Now Google Translate has added Faroese.
In collaboration with the Centre for Language Technology at the University of the Faroe Islands, Google has added Faroese to the many languages on Google Translate.
Today, a new update for the Google Translate service is being released. This update includes, among other things, an expansion of the languages that can be selected. A total of 110 new languages have been added to the service. One of these languages is Faroese.
In collaboration with the Centre for Language Technology at the Faculty of Faroese Language and Literature, Google has developed the capabilities to translate Faroese so well that Faroese has been added to the free service. This means that we can now translate between Faroese and many other languages in the world.
For many years, it has been a goal for Faroese people to have Faroese as an option on Google Translate. There have been many different initiatives, some fun and creative (e.g. Faroe Islands Translate by Visit Faroe Islands), others professional (translation project by Sprotin) and also political (e.g. the prime minister sent a video to Google with a request). Despite this, it has been difficult to get Faroese through Google’s doors. But now, the time has finally come where we in the Faroe Islands can use the service with and in our own language.
Google's translation service has many useful features. For example, you can speak in the language you want to translate, and you can translate both entire documents, websites and other things with a single click. Initially, the speech and listening functions and the document function are not available for Faroese, but work is already underway to develop these. The breakthrough also opens the door to bringing similar features for Faroese to other Google services, such as Google Docs.
This is the first version of the service in Faroese, and there may still be minor errors. The Centre for Language Technology at the University of the Faroe Islands will continue to cooperate with Google to improve translation quality both by evaluating and by sharing data for further development. It can therefore be expected that the service will improve over time.
Over the past year, researchers at the Centre for Language Technology have conducted research on Faroese machine translation. The work of Barbara Scalvini, Iben Nyholm Debess and Annika Simonsen has led to the development and evaluation of new computer translation models, and it is this research activity that has led to the connection with Google.
The cooperation between Google and the Centre for Language Technology is rewarding for both parties, and it continues to ensure an ongoing quality improvement of the service for Faroese people and others interested in Faroese.
Machine translation is a useful technology and facilitates communication between people and cultures. It makes it easier to read material from other languages and understand people who speak a different language than your own. Tourists can orient themselves better and communicate with the locals, and immigrants enjoy translation services as part of their integration.
Faroese will be rolled out on Google Translate from Thursday 27th of June and should be available to all users by Friday 28th of June at the latest.
