JP2006107261A - Translation support system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an innovative support system that facilitates the translation of a document from a first language to a second language. <P>SOLUTION: On a main reference window on a monitor image 1, at least text string areas 10a and memorandum string areas 10b correspondingly parallel with the text string areas 10a are alternated. The text string areas 10a of the main reference window 10 display a document in a first language. When a word in a text string area 10a is specified, a dictionary search function extracts information on equivalents of each word forming the document in the first language and on compounds including each word and their equivalents, and displays the information corresponding to the word specified in the text string area 10a on a word display window 13 and a compound display window 12. Information selected from the display on the word display widow 13 and compound display window 12 is displayed in the corresponding memorandum string area 10b of the main reference window as positioned near the specified word. The user can create a translation in a second language by reference to the display on the monitor screen 1 and enter the translation on a translation creation window. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2006,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to a translation support system used when a sentence in a first language is translated into a second language.

In today's society where internationalization of society is accelerating, the necessity of understanding foreign languages or translating them into native languages is increasing due to the spread of the Internet and the borderless use of document literature.
For this reason, learning industries such as foreign language schools such as English conversation classes are in the spotlight. However, language differences between countries are a major obstacle to internationalization.
On the other hand, the performance of personal computers that can be used by individuals has also made remarkable progress. Some of such personal computers have a foreign language electronic dictionary function.

This electronic dictionary function records a conventional booklet dictionary on an electronic medium such as a CD-ROM or a hard disk of a personal computer, and performs necessary operations as required by the user. Etc. are searched.
In recent years, such an electronic dictionary function has become indispensable for general business people and students, as well as business operators who need to understand foreign languages.

  In this movement, in order to further improve the convenience for users, for example, in Japan, many translation software that translates foreign language sentences into Japanese at once has been developed and marketed. . However, the translation capability of such translation software is far from a satisfactory level even with the current computer technology, and it must be evaluated that it is still in the development stage.

When such a general-purpose translation software is used to translate a foreign language sentence into Japanese, the resulting machine translation is often unnatural as Japanese and mistranslations frequently occur. For this reason, users of general-purpose translation software usually need to make extensive proofreading by comparing machine translations obtained with original foreign language sentences, which is very wasteful. is there.
In particular, those who have a certain level of translation ability can translate accurately without using translation software for a certain amount of text, so they feel painful in the construction of machine translation sentences and regret using the translation software. Many people do.

The cause of such inaccurate translation is that the syntax of foreign languages and Japanese is often different, so the syntax cannot be easily analyzed.
In addition, if there are multiple translations of a word, or if multiple meanings can be derived by combining idioms, it is necessary to select the appropriate translation or translation from the surrounding text. It is not easy with other translation software.

JP-A-11-272672 JP 2004-118285 A

  An object of the present invention is to provide an epoch-making support system that facilitates translation from a first language into a second language, such as Japanese from a foreign language.

The above purpose is
A translation support system that operates on a computer and is used to translate a first language into a second language using a dictionary search function,
At least a main reference window, a translation creation window, a word display window, and a compound word display window are displayed on the monitor image of the computer.
On the main reference window, a text string area and memo string areas arranged in parallel so as to correspond to the text string area are alternately provided,
In the text column area of the main reference window, a sentence in the first language is displayed so that a part of a character string constituting the sentence can be specified,
In the word display window, information on the corresponding translation of the first language character string searched by the dictionary search function for the character string specified in the first language sentence is displayed.
In the compound word display window, for the character string designated from the sentence in the first language, the compound word including the character string in the first language searched by the dictionary search function and the corresponding translation information are displayed.
In the memo string area of the main reference window, the information selected from the display of the word display window and the compound word display window is displayed so as to be located in the vicinity of the corresponding first language character string on the text string area,
A translation support system in which a translation created and input by a user is displayed based on display contents of a text string area, a memo string area, a word display window, and a compound word display window. Is achieved by using

In addition, the character strings that compose the sentences in the first language displayed in the text string area of the main reference window are grouped in units of words so that they can be selected in units of groups. It is recommended to make it easier.
In this case, a one-line display window is displayed on the monitor screen, and one line including the designated character string is continuously displayed from the text in the first language displayed in the text column area of the main reference window. Display the required area in the character string to be specified, and for the first language character string specified on the one-line display window, the correspondence including the first language character string searched by the dictionary search function The translation information is displayed in the word display window, and the compound word including the character string and the corresponding translation information are displayed in the compound word display window. It is recommended to be able to translate strings that were not properly done.

