Interview Questions and Answers - Lao-English Online Dictionary to Google Translation

60 views
Skip to first unread message

Luan Vannithone

unread,
Jul 30, 2012, 3:52:51 AM7/30/12
to Cameron Darke, Sunny's friend - workLiveLaos, LaoEnGT
Cameron,
 
Please find below answers (in Red) to your interview questions .
 
All the bests,
 
Luang Vannithone
Subject: Fwd: Introductions
From: cam...@worklivelaos.com
Date: Tue, 17 Jul 2012 12:37:41 +1000
To: luan_va...@hotmail.com

Hi Luan,

Find the I interview questions below: 


Begin forwarded message:

From: Cameron Darke <cam...@worklivelaos.com>
Date: July 5, 2012 10:51:44 GMT+10:00
To: Luan Vannithone <luan_va...@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Introductions

Hi Luan,

Sharing of culture is exactly what I'm trying to do. I think this article will really help to show people in Laos that the overseas community still cares about their home country and wants to help develop it. I think what you're doing is fantastic! I'm in Oz at the moment, but in Melbourne. If I manage to get up to ACT I'll look you up.

Here are the interview questions:

Google Translate Interview 

WLL. What gave you the idea and the motivation to attempt this enormous project?
 
Luan:
You are definitely correct when you qualify your question with 'enormous project'. I find the size of the work is getting bigger and bigger as we go along. It's like an epic journey, and a very challenging one.
It started in 2009 when a good friend of my, Houmphanh Thongvilu who enlisted me to work on his 'web translation' project using his personally built web translation engine. The problem was then there was no online or soft copy of English-Lao dictionary or glossary available. Word and/or expression pairs need to be collected, harvested and compiled. Plus the fact that his web engine was hosted on his PC at home was also very inconvenient. It was frequently down (or offline), and not practical for sustained development work.
At about the same time Google started to make their Google Translator Toolkit (GTT) available to supplement their 'Google Translate' facility. I decided to investigate using it for supporting Lao language.
The motivation?
As mentioned on the project website ...
"... so that Lao language would be promoted in Google Translate as 'available'. This would facilitate translation from English to Lao and vice versa, thus helping with communication and information exchange. Currently only major languages are available, but not minor ones like Lao, or Khmer for examples. For Lao language it's up to Lao speaking people to make it happen. ".
For more detail see ...
In other words this will help Lao language have its presence in the Internet and be preserved in this world. This should also facilitate further development and evolution of the langauge into a more consite and precise language. Subsequently the Lao community would be more effective and efficient.

 
WLL: Do you have a scholarly background yourself?

 
Luan:
I would say I have an average background. I studied the final year of high school at Lycee De Vientiane, then obtained a scholarship in 1975 to study in Australia. I completed a Bachelor Degree in Economics at ANU (Australian National University). However my profession is actually in computer and Information Technology services (IT).  

WLL:  Was it difficult to make initial contact with Google?

Luan: 
It was and still is! I posted a few questions and requests to Google in Google Translator Toolkit (GTT)'s Forum, where Google people use for communication with potential user communities, but they seems to be tardy here. I wonder maybe this is because Lao population is rather small to warrant their attention, and maybe the advertising dollars generated won't commensurate their involvement effort. I try to run and progress the work mostly from my own (and the group) understanding of the product from the Online Help information provided with the GTT product. Hopefully when the output from our effort matures enough Google would promote the Lao language and make it available automatically. This proved to be a long drawn out affair, and is still continuing.
 

WLL: What was Google's response?

Luan: 
None so far. See above

WLL:  Google translate works for many languages already, including Thai. Was this their own initiative or were people like yourself working hard behind the scenes for each language?

Luan: 
Very google question. It's the very exact question I want to ask Google myself, only if they respond. I am hoping at some point they will reply to the questions I posted thus far. I want to contact those who work directly with Thai language.

WLL: Is this a volunteer venture or do you receive some kind of funding?

Luan: 
It's purely a volunteer venture at this point.

WLL: What exactly do you do when undertaking this project? Do you just write down every word you can think of in both languages or what is the process?

Luan: 
This web page below explains my strategy ...
In summary we are using NUOL's Spot Dictionary as a base.

WLL: How is Google Translate different to using a dictionary? How does it work?

Luan: 
Google Translate can do it much faster, although it makes no sense at time. One has to use it as guide, and not as authoritative translation aid. 
It's probably best I refer you to GTT's Online Help itself for answer to 'how does it work?' ...

