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Navy Unveils Polyglot Chat For Iraq
An anonymous reader writes "According to ScienceBlog, the U.S. Office of Naval Research, trying to keep friendly armies in Iraq from accidentally blowing each other to smithereens, is helping create software that connects instant messaging (IM) with machine translation (MT). The result: Chat software to be used in Iraq that automatically translates your messages into the correct language of the reader, called the the Coalition Chat Line - it's 'getting rave reviews from U.S. and allied-coalition personnel.'"
The US and UK troops will be able to understand each other! Two nations no longer divided by a common language :-)
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
Given the quirks of babelfish and similar, I hope poor, mangled machine translations don't cause more negative incidents than they prevent.
Was it microsoft that applied for a patent related to automated translation with IM? Maybe they can now sue the Navy and get event more licensing revenue!
More methods for the enemy to be able to figure out your location. Just what troops need!
+5 Insightful, really!
...is better than you may think. Though it is as difficult as everyone says to translate a random text from one language to another, translating short texts in a specialised domain between well-linked languages isn't too hard. Heck, they might even be able to get away with using lookup tables.
They released it to others... preferably open source, so that one might be able to better understand a friend far away.
What we say: "We want to help you."
What they hear: "All your base are belong to us!".
Online Starcraft RPG? At
Dietary fiber is like asynchronous IO-- Non-blocking!
Maybe now the guy that works at the pizza place can finally understand my order. When does the public get this software?
Chat software to be used in Iraq that automatically translates your messages into the correct language of the reader, called the the Coalition Chat Line
Iraq doubleplusgood / Iraqpersons secure / foodwater supplies up 82% / Kerry verging crimethink / oldthinkers unbellyfeel Bush / think in Bushspeak.
The coolest voice ever.
Hoy hemos matado a un terrorista --> Today we to eat a dangerous ista.
:-)
Wir haben es nicht gewust --> Wine is not a sausage.
Wie wis joe a melly klistmas --> We whish you a Merry Christmas.
No offence meant.
fortune is my favourite linux command
US: our base is protected
translate
UK : Your Base is under control
translate
Pol : Your Base Is Inside our control
translate
Jap: All Your Base Are Belong To Us
translate
Iraq : Well No Sh!t sherlock.
END TRANSMISSION
--Idiots, Every single one of YOU, A flaming mass of conglomerated morons, hey wait a second, isnt that how RAID works?
That is intended to help peace in such regions? Wonder what amount of casualties could start simple phrases like "greetings to your mother". At least if its read in english you know what it tried to say, but if the original meaning is lost with translations that had some non-diplomatic implications, well, the risk is high.
Hey, like it or hate it, Esperanto can be taught in just a month or two, to a level allowing excellent communications. I think its great to have such software, but that doesn't help face to face, whereas everyone learning a neutral language will help in every situation. So if we are going to pour money down a funnel, lets pour it down the funnel that has long-term benifits for mankind.
Drop me a line at:
Key ID: 0x54D1D809
Two nations no longer divided by a common language
Indeed. I can't tell you how many fights erupt when a Brit asks a Yank for a cigarette.
The coolest voice ever.
A real Universal Translator! Now if they can only fix these problems in time.
original:
"Our troops will be to your left doing field exercises for 24 to 48 hours, please disregard hostile sounding noises during that time"
english to japanese, then japanese to english:
"As for our troops there is a noise of sound of the enemy between that you ignore on your left which does 48 hour field exercises from 24"
english to korean, then korean to english:
"Our unit in 24 48 hours in your left which does a hazard field exercise, the sound which will be hostile during that hour which disregards me will connect a sound arresting"
pray for our troops
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The article starts with a question:
So how do you get soldiers and commanders speaking different languages in a theater of war to communicate effectively and not, for example, blow each other up mistakenly?
I think there is a simple answer to that question - use human translators! I would never trust a machine translation with my life.
I speak a second language to reasonably high standard, and so I realise that languages can be really subtle things. Sometimes things just don't translate directly, and they need interpretation e.g.
Non-English speaking soldier How's the new weapon system working?
US soldier It's hot! Damn hot!
Non-English speaking soldier Oh dear! It shouldn't be hot! You must stop using it immediately!
US soldier No I mean it rocks!
Non-English speaking soldier It's fastenings are insecure? Sounds like we should send an engineer immediately! Please cease using it!
