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Comments on Translation Golf (draft stage)

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Translation Golf (draft stage)

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In Spanish.SE we used to have quite a lot of fun with the Translation Golf: we would pick some English text and the goal was to translate it into Spanish using the less amount of characters as possible, but keeping the meaning of the original text.

Here in Linguistics we cannot assume the knowledge of any language other than English, since each one of us may know a different set of them.

For this, I was thinking in two levels:

  • What about having a game consisting in challenging the 'compression' of a given text in English? This would mean finding shorter ways to express something, shorter synonyms, and so on.
  • If the above had enough support, what about having a category for challenges like this?

In the same vein as site proposals, please comment your interest below.

feature-request categories games
posted almost 4 years ago
4y ago by Moshi‭
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fedorqui‭
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General comments (10 comments)
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Ground Rules (draft)

This is loosely based off of the original translation golf on StackExchange, but modified to fit a wider range of languages.

Goal: Translate a given text using the minimum number of characters

  1. The translation must be accurate
  2. Unless otherwise stated, the translation must be grammatically correct.
    • If using a dialect, the dialect must be specified, and the translation must solely use that dialect
    • If there is a question of whether something is grammatical, consult some authoritative source (or ask here on L&L!)
  3. If there is a question of whether a word exists, consult a dictionary or other authoritative source.
  4. The original poster must provide an example translation (whether golfed or non-golfed)
  5. Spaces and punctuation do not count as letters.
  6. Abbreviations may or may not be allowed, depending on the original poster[1]
  7. If the source text does not specify gender, any gender may be used in the translation

  1. A divergence from the StackExchange rules, but sometimes the source text uses it and it would be a bit odd to exclude them from answers in that case. ↩︎

posted almost 4 years ago
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Moshi‭
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General comments (12 comments)
General comments
Moshi‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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Since the site pretty much died for a week, this seem like the best way to get some more interest. I've already drafted the first translation golf post, I just need an idea for what the source text should be.

fedorqui‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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Thanks for refloating this, Moshi! In Spanish.SE we were translating from English, normally. Since here in Codidact we are in an English site and no other language is 'expected' to be known, my idea was to make the challenge focus on shrinking the text.

Moshi‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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@fedorqui I don't see why we can't have both - the same rules would apply to an English -> English "translation" golf challenge.

fedorqui‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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@Moshi well I wouldn't call English -> English a translation, but this is just a terminology matter :D

Skipping 1 deleted comment.

Lundin‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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Is it enough to just make the text comprehensible even if it sounds odd? For example "(human) languages" could be translated to "(Man) languages", which sounds weird but gets the meaning across.

Moshi‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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@Lundin Sure. The only limit is that it has to remain grammatical.

Peter Taylor‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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Rule 4 doesn't make sense outside a bilingual context.

fedorqui‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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I don't like the fact that the translation is given into another language (including English). The nice part in SE was to help each other to find interesting synonyms and ways to express things more succinctly. With each one talking their own language, the purpose is lost.

Moshi‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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@fedorqui I tried to make the rules as general as possible; This set of rule would also allow e.g. the Spanish -> English translation-golf. Also, I thought it'd suite L&L better, we're all here to learn another language (or learn something about our own), aren't we?

Moshi‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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@PeterTaylor If you're referring to how the rules allow English -> English golfing challenges, then yes, #4 doesn't particularly make sense in that context. The entire idea of "translation" golf doesn't particularly make sense in a non-bilingual context, so there are bound to be some odd rules left over. I could of course just tack on "(excluding same-language golfs)", would that make sense?

Peter Taylor‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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I was more referring to the multilingual nature of the existing challenge - an example translation from English to Swahili is pointless for non-Swahili-speakers.

Moshi‭ wrote almost 4 years ago
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@PeterTaylor Ah, I see what you mean. I admit it's also kind of weird there; but that challenge is kind of a special test run case on it's own. The next one probably will probably be a straight challenge with only one target language.