Word gets around. Ravelli Ormstein learned of the article Second Life Free Language Translator I wrote and responded. You can see the comment here, scroll down. He gave me a link to a buried comment made by the author of the translator. That comment is enlightening. Read it below the fold.

“Pain” by Logan McMahn, on Flickr

Quoting Discord Schism:

Please Do Not Support This Product

Posted April 12, 2013 by Discord Schism 3 stars

Check the name of the script programmer, that’s me. I have given NO permission to ANY of the people on the marketplace to sell or even distribute this product. I made it as a promotional product years ago, and discontinued it over 1.5 years ago. There is NO support, there is NO updates coming (this isn’t even the latest one made, the last version had something like 50+ languages). This product is based entirely around the Google translation service, which stopped being a free service at the end of last year so there are no guarantees that it will keep operating. The only reason it works is because of the limited amount of free translation per month that google allocates is done based on IP addresses, so it’d be based on the sim group you are on. High population sims with a lot of translators on it will stop working faster than others.

AGAIN!!! this person, or anyone else selling or distributing my translator does NOT have my permission to do so. I have given up on LL doing anything about this because of the number of people who seem to think it’s ok to sell or give away other peoples work. I honestly wouldn’t care if it was freely shared if I didn’t have to deal with the 100s of IMs I get a week asking for support on a product that I discontinued over a year and a half ago. (Reference)

I did find that Google Translate and the Metanomics Translator v2.1 deliver the exact same translations. Discord’s post confirms that. Knowing that it is working on the free 60 day trial explains why it is still working and the translations are exact matches.

Generally if someone wants to stop maintaining a bit of software they made, they release the source so others can build on it, upload it, and release it with their name in the ‘creator’ field. Discord apparently has not done that. So, Discord is still get requests for support. That has to be annoying.

Discord has posted in numerous places that the translator does not work well and the copy that is out is not even the latest copy made. But, he has the problem we all have when trying to get information out in Second Life, it is difficult and few people find it. I was researching the translator and never saw his various notes.

A significant number of those using the Metanomics Translator have not run into problems. Apparently the trial cut-off is unpredictable and resets each month. So, those doing little translation may never notice a problem.

For combat gamers the 3 additional scripts and about 200k of memory needed may be a deterrent to its use. But, that is a pretty small load so, maybe not.

Other Translators

With the SL Viewer having a built in translation service there is not much demand for translator attachments in SL. However there is Hank Ramos’ Universal Translator. Metanomics seems very similar. But, since it is no-mod I can’t tell if it is based on Hank’s work or not. Hank’s appears to have first appeared in November 2009 and the last update is by Lady Sumoku in January 2015. It is open source and the code is in the SL Wiki.

This translator also uses Google’s services.

Google was changing their policy on translation services in 2011. The Lab changed the viewer to use the new Google API’s in November 2011. The latest version of the Universal translator that I found is 2013. See: HR Universal Translator Version 2.0.6. In the Marketplace the cost is L$99.

You can see the device in-world in Grignano. If you want to test it bring someone that has their viewer set to a default language other than your language.

You can pick up a free UPDATE in-world. I think you have to already have a copy of the translator for that to work.

The advantage of this translator is everyone within 20 meters is translated and can hear the translations, well, in chat. It is a box you set out not a HUD you wear.

As best I can tell, this too uses the free Google 60 day trial. I’m guessing the reason it keeps working is the regions shuffle through the servers as they usually get restarted weekly. So, an individual translator moves around to servers with different IP addresses. Or… may be that isn’t why they keep working.

The IOL Q-Translator is the other one I found in the Marketplace. It costs L$490.

It comes with nice features and it is cheaper than the US$5 to $10 per year you would pay for a Google Translator Key.

It has many nice features over Metanomics and Universal. One is the interface comes in 18 languages. I think that is a plus. But, the viewer changes interface language too.

IOL works with chat, IM, and various viewer panels. So, you can do things like use the wiki from within the viewer and have IOL translating your search query. None of these work they way you think. All the easy use claims are for local chat. IM and group all require a copy paste process, but they use private channels so you are not copy/pasting from local chat.

Other panels are translated using /8 chat commands.

It also has spell check and a big manual (19 pages).

UPDATE: See: BUG-8794