From lojbab@xxxxxx.xxxx Fri May 28 15:12:13 1999 X-Digest-Num: 151 Message-ID: <44114.151.901.959273824@eGroups.com> Date: Fri, 28 May 1999 18:12:13 -0400 From: Bob LeChevalier-Logical Language Group From: Max Kubierschky > >> The limitation is in the natural langauge side of the interface. If there >> is an engine that could generate smooth text from coarse keyword glosses, >> we would be very close in Lojban to English, since the parser/glosser can >> output coarse keyword glosses. The major limitation here remains in the >> lexicon - too few words are defined well enough for an MT program to >> translate them. > >As far as i understand, a "coarse keyword gloss" is some isomorphic >transcription of lojban, that is more readable to non lojbanists. True? >Have problems similar to the keyword gloss -> english problems yet >been attacked (with or without success) in computer linguistics? No idea. Maybe someone else knows, but i am far from a computer-linguistics guru %^) >> Only to the level of the parser/glosser that I mentioned, which would be >> "low quality" by any standard. Anything higher would take serious work, >> probably funded research or graduate-studies research work, because the >> person-months of work needed to produce the lexicon and reasonably fast and >> sophisticated code are not going to be easily found among volunteers >> working occasionally in their spare time. > >No doubt that the amount of work needed is high. But how high is it >compared to translating tons of linux manuals to a target language >by hand (which is actually done on a non fundned basis for some >languages)? >I don't think that there is lack of resources on the programming side >of the problem (considering the tremendous amount of free software on >this planet). So the question reduces once again to: >How hard is it as a linguistic problem? Probably more time-consuming than "hard", I would suspect, given that you are looking for "OK" text and not colloquial text. But I would be the last person to trust for a definitive answer. lojbab ---- lojbab ***NOTE NEW ADDRESS*** lojbab@lojban.org Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc. 2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273 Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: see Lojban WWW Server: href=" http://xiron.pc.helsinki.fi/lojban/ " Order _The Complete Lojban Language_ - see our Web pages or ask me.