  The translation work requires the consideration of the translator's ability to memorize words and the intuition for syntactic analysis, but the translation support system of the present invention allows the translator to concentrate on syntactic analysis. The translation support system of the present invention can display information such as the corresponding translation of the word selected by the translator in the vicinity of each word of the sentence in the first language on the screen on the personal computer. The operator can easily take the translation into consideration in the vicinity of the sentence of the first language by looking over the translation of the word corresponding to the level in the translation window.

Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 is an explanatory view showing an embodiment of a monitor screen of a personal computer using the translation support system according to the present invention, FIG. 2 is an explanatory view showing the configuration of the main reference window shown in FIG. 1, and FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing the operation status of the translation support system according to the present invention, FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing the display state of the first language on the main reference window of the monitor screen shown in FIG. 1, and FIG. 5 is the monitor shown in FIG. FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram showing a character string selection search state on the monitor screen shown in FIG.

First, FIG. 1 will be described.
In the figure, 1 is a monitor image, 10 is a main reference window, 11 is a translation creation window, 12 is a compound word display window, 13 is a word display window, 14 is a first language insertion window, 15 is a search word display window, 16 is The line number display window 17 is a start button, 18 is a reset button, and 19 is a single line display window.
The monitor image 1 is displayed on a monitor of a personal computer (not shown), and the translation support system according to the present invention is installed in the personal computer.

Next, the arrangement of the windows in the monitor image 1 will be described.
The main reference window 10 is arranged on the upper left side of the monitor image 1, and the translation creation window 11 is arranged on the upper right side of the monitor image 1.
The compound word display window 12 is disposed on the lower left side of the monitor image 1, the word display window 5 is disposed substantially at the lower center of the monitor image 1, and the first language insertion window 14 is disposed on the lower right side of the monitor image 1. .
The search word display window 15 is arranged on the left side of the middle stage of the monitor image 1, and the line number display window 16 is arranged in the middle of the middle stage of the monitor image 1.
The one-line display window 19 is arranged between the main reference window 10, the search word display window 15 and the line number display window 16.
The start button 17 and the reset button 18 are sequentially arranged in a vertical line between the word display window 13 and the first language insertion window 14 of the monitor image 1.

Next, display contents of each window will be described.
When this translation support system is activated, the monitor image shown in FIG. 1 is displayed.
The first language insertion window 14 is an area for inputting and displaying a sentence in the first language to be translated.
As a method for inputting a sentence to the first language insertion window 14, direct reading for designating a text file in which a sentence in a required first language is input, direct input from a keyboard, or display on another application And pasting from text information.
In addition, each window including the first language insertion window 14 is configured so that a necessary area can be displayed by an appropriate scrolling operation or the like when the content to be displayed exceeds the area of the window.

As shown in FIG. 2, the main reference window 10 includes a text string area 10a for displaying sentences in the first language, and a memo string arranged in parallel with the text string area 10a below the text string area 10a. When the text string area 10a has a plurality of lines, the text string area 10a and the memo string areas 10b corresponding to the text string area 10a are alternately arranged.
Note that the dotted lines in the main reference window 10 in FIG. 2 are shown for convenience of explanation, and are not actually displayed.

In the body column area 10a, a first language sentence to be translated is displayed by performing a start operation described later.
The sentences in the first language displayed here are displayed in a grouped state for each element constituting the sentence, such as a word or a phrase.
In the memo row area 10b, a required corresponding translation can be selected and displayed by a display operation described later. This corresponding translation is listed directly under the corresponding first language word.

In the memo string area 10b, information displayed in the word display window 13 and the compound word display window 12 can be selected and displayed. Therefore, not only the corresponding translation but also the compound word and its corresponding translation. Information is also displayed, but here, all of these are collectively referred to as a corresponding translation.
In addition, when the number of characters of the corresponding translations of the first language and the second language is compared, the corresponding translation may be longer than the words of the first language, so that multiple lines can be displayed in the memo column area 10b. Keep it.

In the word display window 13, a corresponding translation of a foreign language word designated by a designation operation described later is displayed.
This corresponding translation includes not only a translation of a word but also information such as a synthetic word derived from a character string constituting the foreign language word.
In the compound word display window 12, a compound word including a word designated by a designation operation described later and its corresponding translation are displayed.
The compound word information includes idioms and idioms including a designated word, its usage, example sentences, and the like.

