Translating Text into Other Languages

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Using Word, you can perform basic translation tasks, such as translating words or phrases and inserting translated text into your documents. Word uses bilingual dictionaries installed on your computer as well as online (if you're connected to the Internet) to translate single words or short phrases. If you want to translate longer phrases, paragraphs, or documents, you can access online machine translation services as well as professional human translation services from within Word's Research task pane. The main interface for using Word's translation feature is the Translation reference resource in the Research task pane, which is shown in Figure 6-22.


Figure 6-22: The Translation reference resource in the Research task pane helps you translate words and phrases.

To open the Translation reference resource, use one of the following methods:

  • Choose Tools, Language, Translate.

  • Press Alt+Shift+F7.

  • Display the Research task pane (choose Tools, Research, or click Research in the Standard toolbar), and select Translation in the Search For list.

  • Right-click a word in your document that you want to translate, and choose Translate from the shortcut menu.

    Note 

    The first time you use translation services in an Office 2003 application, you will need to install the client dictionaries. After you install them, the dictionaries are available automatically when you connect to the Internet.

    You can control which installed language pairs are available by clicking the Translation Options link in the Research task pane, and configuring the options in the Translation Options dialog box. If the Translation Options dialog box doesn't show a bilingual dictionary that you need, you might need to install Microsoft Office Proofing Tools, which is an add-in package that Microsoft offers for more than 45 languages (for more information, visit http://shop.microsoft.com).

To use the Translation tool, follow these steps:

  1. Specify the text you want to translate by clicking a word or selecting text before you display the Research task pane (as described earlier). If you want to translate an entire document, you don't need to specify the text you want to translate—just open the document, and then display the Research task pane. If the Research task pane is already open, you can type the text you want to translate directly into the Search For box.

  2. Ensure that Translation is selected in the Search For list.

  3. Select From and To translation dictionaries in the lists. For example, you can select from English (U.S.) to Italian (Italy).

  4. To translate the word or phrase that appears in the Search For text box, click the Start Searching button next to the Search For box. Your translation results appear in the results list in the Research task pane. To translate the entire document, click Translate Whole Document. Entire document translations appear in your Web browser, with a link to human translation services if you'd like a more accurate translation than the machine translation results.

    Tip 

    Translate documents using online machine or human translation services  When you click Translate Whole Document in the Research task pane, your document is translated using a machine translation service. Machine translation services can help you determine the main ideas in documents, but they shouldn't be used for important or sensitive documents because computers cannot preserve your text's full meaning, detail, or tone. To translate critical documents, you should use a professional human translator.

If you are having trouble finding appropriate translations, try looking up the singular forms of nouns (for example, child instead of children) and search using the infinitive forms of verbs (for example, swim instead of swam). Searching for root words generally results in greater success during translation. Also, keep in mind that the Word translation tool serves approximately the same function as a language dictionary—it's not a full-service translation utility, but it's a nice way to interpret a few words or phrases.



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Microsoft Office Word 2003 Inside Out
Microsoft Office Word 2003 Inside Out (Bpg-Inside Out)
ISBN: 0735615152
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2005
Pages: 373

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