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AltaVista Smoothes Over Tower of Babel

Automatic translation can handle major European languages.

By Brian McWilliams, PCWorld   

According to spokesperson Don Bradley, AltaVista will do more than Web searches: It will also translate, for free, the content of sites between English and Spanish, Italian, German, French, Portuguese, or Italian.

%dquotThe ultimate goal is that you wouldn%squott need to have multiple Web sites in different languages,%dquot says Bradley. %dquotYou%squotd be able to stick a message in your Web page and have it translated instantaneously by AltaVista.%dquot

Behind the scenes is language translation software from Systran running on Digital%squots high-end Alpha servers. When you view a Web site from within AltaVista, the software quickly does what%squots called a near translation of the text on a page. That means it may choke on difficult idioms or grammatically incorrect phrases, but you should get the basic meaning nonetheless.

Bradley says Digital is watching to see how popular the translation service becomes, and hopes to add Asian languages to the lineup. Besides enabling the company to sell more banner advertising, Bradley says the translation service helps to differentiate AltaVista from other search sites.

While the service is only in test mode right now, Bradley said Digital has already had to install new hardware since it went online today to support the traffic. So expect delays or even some unavailability over the next couple days.