In the translation creation window 11, it is possible to input and display necessary characters directly from the keyboard.
During the input of the translation, a cursor is displayed at the character input position on the translation creation window 11. At this time, the mouse is moved to the corresponding translation displayed on the main reference window 10 or a word having the corresponding translation. The corresponding translation can be transferred to the cursor position on the translated sentence creation window 11 by selecting the pointer by overlapping it and double-clicking it.
When a word that does not have a corresponding translation is selected, the word can be transcribed in the translation creation window 11 as it is.

The search word display window 15 displays a total of three words, that is, a word in the first language displayed in the main reference window 10 and designated by a designation operation described later, and words before and after that.
The words displayed in the search word display window 15 are search conditions for performing a search by a dictionary search function described later.
The number-of-lines display window 16 indicates the number of lines in the line including the word designated on the main reference window 10. The “number of lines / main reference window 10 that can be displayed” is displayed. The total number of sentences in one language is displayed.

The one-line display window 19 is displayed in the text string area 10a of the main reference window 10 and displays one line including a word designated by a designation operation described later.
The first language character string displayed in the one-line display window 19 can be selected by operating a keyboard or mouse after a word lock operation, which will be described later, by operating a keyboard or mouse. When a character string is selected, a dictionary search is immediately performed based on the character string, and corresponding information is displayed in the word display window 13 and the compound word display window 12.

The start button 17 is overlaid on the main reference window 10 in order to put the first language sentence displayed in the first language insertion window 14 into a state in which the corresponding translation can be referred to by placing the mouse pointer and clicking on the start button 17. Used to display.
The reset button 18 is used for erasing and initializing the display of the first language insertion window 14 and the main reference window 10 when the mouse pointer is overlapped and clicked thereon.

Further, this translation support system is provided with a storage function, and the contents of translation work can be stored in a predetermined storage medium.
The sentence described in the translation creation window 11 can be saved as a text file, and the sentence can be pasted directly as a text data into a file such as another document creation application. .

Next, based on the flowchart shown in FIG. 3, the usage method and operation state of the translation support system will be described.
Here, the description will be made assuming that the first language is English and the second language is Japanese.
When the translation support system according to the present invention is activated, the monitor image 1 shown in FIG. 1 is displayed on a monitor of a personal computer (not shown).
The user inputs an English sentence to be translated into the first language insertion window 14 by specifying a file or pasting it.

Next, when a mouse (not shown) is operated and the start button 17 is pressed, the English sentence displayed in the first language insertion window 14 is displayed in the text string area 10 a of the main reference window 10.
At this time, English sentences are displayed in a grouped state for each word.
When the user moves the mouse pointer to the translation creation window 11 and clicks the mouse, the cursor moves in the translation creation window 11, so the user can translate the Japanese translation by looking at the English text displayed in the main reference window 10. Think and translate Japanese translations using the keyboard.
If there is a word whose meaning is unknown during translation, the mouse is operated, and an English word designation operation is performed such that the mouse pointer is superimposed on the word on the main reference window 10.
In this way, when the mouse pointer is overlapped, as shown in FIG. 4, the designated word is surrounded by a grouped element unit so that it can be seen that it is designated.

When an English word is selected, a translation search process is performed based on the selected search information, and a corresponding translation of the word or a compound word is searched.
This search is instantaneously performed when the mouse pointer is set to a word, and the corresponding translation of the word is displayed in the word display window 13 as shown in FIG. At this time, when there are a plurality of corresponding translation candidates, they are displayed.
In the word display window 13, if there is information such as word usage or explanation in the information searched for the word, it is also displayed at the same time.

Furthermore, at this time, a compound word such as an idiom extracted from the search condition displayed in the search word display window 15, specifically, a word string composed of three words displayed in the search word display window 15 is included. Three types of compound words are searched: a compound word, a compound word including a combination of the first word and the selected word, and a compound word including a combination of the selected word and the last word.
If there is extracted information, its usage, corresponding translation, example sentence, etc. are displayed in the compound word display window 12 as shown in FIG.

If the translation work can be continued immediately by simply looking at the information displayed in the word display window 13 and the compound word display window 12, the cursor may be returned to the translation creation window 11 to continue the translation work.
In addition, if there are multiple words whose meaning or usage is unknown, such as when there is a need for consideration for translation, and there is a corresponding translation required for translation in the displayed information, the mouse pointer is left as is. When the button is moved, the display of the word display window 13 and the compound word display window 12 is switched one after another according to the word indicated by the mouse pointer. For example, a mouse (not shown) is right-clicked in the word line display state. For example, lock foreign words.