Sametime (IBM's instant messaging product for the enterprise) has had this for some time:
http://jkent.dfw.ibm.com/ebia/doc/LTSS.html
What did you eat today? http://www.atetoday.com/
I seen to remember an early episode of King of the Hill where Hank sent Bobby on a "Snipe-hunt". It seems to be a long running practical joke in the south and at camps. Here's a link for you.
...since Iraq was originaly the Babylonian empire :-)
Iraqi: I will not buy this record, it is scratched.
Soldier: Sorry?
Iraqi I will not buy this record, it is scratched.
Soldier: Uh, no, no, no. This is a patrol.
Iraqi: Ah! I will not buy this *patrol*, it is scratched.
Soldier: No, no, no, no. Patrol...um...military (holds up his rifle).
Iraqi: Ya! Mil-teh-ree! Ya! Uh...My hovercraft is full of eels.
Soldier: Sorry?
Iraqi: My hovercraft (pantomimes hefting a rifle)...is full of eels
Soldier: Ahh, insurgents!
Iraqi: Ya! Ya! Ya! Ya! Do you waaaaant...do you waaaaaant...to come back to my place, bouncy bouncy?
Soldier: Here, I don't think you're using that thing right.
Iraqi: You great poof.
Soldier: Look, just move along please.
Iraqi: If I said you had a beautiful body, would you hold it against me? I...I am no longer infected.
Soldier: Uh, may I, uh...(takes notebook computer, types in a phrase)...Costs six and six...ah, here we are. (speaks weird Iraqi-sounding words)
Iraqi punches the soldier.
I sure hope the military's got better machine translation than the rest of us do.
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
English:
Hello. I am in Iraq. My Grid Coordinates are XY76543421, and I think that I may shoot at some guy that is pissing on the only tree out here.
In German:
Hallo. Ich bin im Irak. Meine Koordinaten des Rasterfeldes sind XY76543421, und ich denke, daB ich in irgendeine Einzelperson dieses pissing im einzigen Baum in Richtung zu drauBen werfen kann hier.
Into French:
Hallo. Je suis en Iraq. Mes coordonnees du champ de trame sont XY76543421, et moi-meme pensent que je peux jeter celui-ci dans un particulier pissing dans le seul arbre en direction dehors ici.
Back into English:
Hallo. I am in Iraq. My co-ordinates of the field of screen are XY76543421, and myself think that I can throw this one in a private individual pissing in the only steering shaft outside here.
Meaning: WTF?
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"First things first -- but not necessarily in that order"
-- The Doctor, "Doctor
is full of eels!
# (/.);;
- : float -> float -> float =
That's fine and dandy...if the entire military was composed of college educated soldiers. Chances are they only graduated from high school if they even reached that far...
_______________________________
"I'm not Conceited...I'm just a realist..."
Well, since in the last 10 years only 4 Canadians have died as a result of direct military combat, all 4 of them the result of US Friendly fire, will it translate Canadian to American as well? Oh wait, I guess we all speak English.. So much for that..
Mod +5 Drunk
Why this will never fly.
#10 Some of our Middle Eastern allies will become
offended by always being greeted with the
message, "Are you female?"
#9 Enemy troops will always know our location
simply by logging on as "1337BustyBlonde" and
typing "a/s/l"
#8 "Dood, ph33r my m4d fr@gg1ng ski11z" doesn't
have the same ring as "Mess with the best, die
like the rest."
#7 Along those same lines, "All your base are
belong to us" does not have the same ring
as "Veni, Vidi, Vici"
#6 Spammers will be responsable for one of the
worst military blunders in history when carpet
bombing *.mil domains with "Free Disney World
Vacation" spam initiates the carpet bombing of
Disney World with several thousand tons of high
explosives.
#5 Less technically inclined officers will bring
the entire system to its knees when the click on
the *.jpg.exe link and release the latest virus
threat.
#4 Our leadership ranks will be wiped out by our
own troops when above mentioned officers give the
excuse "I didn't think the virus would affect us.
I mean, we are all wearing our biohazard gear."
#3 Troops will be too busy reading Slashdot
#2 NO MORE WAR! Troops will be too busy buying
Vi@gra and "Organ enhancement" pills to shoot
people.
AND THE NUMBER ONE REASON THIS WILL NEVER WORK...
