Sunday, 11 December 2016

Week 6 [12.12-18.12.2016] Machine Translation and Computer Assisted Translation as Example of Tools Utterly Changing One of the Mordern World Proffessions



Hello everybody,
I am very happy to present you an interesting article on what is partially connected to a very important issue for a modern world ‒ the need, importance and role of certain proffessions. Machines and computers speed up many production proccesses, save time and work, help develop advanced technical solutions to various problems. Nevertheless, there is also a negative side of technical progress, some proffessions disappeared, some are slowly fading away, while other need to evolve and change their form. This article pertains to machine translation and coputer-assisted translation and their influence on role of translators in the modern world. I hope you will find it interesting. I would also like you to comment on it, bearing in mind the following questions:
1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?
2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?
3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?
4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular proffession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

33 comments:

  1. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference between machine and computer assisted translation?

    First of all if I am correct this article was published in 2004 so 12 years ago and might be very outdated.

    Computer assisted translation is based on human-made transitions and are stored in a repository called Translation Memory. The new translations are made by using the most of the old version but the terminology should be updated by a human. The Machine translation uses the human-made translation only in the first stage and the engine trains the machine to learn how to translate new texts either by using the more frequent translations or applying grammar rules. And usually the machine translation very often make mistakes.

    2. Do you know any other professions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?

    Well I think that especially in production in magazines a lot of people are replaced by machines or even in agriculture, some time ago people had to deal with sowing seeds and harvesting wit their’s own hands and nowadays there is so many special vehicles and machines.


    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?

    When stayed abroad I used many times Google Translate and it helped me a lot. I really liked the translation by Google Glasses in real time for instance when I looked at Spanish newspaper the text was replaced by english one. I wish one day it will be normal to use it especially helpful in Chinese or other asian languages.

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular profession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    I think that every profession changed a lot because of programs like business analysis or research methods but I don’t know any profession that disappeared.

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  2. Thank you very much for your opinion. Indeed, the text is from 2004, nevertheless, it has been recently updated and apart from that,nothing has changed for the past 13 years in this matter. No new inventions were introduced, no groundbreaking solutions that could drastically change world of machine and computer-assisted translation. I do agree with you that it would be great to have Google Glasses that would provide for its users an ideal translation of a newspaper or book written in all possible foreign languages.

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  3. 1) Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference between machine and computer assisted translation?

    I think Cezary explained that in a way I have nothing more to add.

    2) Do you know any other professions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?

    I don't know which one disappeared probably some industrial low level positions related to quality check are now fully taken over by machines. For sure the work of librarians has changed dramatically but they are still needed. So I cannot name particular profession but as I stated above industrial related positions are being hit the most in my opinion.

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?

    Lol, if I need to translate something I type into Google keyword "translate" so I guess you know where I'm landing? I don't really need anything more than that. I know Microsoft has introduced live translation of skype calls. But that's pretty it. Abroad I'm forcing people to speak english=)

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular profession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    As per point 3 there is a lot of change going on because of the technological advancements. Let's name few: Quality management in the production processes, all research in science are computer supported now (Physics now and 30 years ago has totally different set of tools to solve problems). It's hard to really name particular profession so it's even harder to name a program=)

    Thanks for article.
    M

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  4. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?
    Wow, this article is really old. After 12 years I think world has changed. A lot of aspects mentioned in this article are deprecated. However, answering your question. Machine translation is trying to translate text with algorithms based on deep learning and so on. Most of the times quality of translated text is far from being acceptable. Computer assisted translation is a form of language translation in which a human translator uses computer software to support and facilitate the translation process. According to wiki :)
    2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?
    Librarians, a lot of factory workers.
    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?
    They can be useful on the most basic level. I wouldn't use it, let's say as a support in my job interview in Japan :D
    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular proffession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?
    It's hard to add something new to what has been already written by my colleagues. Even grocery shops are being transformed into self-service ones.

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  5. To be honest I don't feel ready to investigate machine translation subjects. It's probably hardest topic known since foundation of human civilization. If somebody don't realize how selfsame difficult presented subject is than should try to translate neons in New York or Las Vegas depending on mobile phone apps.

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  6. 1.Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference between machine and computer assisted translation?
    I think that a lot change since this article was published but still we need human to do well-prepared translations. Human Languages are difficult and every is different so it is very difficult to make good computer translation. Machine translations are made to improve this tasks but still are not good enough.

    2. Do you know any other professions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?

    I can answer this question saying that every profession has to adapt to new technology. For example teachers, doctors, scientist have to learn to use technology to communicate with people but they can not be replaced. Some of professions like cashier may be replaced by machines in a future but we will always need people to work just on different tasks.

