Google develops instant lingo translator software

The software would analyse "packages" of speech, listening to the speaker until it understands the full meaning of words and phrases, before attempting translation, according to the Google.

The internet giant hopes to have a basic system ready within a couple of years by building on existing technologies in voice recognition and automatic translation. If everything goes according to plan, the software could eventually transform communication among speakers of the world's 6000-plus languages.

Google already has an automatic system for translating text on computers, which is being honed by scanning millions of multi-lingual websites and documents. It covers 52 languages, adding Haitian Creole last week.

The company also has a voice recognition system that enables phone users to conduct web searches by speaking commands into their phones rather than typing them. Now it is working on combining the two technologies to produce software capable of understanding a caller's voice and translating it into a synthetic equivalent in a foreign language.

 "We think speech-to-speech translation should be possible and work reasonably well in a few years' time," Franz Och, Google's head of translation services, said.

The translation software is likely to become more accurate the more it is used. "The more data we input, the better the quality," said Mr Och. There is no shortage of help. "There are a lot of language enthusiasts out there," he said.