Is Babelfish translator a rule-based machine translation?
Thread poster: Chiara Badesso
Chiara Badesso
Chiara Badesso
Switzerland
Local time: 23:11
German to Italian
+ ...
Jun 17, 2016

Do you know if https://www.babelfish.com/success/ is rule-based, statistical or hybrid? I can't find any information about this engine ...

 
Jeff Allen
Jeff Allen  Identity Verified
France
Local time: 23:11
Multiplelanguages
+ ...
about BabelFish Jun 20, 2016

chiarabadesso wrote:

Do you know if https://www.babelfish.com/success/ is rule-based, statistical or hybrid? I can't find any information about this engine ...


It has the registered name BabelFish at the site. Appears to be the the one which appeared in 1997 in a co-venture between DEC/Digital and Systran. It was the Systran rule-based system.
Only current people at Systran would be able to tell you if they are still the underlying system of this specific site.

Jeff


 
Tomás Cano Binder, BA, CT
Tomás Cano Binder, BA, CT  Identity Verified
Spain
Local time: 23:11
Member (2005)
English to Spanish
+ ...
I would say it is rules-based Jun 21, 2016

I say so because it identifies the nature of words and their combination quite well when you enter a sentence that is syntactically correct but is plain absurd. You can try by creating a sentence containing highly improbable collocations (you probably remember Chomsky's good ole' "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously").

When you enter such a sentence just made up by you (so that there is no previous history of it), Babelfish builds a sentence that is correct syntactically, while Go
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I say so because it identifies the nature of words and their combination quite well when you enter a sentence that is syntactically correct but is plain absurd. You can try by creating a sentence containing highly improbable collocations (you probably remember Chomsky's good ole' "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously").

When you enter such a sentence just made up by you (so that there is no previous history of it), Babelfish builds a sentence that is correct syntactically, while Google Translate makes a total mess of it: it cannot find sufficient group candidates to cut and paste and build the translation sentence.
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Chiara Badesso
Chiara Badesso
Switzerland
Local time: 23:11
German to Italian
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
I'll ask people at Systran Jun 21, 2016

Thank you Tomás and Jeff for your answers. It's funny how hard it is to find (simple) technical info about a translation engines ...

@Jeff: I also had the same impression
@Jeff: I'll get in touch with Systran


 
Jeff Allen
Jeff Allen  Identity Verified
France
Local time: 23:11
Multiplelanguages
+ ...
Did Systran reply about Babelfish? Oct 9, 2018

Chiara Badesso wrote:

Thank you Tomás and Jeff for your answers. It's funny how hard it is to find (simple) technical info about a translation engines ...

@Jeff: I also had the same impression
@Jeff: I'll get in touch with Systran


Hi Chiara, did Systran reply to you?
They were doing hybrid MT (rule based with statistical processing components) and have now been focused on Neural MT for the past 2 years.
But they usually don't put the most updated and customized MT systems on sites like Babelfish. That is mainly for paying customers.


 


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Is Babelfish translator a rule-based machine translation?






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