Machine translation instant messaging applications

• US 20070208813A1
• Filed: 02/17/2006
• Published: 09/06/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 02/17/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Cutrell, Edward, Toyama, Kentaro, Blagsvedt, Sean, Ananthanarayanan, Ganesh, Kannan, Swagath
• Granted Patent: US 8,660,244 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/206
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/58 Use of machine translation, e.g. for multi-lingual retrieval, for server-side translation for client devices or for real-time translation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/04 Real-time or near real-time messaging, e.g. instant messaging [IM]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/063 Content adaptation, e.g. replacement of unsuitable content

Abstract

An instant messaging translation plug-in interacts with an instant messaging program to intercept incoming messages and forward these messages to a language translation service. The plug-in then displays a translation received from the service along with the original message. This provides translation which can be used by instant messaging users to communicate across language barriers, and without local translation or knowledge of the internal workings of the translation services used. Additionally, the translation plug-in also provides for manual translation of messages, which allows communication with users who use a different language but do not use the translation plug-in. Messages are modified before translation in order to correct spelling, to prevent particular words or phrases from being translated, and to change instant messaging language into standard language form. The techniques can be performed on various messaging services, including instant messaging on computers or mobile devices, as well as SMS.

Claims

1. A method of translating text in instant messaging, the method comprising:

under control of an instant messaging program;

intercepting an incoming message;

sending the message to a translation service; and

displaying a translation of the message.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the method is performed by a translation plug-in to the instant messaging program; and

the translation plug-in displays a separate translation pane within a window of the instant messaging program.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

in the instant messaging program;

receiving an indication from a user to begin translation services;

requesting translation plug-in code from a server; and

executing received translation plug-in code to display the translation plug-in.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

in the instant messaging program, requesting a list of translation services from a server;

receiving the list of translation services; and

providing translation options to a user based on the translation capabilities of services listed in the list of translation services.

5. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

displaying a translation box in the translation pane;

receiving, in the translation box, text from a user to be translated;

receiving, in the translation box, an indication that the text should be translated; and

displaying translated text in the translation box.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising:

receiving, in the translation box, an indication that the translated text should be sent as an instant message; and

sending the translated text as an instant message.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

receiving an indication that the translated text was improperly translated;

receiving an alternative translation from the user; and

sending the alternative translation as an instant message.

8. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

automatically correcting misspelled words in the text before translation.

9. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

if the text contains instant messaging language, automatically correcting the text into standard language form before translation.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving an indication from a recipient user that the user does not understand the translation of the message; and

based upon the indication, sending a error message to a contact that sent the incoming message indicating that the message was not understood;

wherein the user is not required to be able to communicate in a language used by the contact to indicate that the user did not understand the translation.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

based upon the indication, sending a message to the translation service such that the translation service can log that the translation was not understood by the user.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the method is performed on a mobile device.

13. A system for displaying translations of instant messaging text, the system comprising:

a translation module; and

an instant messaging module configured to receive a message;

wherein the translation module is configured to;

receive an indication that the message is to be translated;

allow the message to be automatically modified according to user preferences to facilitate translation; and

translate the message; and

wherein the instant messaging module is configured to display the translated message.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the translation module is further configured to display a translation box comprising a text entry field and a translate button, and configured to:

allow a user to enter text to be manually translated; and

upon the user hitting the translate button;

sending the text to the translation service; and

displaying a translation of the entered text.

15. The system of claim 13, wherein the translation module is configured to:

automatically correct spelling of messages before translation;

utilize an instant message dictionary to correct instant messaging language into a standard language form; and

after receive indications that particular words are not to be translated, preventing those words from being translated by the translation service.

16. One or more computer-readable media containing machine-executable instructions which describe a method for facilitating messaging between two users communicating in different languages, the method comprising:

receiving an indication from a user of a first language used by the user and a second language used by a person with whom the user is communicating;

receiving an indication that a message has been received by a messaging service;

performing modifications to the message to prepare the message for translation;

sending the message to a translator which is configured to translate text from the second language to the first message;

receiving a translation of the message from the translator; and

displaying the translation to the user.

17. The computer-readable media of claim 16, wherein the method further comprises:

recognizing an indication that one or more portions of the message should not be translated; and

modifying the one or more portions so that they are not translated when the message is translated.

18. The computer-readable media of claim 16, further comprising displaying a translation box to the user;

receiving text to be translated in the translation box; and

translating the text from the first language to the second language.

19. The computer-readable media of claim 16, wherein performing modifications to the message to prepare the message for translation comprises:

automatically correcting spelling of one or more words in the message; and

automatically correcting modified instant messaging language into standard language.

20. The computer-readable media of claim 16 wherein the messaging service is SMS.