babel fish

What can you use the application for?

BabelFish is one of the first machine translating applications which can be used to automatically translate the contents of a textbox, or an entire website from one language and into another. BabelFish is only designed to create language that is understandable, and it never promises to create perfect translations. Babelfish can be used to quickly and easily translate documents into various languages, including French, German, Chinese and Japanese among plenty of others. Although BabelFish has lost ground to Google translate it was one of the first translation applications on the

Internet.

What is the history and popularity of the application?

BabelFish was created by AltaVista and instantly became a hit due to it being one of the first applications making this sort of thing possible. The software takes its name from the Babel Fish which is a fictional creature from the Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy. AltaVista was brought by Overture Services Inc in 2003, and later on in the same year Overture was taken over by Yahoo! In 2008 babelfish became Yahoo Babel Fish. BabelFish was once the most popular web translation application and although it has probably been superseded by Google Translate it still holds a very special place in many people’s hearts.

What are the differences to other apps?

BabelFish was one of the first mainstream automated translation websites; it’s powered by SysTran and does normally produce readable results. Unlike some of the other translation applications babelfish is not capable of translating the text in the actual URL of a site. BabelFish can translate to and from a wide variety of different languages including Chinese, Greek, Spanish, English, and French to name but a few. A Yahoo! Toolbar also includes the translate function which means it’s possible to translate documents without having to visit the site. There is also an option to put the babelfish translation service on your own website by copying a few lines of code. BabelFish provides instant translations and although they may not be as accurate as a professional translator they are completely free.

How does the application look and feel to use?

It’s really easy to use babelfish, you just need to visit the site and then you can enter the text you want to translate, it’s then just a matter of selecting the language and then clicking on a few buttons, this will then present you with a copy of your translated text. Although the output might not be perfect it’s normally readable however will need some corrections. It’s also easy to use the application to translate entire WebPages, to do this simply put in the address and then click the button. When translating WebPages the links that are clicked on will automatically be translated which is quite a nice function. BabelFish looks very similar to Google Translate and this is probably because only so much can be done with translating applications.

How does the registration process work?

Registration is not required to use babelfish; it’s a completely free service that you don’t even need an email address to use. To use this service just visit the website and enter the text you want to translate, this really is all that you need to do. To use BabelFish you do not have to register, and you don’t have to pay anything to use it either.

What does it cost to use the application?

Babelfish is a completely free web application that anyone can use; the application is supported by a few adverts along the side of the page. It also includes adverts on the translation results page, the adverts however are quite subtle and don’t cause any real problem. They are no more noticeable than when using search engines normally.

Who would you recommend the application to?

Babelfish is the ideal website for anyone that’s trying to translate documents or websites quickly and easily. It’s a completely automated process that involves machine translation; this might not be the most accurate form of translation however it is normally pretty reasonable.

Babel Fish Features