#1 The main IM server will be broken by some
dweeb named "Cowboy Neal" who puts his canteen in
the "cup holder"
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. -Frederick Douglass
Most people in the world speak english.
nope.
For proof, get your ass out in say, the middle of china.
You can't take the sky from me...
Never flame the guy with the flamethrower ;)
"Time for a brew". (Apparently "brew" is an American synonym for "beer". In English, and certainly in the context of the army, it would refer to a cuppa tea.)
I was reading an article in Canada's The National Post yesterday that interviewed an English speaking Iraqi. He said that a lot of Iraqi's are detained or apprehended needlessly at US guard checkpoints simply because they cannot speak English to the guards.
The interviewee used to do translation for the US army, but after an incident he is now being sought as a member of the former Iraqi army. Despite this, he still has less trouble going through checkpoints simply because he can explain his business in English.
we think in memes.
We happen to use words to express the memes but we don't think in words.
Regardless, its the old: "I know you think you understand what you heard but I don't believe that you understand that what I said was not what I meant."
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
I've laughed at a lot of these, but folks the Navy has been using chat for some time between ships underway at sea to conduct administrative type communications and for general questions. They DO NOT us it for dictating operational orders or policy. This is still done via voice communications and "official message traffic" (teletype style message in proper formatting released by the designated commander). So all you folks worried about soldiers getting their heads blown off by poor translation can breath easy...that type of info isn't passed via this method, even between our own troops who speak the same language.
IANANES (I am not a native English speaker), please don't look at this comment too closely ;-)
I don't like spell checkers. They catch all the trivial mistakes that you mostly just read over anyway, give you a nice feeling that the text is okay, but then they leave the really grave, embarrassing mistakes in. Most spell checkers should more accurately be called typo checkers. I English, they're able to also analyse grammar a little, beause it isn't all too complicated, but firstly this is absolutely not an option in most other languages and secondly I have to ask if we really want to help people who can't tell 'its' (_one_ word, possessive form of the pronoun it) apart from 'it's' (_two_ words, contraction of it is) in a way that makes them think even less about such things?
but what do i know, i'm just a model.
Instant messaging was a vital communication method during the Iraq war. I was recently involved in a privately-funded study and interview series on the Iraq war.
Ground-based voice communications were poor during the war because forces moved too fast and were too spread out for the out-dated ground-based voice network to catch up. One of the most vital communication links then became the satellite based instant messaging feature of the vehicle-mounted Blue Force Tracking system, which tracked force locations with a GPS and satellite uplink, and provided unit location mapping.
There were many stories of guys in tanks who's only communication link with command at times were their Blue Force Tracking instant messaging system. IM isn't just for 16 year old girls anymore.
Blue Force Tracking, though not widely enough deployed, was one of the biggest technological successes of the war, and was directly responsible for the almost perfect friendly-fire record in the war. The instant messaging feature was practically an after-thought, but we were very lucky we had it, even in limited deployment, and it proved itself as a mature war-time tool.
Conversely, the 507th Maintenance Company incident, where Jessica Lynch was captured, could have been prevented if they had the Blue Force Tracking system. They were last in a convoy and fell behind their convoy a couple miles, at which point they lost radio contact, and didn't know the exact convoy route without the convoy realizing they had fell behind. Now the first and last vehicle in an Iraq convoy is almost always equipped with a Blue Force Tracking unit so that the convoy leader immediately knows of a straggler and is always in communication with them via instant messaging.
Braddock Gaskill
...second language. Chinese (Mandarin) is unquestionably the most common natively spoken language, and probably still ahead of English if you demand fluency in the lanaguage. English however is spoken extensively to some degree of competence outside of native English speaking countries, and is by far the most common second language. Mandarin is not spoken so much outside China.
It is very common in my experience to hear non-native English speakers conversing in English when in another non-English speaking country. (I might note that the grandparent espousing English as a world language seemed to be a native Spanish speaker himself.)
'Most people in the world speak English' is an exaggeration, but the figure is estimated at 1 in 4. English certainly has the best claim to the status of an 'international language,' is spoken or has official status in more countries than any other language, and is used in international organisations and communication more than any other language.
I'd also guess that it's the most popular second language among the non-native speaking soldiers in Iraq, which is what the grandparent was talking about (not so many Chinese there).