System and method for network-based teletranslation from one natural language to another

• US 6,338,033 B1
• Filed: 04/20/1999
• Issued: 01/08/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 04/20/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ip Ot Sub Ulc
• Original Assignee: Alis Technologies, Inc. (Open Text Corporation)
• Inventors: Walker, Martin, Bourbonnais, Jean
• Primary Examiner(s): EDOUARD, PATRICK NESTOR
• Application Number:
  US09/294,026
• Time in Patent Office: 994 Days
• Field of Search: 704/2-7, 704/277, 707/530, 707/536, 707/513, 709/223, 709/316, 709/200, 379/88, 379/88.14
• US Class Current: 704/3
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/232 Orthographic correction, e.g. spell checking or vowelisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/47 Machine-assisted translation, e.g. using translation memory
• 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

Abstract

A network-based teletranslation system and method for translating documents from one natural language to another natural language. The teletranslation system and method are capable of handling a wide variety of formats, including HTML documents from the Internet, intranets or extranets, e-mails, or electronic documents from a word processor or other applications. The teletranslation system and method are compatible with various MT engines and human translation services, and use the computing power of a network in a scalable and flexible way. The teletranslation system and method improve bandwidth and speed by distributing the workload among several computers in the network.

Claims

1. A network-based teletranslation system for translating documents from one natural language to another, comprising:

a client application layer having a plurality of client applications, the client application layer receiving translation documents from one or more software applications and outputting translated documents;

a server layer having a plurality of filters, the server layer calling a plurality of filters in an appropriate order based on the translation documents and existing parameters, the filters preprocessing the translation documents to facilitate further preprocessing by subsequent filters, the server layer having a plurality of machine translation engines for translating the translation documents and returning the translated documents; and

an intermediate layer coupling the client application layer to the server layer and arbitrating the translation documents among the filters in the server layer;

wherein the teletranslation system is capable of handling a wide variety of formats and utilizes a computing power of the network in a scalable and flexible way, and wherein a bandwidth and the speed of the teletranslation system is increased by distributing translation requests among servers in the network.

2. The network-based teletranslation system as recited in claim 1, wherein the client application layer further comprises interfaces and plug-ins adapted to the software applications.

3. The network-based teletranslation system as recited in claim 1, wherein the intermediate layer further comprises:

a distributed object application programming interface; and

a detection module for detecting availability of filters in the network.

4. The network-based teletranslation system as recited in claim 1, wherein the intermediate layer supports multiple clients and multiple filter configurations simultaneously.

5. The network-based teletranslation system as recited in claim 1, wherein the intermediate layer distributes a workload among various filters in order to minimize translation times.

6. The network-based teletranslation system as recited in claim 1, the intermediate layer further comprising:

detection modules for detecting filter failures;

reporting modules for reporting the failures; and

correction modules for correcting the failures.

7. The network-based teletranslation system as recited in claim 1, the intermediate layer further comprising:

query modules for querying the state and capabilities of various filters; and

control modules for controlling the state of the various filters.

8. The network-based teletranslation system as recited in claim 1, the existing parameters include translation request parameters, system-level parameters, system load conditions and system error conditions.

9. A network-based filter architecture embodied in a teletranslation system for translating documents from one natural language to another, the filter architecture utilizing a computing power of the network in a scalable and flexible way, and increasing the bandwidth and speed of the teletranslation system by distributing a translation request among various filters in the network, the filter architecture comprising:

one or more atomic filters each programmed to perform a specific task;

one or more aggregate filters constructed by combining other filters, the aggregate filters analyzing the translation request and calling the other filters; and

one or more load balancing filters distributing the translation request among the aggregate filters to increase the speed of the teletranslation system and optimizing the computing power of the network.

10. The network-based filter architecture as recited in claim 9, wherein the aggregate filters comprise one or more atomic filters.

11. The network-based filter architecture as recited in claim 9, wherein the aggregate filters comprise one or more aggregate filters.

12. The network-based filter architecture as recited in claim 9, wherein the aggregate filters comprise one or more load-balancing filters.

13. The network-based filter architecture as recited in claim 9, wherein the aggregate filters comprise a combination of one or more atomic, aggregate and load-balancing filters.

14. A method for translating documents from one natural language to another by a network-based teletranslation system, comprising the steps of:

receiving translation documents at a client application layer having a plurality of client applications and outputting translated documents;

calling a plurality of filters at a server layer in an appropriate order based on the translation documents and existing parameters, the server layer having a plurality of filters;

preprocessing the translation documents at the filters to facilitate further preprocessing by subsequent filters;

translating the translation documents at a machine translation engine in the server and returning the translated documents; and

arbitrating the translation documents by an intermediate layer among the filters.

15. The method as recited in claim 14, further comprising the step of distributing the translation documents among various filters in order to minimize translation times.

16. A method for translating documents from one natural language to another natural language by a network-based filter architecture embodied in a teletranslation system, the filter architecture utilizing a computing power of the network in a scalable and flexible way, the method increasing a bandwidth of the teletranslation system by distributing the documents among various filters in the network, the method comprising the steps of:

performing specific tasks by one or more atomic filters;

analyzing translation request documents by one or more aggregate filters and calling other filters; and

distributing the translation request documents by one or more load-balancing filters among the aggregate filters to optimize the computing power of the network.

17. The method as recited in claim 16, wherein the aggregate filters comprise one or more atomic filters.

18. The method as recited in claim 16, wherein the aggregate filters comprise one or more aggregate filters.

19. The method as recited in claim 16, wherein the aggregate filters comprise one or more load-balancing filters.

20. The method as recited in claim 16, wherein the aggregate filters comprise a combination of one or more atomic, aggregate and load-balancing filters.

21. A program storage device readable by a machine, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by the machine to perform method steps of translating documents from one natural language to another by a network-based teletranslation system, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving translation documents at a client application layer having a plurality of client applications and outputting translated documents;

calling a plurality of filters at a server layer in an appropriate order based on the translation documents and existing parameters, the server layer having a plurality of filters;

preprocessing the translation documents at the filters to facilitate further preprocessing by subsequent filters;

translating the translation documents at a machine translation engine in the server and returning the translated documents; and

arbitrating the translation documents by an intermediate layer among the filters.

22. The program storage device as recited in claim 21, wherein the intermediate layer comprises one or more atomic filters.

23. The program storage device as recited in claim 21, wherein the intermediate layer comprises one or more aggregate filters.

24. The program storage device as recited in claim 21, wherein the intermediate layer comprises one or more load-balancing filters.

25. The program storage device as recited in claim 21, wherein the intermediate layer comprises a combination of one or more atomic, aggregate and load-balancing filters.