Of all the services Google provides, translation is easily my favorite. I can live with Firefox, I can live with Hotmail, I can live with iOS, but take away Google Translate and I’ll shed enough tears to fill up a bathtub. Why do I care so much? New readers might not know this, but I live in Finland. Admittedly I should take a language course, but it’s just so much easier to Google things. Also, I travel quite a bit, which means I end up using Google Translate constantly.
Why do I bother bringing this up? Because Google’s updated their translation app for Android. They’ve added gesture support, so that instead of having to fiddle with tiny on-screen controls, you just flip your phone into landscape and start talking. Wonderful. Google’s also added handwriting support for Hebrew, Greek, Javanese, and Esperanto; and there’s now support for Malay and Ukranian using the camera translation feature.
Why don’t I use another app, such as Samsung’s S-Translator, which also works offline? Because in my experience, nothing comes close to Google. Absolutely nothing. You obviously shouldn’t use translation software on important documents, but if you’re smart enough to piece together disparate words and ignore terrible grammar, Google Translate will make it possible for you to talk to anyone, anywhere, about anything.
If that’s not powerful, I don’t know what is.
Note: As of the publication of this article, Google Translate hasn’t been updated in my local Play Store, but I expect that to happen within the next few hours or days.