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?
    I know that facebook translate comments in other languages but it is rather poor quality translations. Unfortunately, I do not know any other translators that may help scientist.

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular profession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?
    I do not know but maybe in a few years coursera and such kind of eductaional platforms will replace normal universities.

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    1. Thank you for your comment. I totally agree that Facebook provides worst translations of comments ever. They are far worse than "thank you from the mountain" statement provided by Google Translate when you enter "dziękuję z góry" as source language phrase. It would be great if educatios platforms replaced normal universities but I guess we will have to wait for that a couple of years more.

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  7. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?

    The most profound difference is, the human being is responsible for the effect in CAT, while MT is fully automatic.

    2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?

    There are too many of them. The most obvious profession that was eradicated by computers is typist. There are no typists around anymore. Secretaries on the other hand had to evolve into team assistants - somebody to help on planning, but not necessary redact and write your letters for you.

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?

    You're asking the wrong person. Since I have experience in Software Localization, I know many Translation Memory and Machine Translation systems. Frankly, neither Google Translate, nor Bing Translator is a professional one. It's rather aimed at hobbyists.

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular proffession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    Let me think... MS Word? Or MS Office in general. I believe there could be many examples...

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    1. Thank you for a great comment. You made an excellent point when pointing out the difference between CAT and MT.The role of human is crucial for the outcome in CAT programme,as it is he who is entering and modifying its records. I didn't think of typist when I was trying to come up with a profession that disappeared. Well said!

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  8. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?

    I thing that Cezary explanation is so accurate that is difficult to add more to it.

    "Computer assisted translation is based on human-made transitions and are stored in a repository called Translation Memory. The new translations are made by using the most of the old version but the terminology should be updated by a human. The Machine translation uses the human-made translation only in the first stage and the engine trains the machine to learn how to translate new texts either by using the more frequent translations or applying grammar rules. And usually the machine translation very often make mistakes."

    2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?

    Factory workers, cashiers, Currency Exchange Office workers etc.

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?

    A machine translation application is a program that attempts to translate text or speech from one natural language to another. Machine translation applications have become relevant to the modern language industry. Please see the individual products' articles for further information. There are a plenty of such programs. Please see Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_machine_translation_applications). I counted 24 of those.

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular proffession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    That is not so easy to forecast where we can imagine a physical "machine" taking the place of a human:
    • Taxi drivers and truck drivers replaced with autonomous vehicles (see Self-Driving Trucks Are Going to Hit Us Like a Human-Driven Truck).
    • Agricultural labourers and factory workers replaced with automated machinery.
    • Toll booth operators replaced with Fast-Trak, iPass, etc.
    and so on.

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  9. Hi thanks for the topic introduction. To answer your questions:
    1. Currently there is quiet a huge difference between text that has been translated via machine translation and a person. It is usually visible when the words are used in specific context and possess various meanings, or when the order in which they are put somehow influence the resulting meaning.
    2. Yes there are many, ie.: telephone operators, milkmen. ;)
    3. There are a lot of translation programs, however I am not really aware of any particularly better than what Google offers.
    4. Uber is probably making taxi drivers irritated.

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  10. Hi, that's a great topic!

    1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?

    Machine translation is a process based on three stages - it anlyzes the structure of a sentence in the ource language, breaks down the sentence into small elements and rebuild the sentence in the target language.

    Computer-assisted translation is more complex process which includes many tools and sources to reach the best translation possible.

    2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?

    Of course - sorting offices, for example. I believe no one checks the address of every package, but the code of the package is scanned by the machine and then some auto warehouse line takes it to other packages that are meant to be sent to the same area.

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?

    I had a translation device in the past. It was a very small device with capabilities of early Google Translate.

    I think this programs can be useful. My friend's mother works in the US as a charwoman and she communicates via Google Translate with people for whom she is cleaning houses or offices. So I can see the potential.

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular proffession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    I think it is very similar question to the second one. But for example applications for banking changed the way banks are working. We can do almost every banking operation by using the application.

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    1. Wow, your friend's mother is a very smart woman. I wouldn't come up with such an idea. I would try gestures, mimics, though I am well aware of potential of Google Translate and I am using it on a daily basis when trying to translate something very quickly, to grasp the basic points of some scientific articles etc.

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  11. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?

    Computer assisted translation (CAT) is utilising Translation Memory for storage translation done by human. Down to multi-context use of many words yet, the CAT is still producing plethora of mistakes, which subsequently must be corrected by human translator to arrive with the correct translation.

