I'll have one Google Translator and a side of salad please.

tiger86 0 Tallied Votes 266 Views Share

Lately everyone on the Web has been wanting to know about one thing Google Buzz, well I'm tired of that subject. I would probably write about a different company but when I found out that Google is getting into the food industry, I felt that I had to write about it.

Google isn't going to be opening up a Google Diner or anything like that but they are working on enhancing the types of food you can eat by breaking the language barriers that so many of us have run into at restaurants. What am I going on about? An alpha version of Google Goggles that can translate a menu of food in a different language into your language with a single snap from your camera enabled phone. They say that it will be awhile before this is an available feature. I'm guessing that they mentioned it at such an early stage as an attempt to try lower the amount of Google Buzz articles.

I know that this feature is still very much in the alpha stage but I see it being used for so much more than just menus at restaurants. I think if they made one that let you flip through a bunch of papers and it instantly changed the words via your phone, it would majorly help universal communication and possibly even help governments communicate better and therefore help avoid wars.

Dani AI

Generated

Good catch, — that “menu translation” alpha you mentioned did grow into real products, but it took years and a few acquisitions. Google bought Quest Visual (maker of Word Lens) in May 2014, folded the camera-translation tech into Google Translate (Word Lens features appeared in the Translate app in January 2015), and later launched Google Lens as the more capable successor; Google Goggles was effectively retired as Lens rolled out. ’s “months” estimate was optimistic — the work moved from prototype to mainstream over several release cycles. (techcrunch.com)

Practical: today there are two easy options — the Google Translate app’s Camera/Instant Translate mode, or Google Lens (accessible in the Google app, Photos, or as a standalone Lens experience). For travel download offline language packs ahead of time; point at printed menu items in good light, keep the phone steady, and use the high-resolution “Scan/Photo” mode for ornate fonts or handwriting. Camera translation is excellent for quick meaning and navigation, but it can give literal or awkward dish names and miss contextual nuance — don’t rely on it for legal, medical, or diplomatic texts, and double-check allergen ingredients with staff or a human translator. (androidauthority.com)

Quick checklist for the impatient traveler: install Translate + Lens, download offline packs, take clear photos, and confirm critical details (allergies, legal wording) in person when stakes are high. The idea you sketched of removing language friction has largely come true for everyday use — menus, signs, ingredient lists — but true “universal understanding” still needs human judgment when nuance matters. (blog.google)

patonj 0 Newbie Poster

They have published it before the negative Buzz of Google Buzz. I heard some people at an online translation service named Tomedes ( http://www.tomedes.com ) saying it's a matter of months till the service is Beta lunched.

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