When the lock operation is performed, even if the mouse pointer is moved, the display of the word display window 13 and the compound word display window 12 is not switched. Therefore, the mouse pointer is moved to the word display window 13 or the compound word display window 12, The corresponding translation or the like can be selected by a corresponding translation display operation such as selecting a required phrase in the corresponding translation displayed by operating the mouse, for example.
When this display operation is performed, as shown in FIG. 5, the selected corresponding translation is displayed in the memo string area 10b immediately below the locked word.

Further, if necessary, the display operation for other words is repeated in the memo string area 10b, and the foreign language sentences in the text string area 10a and the corresponding translations in the memo string area 10b are contrasted with each other. The Japanese translation is composed by the user himself and entered into the translation creation window 11.
The display operation in the memo string area 10b may be performed only on English words that the user thinks necessary according to the translation ability of the user.
In addition, among English words, there are words that cannot be searched for an appropriate corresponding translation as it is, such as a coined word in which a prefix or suffix is synthesized with a word, or a synthesized word in which a plurality of words are connected with a hyphen.
In this case, as shown in FIG. 6, a character string desired to be searched is selected from the display of the one-line display window 19, and a corresponding translation or the like is searched.

Since the retrieved corresponding translation or the like is displayed in the word display window 13, when the displayed information is to be displayed in the main reference window 10, a required word / phrase in the corresponding translation or the like is selected and the corresponding translation display operation is performed. Can be done.
In the embodiment shown in FIG. 6, this search is performed only for the selected character string, and the search word display window 15 and the compound word display window 12 are blank. Like processing, you may make it also search for the compound word etc. containing the combination before and behind the selected word.

In addition, the corresponding translation displayed in the memo string area 10b can be easily copied on the translated sentence creation window 11 by double-clicking the corresponding word or the corresponding translation. When is empty, it is recommended that foreign language words be copied directly.
When all the foreign language sentences displayed in the main reference window 10 have been translated and it is desired to continue the operation, the reset button 18 is pressed, and the contents of the main reference window 10 and the first language insertion window 14 are displayed. , And a new foreign language sentence is newly input into the first language insertion window 14 and the operation is continued.

Since the description in the translation creation window 11 is not deleted even after resetting, the next Japanese translation can be input after the created Japanese translation.
When the translation work is interrupted or terminated, the work content is recorded on a hard disk or a predetermined storage medium as necessary, and the work is finished.
When the user uses the recorded information, the work can be resumed and continued from the state at the end of the work.

In addition, for example, when the word ending is s, ed, ing, etc., such as noun plurals, verb rule changes, etc., the selected word may not be suitable as a search condition. These fixed endings may be automatically deleted, and a search may be performed based on the deleted character string to increase search efficiency.
In this case, for example, if the ending is s or ed, such as this or seed, the search condition automatically becomes thi or se, and no appropriate corresponding translation is searched, but in this case A function for selecting and searching a required character string on the one-line display window may be used.

As described above, the feature of the translation support system according to the present invention is that a search is performed by selecting a required word for information such as a corresponding translation related to a word constituting a sentence in the first language, and a word display. The window can be displayed immediately on the window and the compound word display window, and if necessary, the corresponding information can be displayed in the vicinity of the required word on the main reference window, for example, immediately below, and the word display window can be displayed if necessary. Another object of the present invention is to create a translation in the second language while referring to information displayed in the compound word display window and the main reference window.
Therefore, when performing the translation work using the translation support system according to the present invention, basically the user himself, making full use of his translation ability, constructing and inputting a translated sentence in a second foreign language, When there are parts that are difficult to translate, the display function such as the corresponding translation of this system can be used to display information necessary for translation of translated words one after another, and can be referred to immediately.

In this way, since the system does not mechanically construct the second foreign language translation, using the translation support system according to the present invention does not constitute mistranslations or unnatural translations, and is easily accurate. You can make simple translations.
In addition, since the translation entered in the translation creation window is a sentence entered by the user himself, it can be easily reviewed, and the translated sentence can be mechanically translated as in the case of using a conventional machine translation system. If it has been configured, it is not necessary to review the translated text, which is indispensable, and the translation effort can be reduced.

