Breaking the language barrier, ETT-style

Saturday April 16 2005 09:22 IST

VISAKHAPATNAM: Computers are constantly conquering new frontiers and now are all set to break the ‘language barrier’ with the advanced software being developed.

That’s what M Prasanth Kiran, a B.Tech final year student of the Avanti Institute of Engineering and Technology, Narsipatnam, has achieved, morphing computers into user-friendly tools for those poor in English.

When assigned to select a project of his choice, Kiran hit upon the novel idea of translating English text to Telugu. He soon succeeded in developing his dream software, the ‘English Telugu Translator’ (ETT) -- a package not yet fully developed anywhere else.

ETT uses Java and other Microsoft programming tools to translate English sentences into Telugu by following Telegu grammar rules. The output can be seen in the Telugu script and heard in speech form with the help of sound-generator software.

But what makes Kiran’s software unique? Though software that can translate tool bars, icons and menus into Telugu is currently available, his software goes a step further and can translate the entire text.

For instance, an English sentence such as:‘I am going to school every day with my friends’ initially comes out as ‘Nenu paatasalaki prati roju na mitrulato veltunnanu’. The same thing appears in Telugu a few moments later. Similarly, when a Yahoo web page is opened, the welcome note appears as ‘Yahooki swaagatam’. This is possible because of a unique dictionary, which Kiran developed to suit his specifications.

The budding innovator told this website's newspaper that he is fine tuning his software further so that it can be integrated with other systems so as to enable the user to listen to standard telephone messages in Telugu, get SMS messages and e-mails in Telugu and scroll English news messages in the visual media and convert movie sub-titles into Telugu.

Also, by using speech recognition software, ETT can convert spoken English into Telugu with the same voice.

Kiran exhibited his software during the RINL Formation Day celebrations held recently, where he won the appreciation of the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant (VSP) CMD Y Siva Sagara Rao.

Also, the Computer Society of India, city chapter, has commended his achievement.

NewIndiapress.com