Google adds Persian translation, Facebook adds Persian version

Cyrus Farivar says:

I guess folks over at Google and Facebook have been reading my Twitter messages and my blog – or more likely, simply sped up processes that were already in motion.

Google announced about 90 minutes ago that it had added Persian to Google Translate, while Facebook is about to launch its Persian-language version of the social networking software.

In my brief test, it seems like the “alpha” moniker is quite valid. While Google Translate was able to handle the Persian phrase: سÙ„اÙ…ØŒ اسÙ… من سیروس است

and accurately translate it as:

Hello, my name is Cyrus.

Google adds Persian translation, Facebook adds Persian version

• [ausuchinu]

  Good for Google. The (primary) Persian language is Farsi.

• [ehamiter]

  Farsi is Persian for “Persian.” Dari and Pashto are used a little in that area, but in most cases, the terms are interchangeable.

• [SamSam]

  I was recently completely amazed at Google’s translation service. Its context-sensitive understanding of translation is simply jaw-dropping.

  I was looking at the translation for the French Wikipedia article Patron, available here. (Some examples are from the wiktionary entry)

  Patron is a word that can have a bunch of different meanings in context. Google was able to grab these contexts in a way that makes most other translation services seem like children:

  “Le patron d’une équipe” – > “The boss of a team”

  “dans la marine , le patron est le commandant d’une embarcation” -> “in the Navy, the skipper is the captain of a boat,”

  “Les cartes à jouer s’impriment avec des patrons” -> “The playing cards are printed with patterns.”

  “un Saint patron” -> “a patron saint”

  “un patron désigne un modèle” -> “a master plan identifies a model”

  “Le patron de l’hôtel” -> “The owner of the hotel”

  “Les patrons et les salariés.” -> “Employers and employees”

  I could go on…

  Sorry, I know it’s not quite on topic. Someone should write a post about Google’s translation in general, though.

• [Anonymous]

  Men kommer den fungera lika dåligt som de andra översättningarna som google tillhandahåller. I regel översätter google hyfsat till Engelska, men översättning från engelska till ett annat språk eller mellan andra språk är under all kritik.

  Translation by google.

  But will it work just as bad as the other translations by Google.
  
  Impressive! My translation would probaply have been worse, but I’m not very good at English
  I usually translate google fair to English, but translation of English text into another language or other languages is under criticism.
  
  Huh? My slightly less crappy translation: “Usually google translate well into English, but a translation from English into another language, or between other languages, sucks.”

  End of translation.

  Google translations into other languages than English is usually obviously incorrect, which sucks, but isn’t very dangerous. Translations into English is not obviously incorrect, but frequently contain errors that may lead to the reader misunderstanding the content of the text, which is potentially dangerous.

• [Ted8305]

  Excellent! Good for Google.

  @SAMSAM, Babelfish still mangles the French “tant pis” to “such an amount of worse.” Google gets it right though!

• [Takuan]

  not that good yet can’t even handle:
  T’dr’duzk b’hazg t’t-