How Does Machine Translation Technology Work?

Machine translation technology has done wonders for both the users of the internet and companies and organizations around the globe. Still, many people don't really understand how the technology works. Machine translation technology uses Recurring Neural Networks (RNN) in a Neural Machine Translation (NMT) algorithm to accomplish accurate translations between both similar and disparate languages.

One of the clearest and most accurate explanations of this technology was first offered back in 1968 by a French researcher, B. Vauqois.

Visualize the Process

He explained machine translation technology by asking people to visualize a triangle with the pointy end at the top and the wide end at the bottom. The left side of the triangle represents the source language sentence. The right side of the triangle represents the target language sentence or the sentence after it has been translated.

Now visualize the triangle sliced into tiers horizontally. These tiers represent the different levels of analysis the machine translation technology can perform. The top tiers represent less complicated levels of analysis, such as identifying nouns and verbs.

As we descend through the pyramid, the tiers start to widen as the analysis becomes more complicated. For instance, this deeper level of analysis can begin identifying which nouns are modified by which adjectives and which verbs are modified by which adverbs.

A simple sentence will not require the utilization of every tier or level of analysis and thus can be translated more quickly and accurately. Conversely, translating sentences from one form of characters to another, such as Chinese to Korean, may utilize much deeper levels of analysis.

Further Steps of the Process

Once the sentence has passed through all the levels of analysis, it’s passed over to a transferral process. In this process, the technology creates a version of the source sentence in the target language that is equal to or slightly less complex as the source sentence.

Another process called 'generation' then creates a final version of the source sentence in the target language.

Many Versions of Machine Translation

Many companies are working on their own versions of this machine translation technology, depending on the needs of their regional customers or industries. In every version of this technology, the Holy Grail is to achieve complete accuracy in the blink of an eye.

The key development in this growing industry is the inclusion of the RNN process in all the different levels of analysis taking place during the translation process. Language never stops developing. As new ideas and concepts come into being, words and phrases are created to describe them.

With the development of the RNNs, the different levels of analysis can continue to 'learn' and develop their processes to keep pace with ongoing development and changes of both the source and target languages.

This artificial intelligence approach is vital to machine translation technology. It makes it a dynamic and ever-changing technology that provides a powerful tool to people all over the planet who wish to communicate accurately and effectively with speakers of different languages.

Sanath pollemore is best blogger and writer alll niche.