a good quality microphone and speak clearly in full sentences without pauses – otherwise the machine translation will kick in and interrupt you.
But the results were not bad at all. I asked Maria what she had been up to that morning. She replied in Spanish: “Esta manana ha estado trabajando un poco poco y concertando citas para ver a mis amigos esta tarde.”
That came out in English as this: “This morning has been working a little bit and arranging appointments to see my friends this afternoon.”
The technology does struggle at times – when Maria’s cat wandered in front of the camera I asked what it was called and Translator decided I’d asked whether it was cold.
But there is a lot going on here, as Vikram Dendi, Microsoft’s lead engineer on the project, explained on the line from the US. Live translation involves speech synthesis, voice recognition and machine translation – “each technology on its own is pretty complex, putting them together is a very difficult problem.” More .
See: BBC
Related Translation News posts:

• Microsoft releases Skype Translator
• Skype Translator hands-on: Close but no Babel fish