WLL: If Google Translate relies on a scan of hundreds of thousands of documents, where do you get enough documents in Lao script? 

Luan:
This is the start of an epic journey, I suspect.
I also get involved with an sister project 'Lao short story translation'. The output from this can be used to feed into the other project.
For more info see ...
 

WLL: Are you working with the old or new (post 1975) grammar and vocabulary?

 
Luan: 
Even though my preference is the 'post 1975 grammar and vocabulary', there may be some traces of 'pre 1975 grammar and vocabulary' since there are a number of us with different outlooks and experiences working in this volunteer project.
 
 
WLL: New Thai and English  words have been accepted into the Lao vocabulary to replace many old words. Will  you include these?

Luan: 
Since we rely on input from a number of volunteers with different outlook and experience the answer to your question would be 'yes', out of necessity.

WLL:  When is the project expected to be completed?

Luan: 
Very good question. It appears it's going to be for some time. We need more inputs from smart people and help from Google.

xxx
That's all the questions I have right now. Thank you very much for your responses!

Regards,
Cameron

On Jul 3, 2012, at 13:19, Luan Vannithone <luan_va...@hotmail.com> wrote:

Hi Cameron, Sunny,
 
Sunny,
Thanks for the intro.
 
Cameron,
It's pleasing to see a Australian faleng like you (and Sunny) creating a bit of activities in Laos, helping and sharing of culture between Oz and Laos. I'm trying to do my bit from Oz. From Oz ..., how funny and paradoxical the situation is! You website looks great.
Anyway I will be more than happy to do email interview with you. Just send me questions.
 
Hakphaeng,
 
Bounluang Vannithone 
Date: Sat, 30 Jun 2012 16:01:17 +0700
Subject: Re: Introductions
From: cam...@worklivelaos.com
To: luan_va...@hotmail.com
CC: sunnyf...@gmail.com

Thank you very much Sunny!

Dear Luan,

I am an Australian (falang) from Melbourne, married to a Laotian-Australian refugee. We have both moved to Laos and have been living in Vientiane since 2006, where we run three businesses. My wife runs a marketing consulting business, we run a noodle restaurant together and I run 'Work Live Laos', a real estate and relocation company that is quickly becoming a news website for the English speaking people of Laos. www.worklivelaos.com

I have big plans for WorkLiveLaos.com, and in fact over the next few months I intend to begin translating all my articles into Lao so that anyone in the country will be able to read them, as well as people in the Lao diaspora overseas. Although I speak and read Lao fluently, I am by no means able to carry out this translation myself, so I will be hiring a couple of ad hoc translators in Laos. 

Someone forwarded the documentary 'L(a)ost in Transition' to me and I thought it was excellent. I've only been involved in the Lao community in Melbourne but it looks as though there's a much bigger and more involved community up there in ACT and NSW. I'd certainly love to go to the Lao New Year celebrations in Sydney some time.  

Anyway, I noticed you in the documentary and I think what you're doing with the Google Translate project is absolutely fantastic. Internet usage in Laos is rapidly increasing and thankfully there have been a few advances in Lao script recently, meaning the days of writing in 'karaoke lao' may soon be over. The use of Google Translate to go back and forth between languages will really empower Lao people and open up an entire world of internet for them to read. I would love to support you in any way that I can, starting with an article about yourself and the project that you're undertaking. Do you think I could do an email interview with you?

Thank you so much!
Cameron



On Sat, Jun 30, 2012 at 3:46 PM, sunny forsyth <sunnyf...@gmail.com> wrote:
Afternoon gentlemen,

Luan is running the Lao language google translate project.

Cameron is looking to interview interesting people/find interesting stories to put on his website in Laos (http://www.worklivelaos.com/)

I'll leave it with you guys.

Have great days,

S

Pomma Chantachak

unread,
Aug 1, 2012, 5:43:11 PM8/1/12
to Lao Google Trans Group, cam...@worklivelaos.com
Interesting development, Luang, and I like your answers. Keep up the good work.
Pomma

From: luan_va...@hotmail.com
To: cam...@worklivelaos.com
CC: laol10n...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [LaoEnGT] Interview Questions and Answers - Lao-English Online Dictionary to Google Translation
Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2012 17:52:51 +1000
Reply all
Reply to author
Forward
0 new messages