    2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?
    Tesco/ Sainsbury’s cashiers in the UK. Carrefour in Poland implemented automated cash desks as well. Entire banking sector is switching from retail branches into e-banking/ smart banking which enhances efficiency on both sides – for customer and the company. This is the inevitable change for the professions that are repeatable in nature (Poczta Polska, shops, banks etc.)
    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a country?
    The only one that I know is Translatica. I used to use this pre-invention of Google Translator. I feel that use such software as Google Translate is still better while travelling abroad and not knowing the host mother tongue, than not using it at all. From the contexts presented next to words in dictionary, users ca figure out what the tourist is up to.
    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a proffession or utterly changed a field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?
    Please refer to answer 2 for the examples. The reason behind disappearing the profession is technological progress.

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  12. Computer aided translation is based on human-made and programmed transitions that are stored and that are used in every case. Machine aided translation in the core have same concept but the machine is trained during it work and it is adding new concept itself.
    Many physical workers were replaced by machines, such people had to get new skills and work where machines were not able to adapt (because of lack of getting the experience). Software testers evolved with the new technologies that allowed us to make most of the test fully automatically.
    Bing translator (from Microsoft) is currently one of the best machine translation programs. It is so good that it can be used in real time to translate voice conversations

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    1. Thank you for your comment. I haven't tried Bing translator yet, but after what you wrote, I am definitely going to try it. Maybe I will make a small comparison test just to see what the difference between Google Translate and Bing is, how they manage the same text and where the potential field for improvement is.

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  13. Replies
    1. Thank you for the link to the article. It was very interesting! I enjoyed it very much.

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  14. 1.Computer-assisted translation, computer-aided translation or CAT is a form of language translation in which a human translator uses computer software to support and facilitate the translation process. Computer-assisted translation is sometimes called machine-assisted, or machine-aided, translation.
    Machine translation, sometimes referred to by the abbreviation MT is a sub-field of computational linguistics that investigates the use of software to translate text or speech from one language to another. On a basic level, MT performs simple substitution of words in one language for words in another, but that alone usually cannot produce a good translation of a text because recognition of whole phrases and their closest counterparts in the target language is needed. Solving this problem with corpus and statistical techniques is a rapidly growing field that is leading to better translations, handling differences in linguistic typology, translation of idioms, and the isolation of anomalies.
    2. Telegraphists, Outbound marketers, Typist, Travel Agent
    3. Here is some comprehensive list of machine translations programs
    Comparison of machine translation applications, there is bunch of open sourced solutions as well with open API’s so it can be helpful with scientific research
    4. Any platform utilizing shared economy model is changing professions in very significant way. For example AirBnB is changing travel agents profession an together with application like hopper and wakacje.pl it can replace this profession enterierly.

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    1. Thank you very much for your comment. I was thinking about the profession of telegraphist, when I was watching Titanic in television two days ago. It was an interesting and very important profession. But now we have E-mails, phones, Internet, Skype, GPS and so indeed it was natural for this profession to disappear.

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  15. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?

    I have to admit it is a really difficult topic and I am not convinced I truly understand it. The main differences seem to concern the usage of the repository of human-made translations.

    2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?
    There is a lot of proffessions that are disappearing from the market due to the technical process. The fastest disappearing proffession in USA is, for an example door-to-door sales workers. The structure of advertisement market has clearly changed. There is no need to leave your house in order to sell something.

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?
    I am afraid I don't recognize many machine translation programmes apart from the Google translate. Of course there are plenty of such programmes. First search indicate the list provided by wiki with a list of translators: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_machine_translation_applications
    I think it may be useful. Someday it will be possible to translate anything exactly.
    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular proffession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    Anything that can be provided with an app. Uber is an example, food delvery, too.

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    1. I had no idea that the fastest disappearing profession in the US is door-to-door sales workers. Where did you find that information? I am wondering how it affects minority groups that work only on such a basis, I mean especial Romanichal Gypsies who specialise i.a. in asphalting drives and provide their services exclusively by going door to door.

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  16. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?
    Hmmm I think that this document is outdated it is from 2004, I always thought that articles from 2013 are old especially in computer science.
    I think that Cezary did his job about this question.

    2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?
    I think that computer transalation is not field that can threat humans (especially when it comes to polish language).
    Very long time ago (but not so many when we look at the date of this article) there was profession called computer :D and i think that this is good example (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_computer).

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?

    When it comes to translating from polish to english every translator falls. There are some application which can help you in translating field but not from polish language. I don't think that in near future translation correctness will improve.

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular proffession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    This question is identical as one above and there is my answer for this o

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  17. Thank you for your comment. As I already mentioned, the article, though not very recent, is still very up-to-date, as not much progress was made withing this field of science. I chose it on purpose, in order to inspire you to think of professions of the past and the role of technology in modern life, branches of business. I agree that translating anything from Polish and into Polish is a very hard job and I am not aware of any programme that would provide at least a decent or understandable version of translation.