In addition, this invention is not limited to said Example.
For example, the first language and the second language are not limited to English and Japanese in the embodiment, and any combination of languages may be used by changing the search dictionary. .

In addition, the layout, balance, shape, etc. of each window such as the main reference window may be anything as long as it does not interfere with use, and the search word display window and the number of lines display are as required. Even if it is not provided, it may be made non-displayable according to the setting of the user.
In addition, for example, in order to make it easier to discriminate or work on the first foreign language sentence or word being worked on, they may be displayed by color as necessary, and are selected or designated. The display means for words, sentences, lines, and the like may be any means as long as it is known that selection has been made, such as changing the color of the character string or reversing the character string.

In addition, the first language insertion window and the translation window need not be open at the same time, so both windows can be switched to each other, for example, the text in the first language insertion window is displayed in the main reference window. Later, the first language insertion window may be switched to the translation creation window.
Further, the search word display window and the line number display window may not be provided, and the display function of the line number display window may be a band graph.
Further, the selection, designation or locking operation of words, sentences, etc. is not limited to the above embodiment, and for example, a keyboard may be used or a mouse click method may be used.

In addition, the one-line display window may display only a few words before and after the selected word or only the selected word without displaying all the lines, or display over a plurality of lines. It may be possible or may not be provided.
Furthermore, the selection operation on the one-line display window may be performed on the main reference window, and the one-line display window may be omitted.
In addition, text in the first language may be directly input to the main reference window, and a word to be searched can be selected by selecting a required character string without grouping in units of words. You may make it select.

In addition, sentence grouping is done in units of spaces when words are separated by spaces, such as English and German, and separated by spaces, such as Japanese, Chinese, and Korean. If not, it is desirable to group components such as clauses as units.
In the above embodiment, English is translated into Japanese, but any language can be translated by using a search dictionary according to the usage situation.

  The translation support system according to the present invention particularly supports the translation work of a user having a certain level of translation ability very efficiently, and the various dictionaries used in the system correspond to various languages. It makes language translation work extremely easy.

It is explanatory drawing which shows one Example of the monitor screen of the personal computer which uses the translation assistance system which concerns on this invention. It is explanatory drawing which shows the structure of the main reference window shown in FIG. It is a flowchart which shows the operating condition of the translation assistance system which concerns on this invention. It is explanatory drawing which shows the search process completion state of the monitor screen shown in FIG. It is explanatory drawing which shows the translation input state of the monitor screen shown in FIG. It is explanatory drawing which shows the character string selection search state of the monitor screen shown in FIG.

Explanation of symbols

1 Monitor image 10 Main reference window 10a Text column area 10b Memo string area 11 Translation creation window 12 Compound word display window 13 Word display window 14 First language insertion window 15 Search word display window 16 Line number display window 17 Start button 18 Reset button 19 One-line display window

Claims (3)

A translation support system that operates on a computer and is used to translate a first language into a second language using a dictionary search function,
At least a main reference window, a translation creation window, a word display window, and a compound word display window are displayed on the monitor image of the computer.
On the main reference window, a text string area and memo string areas arranged in parallel so as to correspond to the text string area are alternately provided,
In the text column area of the main reference window, a sentence in the first language is displayed so that a part of a character string constituting the sentence can be specified,
In the word display window, information on the corresponding translation of the first language character string searched by the dictionary search function for the character string specified in the first language sentence is displayed.
In the compound word display window, for the character string designated from the sentence in the first language, the compound word including the character string in the first language searched by the dictionary search function and the corresponding translation information are displayed.
In the memo string area of the main reference window, the information selected from the display of the word display window and the compound word display window is displayed so as to be located in the vicinity of the corresponding first language character string on the text string area,
A translation support system in which a translation created and input by a user is displayed based on display contents of a text string area, a memo string area, a word display window, and a compound word display window. .   The translation support system according to claim 1, wherein the character strings constituting the sentence in the first language displayed in the text string area of the main reference window are grouped in units of words and can be selected in units of groups.   A one-line display window is displayed on the monitor screen, and the one-line display window is a character string in which one line including the designated character string is consecutive from the text in the first language displayed in the text column area of the main reference window. The information of the corresponding translation including the character string of the first language searched for by the dictionary search function for the character string of the first language specified on the one-line display window is displayed so that the required area can be specified. The translation support system according to claim 2, wherein the information is displayed on the word display window, and the compound word including the character string and the corresponding translation information are displayed on the compound word display window.

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