[seul-edu] Announcing Translation: A language teacher's tool (fwd)

[Roman Suzi <rnd@onego.ru>]

It seems, our software index doesn't mention it.

Sincerely yours, Roman Suzi
-- 
_/ Russia _/ Karelia _/ Petrozavodsk _/ rnd@onego.ru _/
_/ Wednesday, January 09, 2002 _/ Powered by Linux RedHat 6.2 _/
_/ "Cats aren't clean, they're just covered with cat spit!" _/
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 09 Jan 2002 18:22:21 GMT
From: di <invalid@elsewhere.ln>
Newsgroups: -* too many to show *-
Subject: Announcing Translation: A language teacher's tool

Esteemed reader of this newsgroup
This is an advert for GPL (General Public License) software.
This software is free to download, use, copy, distribute and change
when you comply to he GPL licence.
We hope you enjoy or newly developed program
With kind regards,
Dirk and Mark

TRANSLATION

Translation: what it is, what it does:
Translation is a free web-based, language independent program for
language teachers to provide online translations to students.
The students can make the translations online and get their
translation and the correct answers by email.

For the teacher the program functions as follows:
With the aid of a browser (any type or version) the teacher types
sentences and their translation into a database. For example:

- Father smokes a pipe
- Papa fume une pipe

- The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
- Der schnelle Fuchs springt über den faulen Hund.
etc. etc.

The teacher can also fill the database with words only.
In this way her database get filled with hundreds or thousands of
words and sentences.

 In the next step she can prepare a exercise for a group or for an
individual. She chooses from all the sentences/words from the database
those sentences that she thinks suitable for her group or for a
articular pupil.

With this feature an important condition for IT education is
fullfilled:  It creates possibilities for education tailored to the
individual's needs. So the teacher can make a translation for a
student that has problems with accents in learning French for example.

When the teacher has chosen the particular sentences for the group or
student she can add a header and a footer to the translation to add
remarks. In this way remarks can be tailored to the individual or the
group. For another group, she can use the same translation, but add
different headers and footers.

 In the next step she activates the translation for use by the
students.  Her task in 'Translation' has now come to an end. She can
 tell or e-mail the group that a translation is ready.

What does the pupil do?
Wherever he is on this planet, he points his browser to the student's
part of 'Translation'. He chooses the excercise that has been prepared
for him and sees:

 Hello students of group 2C
 Here is your translation for tomorrow. Please complete before
 8.00 o'clock so we can discuss it in the afternoon. Good luck!

 1. Father smokes a pipe.
 <here is a text entry box to type in the translation>

 2. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
 <here is a text entry box to type in the translation>

 <here is a 'submit' button>

 When the student hits the 'submit' button, two emails are
 sent. One to himself and one to his teacher. In the email is written:

 The following e-mail is sent to your teacher and to you:
 Translation made by: John
 Made on: 04-01, 12:07

 1
 Father smokes a pipe
 correct answer:
 Papa fume une pipe
 your answer:
 Père fumes un pipe.


 2
 The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
 correct answer:
 Der schnelle Fuchs springt über den faulen Hund
 your answer:
 Der schnellen Fuchs springt uber der faule Hund

 etc. etc.

 The e-mails can be corrected by the teacher and/or the pupil.

This ends our description of 'Translation' as seen from the teacher's
or the pupil's perspective.

But there is more.
It's a multi-lingual program. All linguistic and visible parts of the
program are put in one file and are directly replacable by another
language. In the English version for example you have a sentence in
the language file:
 $text = "Choose a translation from the list"
For a French version of Translation you only have to replace the part
between the " and " to it's French equivalent.
In this fashion we have made a language independent program.In fact,
it is no more than a skeleton the user  fills with his/her language.
An Arabic version is planned that works from the right to the left

Administration:
The one who installs the program on a server is the administrator.
Installation is performed with a few mouseclicks. The administrator
can add teachers to the program.   When one teacher for example gives
German and French, she can be in the database as  'Mary-ger' and
'Mary-Fr'. In this way all her German and French sentences are
separated.

 System Requirements:
'Translation' runs on all platforms: Unix, Linux, Windows,etc.
For Linux it can run on an old computer.
On the server you need:
- a webserver
- a mailserver
- PHP
- MySQL

All these application are freely available or are standard packages on
a Linux distribution.

 How to obtain translation?
 Go to http://translation.starwave.nl  and download the tar.gz or zip.
 When these terms are unfamiliar to you, ask your system administrator
for help.

Try Translation?
Send an email to mark@starwave.nl and you will be sent a login name
and a password. As a teacher  you can try Translation out for some
time.

To conclude:
When you have any questions or remarks, write us.
We have no commercial interests in Translation.
When you need help with the installation or you want Translation
tailored to your specific needs, write to mark@starwave.nl, the PHP
programmer of Translation.
When you want to know more about the backgrounds of Translation, write
to it's spiritual father: translation@starwave.nl.

We hope you teachers and students enjoy Translation,
With kind regards,

 Mark and Dirk