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  18. Hello,
    I have to agree with previous discussion participants. This article is a little bit outdated. We can compare current systems with for example solutions available 4 years ago. Difference in translations quality is huge. We can not abate hardware impact in effectiveness of translations but algorithms and AI solution are most important in this area.

    Microsoft Bing is very good tool that translates polish language too.

    Quality inspection in industrial environment is performed by specialised vision systems that allow check parameters and visual aspects of produced item. This is the biggest field that exchange human and ensures better and stable results

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    1. Thank your for your comment. As I already mentioned I have to check Microsoft Bing when it comes to translating some scientific texts and compare the outcome with what Google Translate provides.

      I do agree that quality inspection is a field where machines and computers can easily take over work of human beings. And to be honest I truly believe that machines and computers will be far better checkers:). Hopfeully, they will take over the whole food indsutry, we will be safer then:)

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  19. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference bettween machine and computer assisted translation?

    Computer assisted translation is a translation made by a human with the use (help) of computer. The machine translation is a translation made by algoritms or some translation engine automatically (without much human engagement)

    2. Do you know any other proffessions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?

    For sure much work in factories was automated. Few decades ago almost every activity in a factory was performed by a human worker, now a lot of it is done by a machine. From the other side, more engineers and people specialised in automation are needed in such companies.

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?

    To be honest I only use Google translator. Of course it can be useful in science and everyday life. Even in the foreign languages that I have learnt there are a lot of words I don't know. The vocabulary in scientific articles is usually specialised and sophisticated, what makes them difficult to understand and a little help from Google translator is always appreciated.

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular proffession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    Nothing specific came to my mind in this moment, but as I mentioned in my answer to the second query, automation replaced a lot of blue-collar workers in factories.

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  20. Do you know any other proffessions That disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new Circumstances due to technical progress, Invention of computers or other machines?
    I believe that this process affected each area.
    Do you know any machine translation programs' apart from Google Translate? Do you think that to dry download_programmes small be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when traveling abroad to communicate with the native people of a Particular country?
    I heard about MICROSOFT TRANSLATOR. They can be useful, because they can accumulate big data. With many parts of the world.

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  21. Machine translation is far from being perfect. It can be the basis for translation but it is seldom precise and correct. Cartwheels, blacksmiths and others disappeared but because of the disappearance of the jobs themselves. I don’t know any of them. I think that such translations are imperfect, artificial and even hopeless but they can be improved with time

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  22. 1. Machine translation based on algorithmic text from one language of the other. CAT tools offer technical solutions to improve the work of the translator, but not replace his skills and knowledge. Therefore, they should not be confused with translators that will automatically translate the text without taking into account differences in language, context or metaphorical expression.
    2. Already died professions such as employees of manual telephone exchanges.
    3. There are a lot of solutions, of course, google translator is the most popular but it is not only solution, just search on the Internet. Certainly translations leave much to be desired. With the help of these tools, you can sometimes see what is written even in some "exotic" language.
    4. Nothing comes to my mind what would so drastically worked, although such tools for online banking and self-service cash registers at shops certainly reduce employment in these sectors.

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  23. 1. Basing on the article presented, can you elaborate on the difference between machine and computer assisted translation?

    On the basis of the article I can say that the difference between machine and computer assisted translation is that machine translation doesn’t need human intervention. Although machine translation is an automatic process, it requires post-editing in order to yield a quality target text.

    2. Do you know any other professions that disappeared or were forced to evolve and adapt to new circumstances due to technical progress, invention of computers or other machines?

    Yes, I can list few professions that disappeared due to technical progress: typesetter, armourer, stove fitter, bell founder. Nowadays computers are used in various areas. Many people had to learn computer skills or how to use modern machinery.

    3. Do you know any machine translation programmes apart from Google Translate? Do you think that such programmes may be useful tool in scientific research or everyday life when travelling abroad to communicate with native people of a particular country?

    I know also the Microsoft Translator. I think that such programmes are very useful especially abroad. Of course it is hard to use them during a conversation but on the other hand they can help us to communicate in exceptional situations.

    4. Can you name a programme that led to disappearance of a particular profession or utterly changed a particular field of science or branch of business? How did it happen?

    For example a media player. Due to the progress of information technology many companies had to close down. Moreover big Polish companies are sold to foreign corporations as like Zelmer (BSH), Wedel (Lotte Group), Telekomunikacja Polska (Orange) or Polar (Whirpool). Many of them lost even their Polish names and trademarks.

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  24. Machine translation is far from being perfect. It can be the basis for translation but it is seldom precise and correct. Cartwheels, blacksmiths and others disappeared but because of the disappearance of the jobs themselves. I don’t know any of them. I think that such translations are imperfect, artificial and even hopeless but they can be improved with time

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