System and Method for Interactive Auromatic Translation

• US 20130173247A1
• Filed: 12/28/2012
• Published: 07/04/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 12/28/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Bloomberg Finance LP (Bloomberg LP)
• Original Assignee: Bloomberg Finance LP (Bloomberg LP)
• Inventors: Hodson, James Alexander
• Granted Patent: US 9,613,026 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 704/4
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/40 Processing or translation of natural language natural language analysis G06F40/20; semantic analysis G06F40/30
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/45 Example-based machine translation; Alignment

Abstract

Embodiments of the invention relate to computerized systems and methods for automatically translating text between natural languages. Text for translation may be broken into segments, which may themselves be templates including placeholders. If an exact match for a segment is found in a translation database, the segment may be matched with its translation from the database. Otherwise, alternate source language text, corresponding to the segment, for which an exact translation is available, may be identified and presented to the user for selection. Text selected by the user may replace the original segment and be matched with its translation.

Translation of a segment may be influenced by other translated segments. Additionally, translations may be modified as the user interactively enters and edits text.

Claims

1. A method of automatically translating text from one natural language to another using a computer system that comprises one or more processors, one or more interfaces operatively coupled to at least one of the processors, and one or more computer-readable storage media operatively coupled to at least one of the processors, the method comprising:

receiving text in a first language through at least one of the interfaces;

at least one of the processors executing instructions retrieved from at least one of the computer-readable storage media to identify within the text a first segment that comprises a plurality of words, the first segment consisting of a complete or partial phrase or a complete or partial sentence;

at least one of the processors executing instructions retrieved from at least one of the computer readable storage media to identify a plurality of first candidate source segments, each of the first candidate source segments differing from the first segment and having in the database an exact translation into a second language that is not the first language;

in response to receiving input through at least one of the interfaces that selects one of the first candidate source segments, designating the selected first candidate source segment as a first source segment; and

at least one of the processors executing instructions retrieved from at least one of the computer-readable storage media to identify in a database a first translation of the first source segment into the second language.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the first translation is a templated translation.

3. The method of claim 1, comprising at least one of the processors executing instructions retrieved from at least one of the computer-readable storage media to identify in the database a second translation of the first source segment into a third language that is not the first language or the second language.

4. The method of claim 3, comprising:

transmitting the first translation through at least one of the interfaces; and

transmitting the second translation through at least one of the interfaces;

wherein transmitting the first translation is effectively simultaneous with transmitting the second translation.

5. A computer system for automatically translating text from one natural language to another, the computer system comprising:

one or more processors;

one or more interfaces operatively coupled to at least one of the processors; and

one or more computer-readable storage media, operatively coupled to at least one of the processors and encoded with instructions that, when executed by at least one of the processors, cause the computer system at least to;

receive text in a first language through at least one of the interfaces;

identify within the text a first segment that comprises a plurality of words, the first segment consisting of a complete or partial phrase or a complete or partial sentence;

identify a plurality of first candidate source segments, each of the first candidate source segments differing from the first segment and having in the database an exact translation into a second language that is not the first language;

in response to receiving input through at least one of the interfaces that selects one of the first candidate source segments, designate the selected first candidate source segment as a first source segment; and

identify in a database a first translation of the first source segment into the second language.

6. The computer system of claim 5, wherein the first translation is a templated translation.

7. The computer system of claim 5, wherein the instructions comprise instructions that, when executed by at least one of the processors, cause the computer system at least to identify in the database a second translation of the first source segment into a third language that is not the first language or the second language.

8. The computer system of claim 7, wherein:

the instructions comprise instructions that, when executed by at least one of the processors, cause the computer system at least to

transmit the first translation through at least one of the interfaces and

transmit the second translation through at least one of the interfaces; and

transmitting the first translation is effectively simultaneous with transmitting the second translation.

9. A computer-readable storage medium encoded with instructions that, when executed by one or more processors within a computer system that comprises one or more interfaces operatively coupled to at least one of the processors, cause the computer system at least to:

receive text in a first language through at least one of the interfaces;

identify within the text a first segment that comprises a plurality of words, the first segment consisting of a complete or partial phrase or a complete or partial sentence;

identify a plurality of first candidate source segments, each of the first candidate source segments differing from the first segment and having in the database an exact translation into a second language that is not the first language;

in response to receiving input through at least one of the interfaces that selects one of the first candidate source segments, designate the selected first candidate source segment as a first source segment; and

identify in a database a first translation of the first source segment into the second language.

10. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the first translation is a templated translation.

11. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the instructions comprise instructions that, when executed by at least one of the processors, cause the computer system at least to identify in the database a second translation of the first source segment into a third language that is not the first language or the second language.

12. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 11, wherein:

the instructions comprise instructions that, when executed by at least one of the processors, cause the computer system at least to

transmit the first translation through at least one of the interfaces and

transmit the second translation through at least one of the interfaces; and

transmitting the first translation is effectively simultaneous with transmitting the second translation.