Simtracan Translator is a translation software that (at its 0.1.3 version) can translate between Mandarin Chinese Simplified, Mandarin Chinese Traditional, Mandarin Chinese Pinyin, Cantonese, Cantonese Pinyin, Chinese Zhuyin and Chinese Unicode Characters.
This software was developed in Python by Daniela Bai (Daniela Barazarte) and it’s main goal is to translate text in multiple derivations of Chinese language without limit of characters, without ads, with great translation and having multiple options in the same translator.
Right now it is able to translate most of the Chinese Characters as it contains a library of more than 18.000 汉字.
Almost two years ago I started to learn Mandarin Chinese and since I am so interested in the language I found some partners to practice with, one of them was a girl from Guangdong who, to play a joke on me, texts messages in Cantonese.
While improving my Chinese, I was also learning Python through a some Youtube tutorial and was willing to putting the knowledge into practice so…as before I couldn't find good translators who could give the translation from Cantonese to Simplified Mandarin to understand my partner's messages, why not build it myself? and that's how Simtracan Translator came to mind.
It was hard at first, considering that I am very new to the programming aspect and not good at Cantonese at all, but even with that I decided to build it.
I started the project and made the decision to call it “Simtracan Translator” as it includes Simplified, Traditional and Cantonese Chinese. Now I am very excited to show this project.
Python 3.x.x
The only aditional Library that his software use is Regex that comes as default in most of the Python versions.
After version 1.2.0 it uses Tkinter
- Download the ZIP of this repositor
- Extract the ZIP you downloaded
- Use Simtracan Translator Freely
- You can use the Python Module mode on the version 0.1.3
- You can use the .exe (Python GUI) mode on the version 0.2.0
Please, be aware that Simtracan Translator’s software could include technical or typographical errors. Also, Simtracan Translator does not warrant that the translations that occur in the software are accurate and/or complete.
- Open your Python Terminal/Console
- Add the folder of the version you need
- Run the code
- If you have problems/error in this step, please contact me
- Start to follow the instructions
Explanation
(This is the explanation of version 0.1.3, different versions work similar)
You’ll need to input the text you want to translate
The software will automatically check the text that you input with a Regex Function
Select a number that tells in what language is that text that you input
Select other number and select the language you want to receive the translation.
If you selected an option incorrectly, or if you selected the same language twice, the software will display an error message and let you select an option (you have three tries to select the option correctly)
Receive your translation
- Open the .exe
- If you have problems/error in this step, please contact me
- Use the translator
Explanation
With an interactive interface you’ll need the text you want to translate. You can paste the text on the Text Area, or get it from a file on your computer.
You can also check the text you input.
It will count how many characters do your text has, and also tell you whether it is on Pinyin or in Chinese Characters
Then you must select in the option menu what language is that text that you input.
Select in other option menu the language you want to receive the translation
Click on “Translate” and receive your translation
If you selected an option incorrectly, or if you selected the same language twice, the software will display an error message and let you select an option again
Save your translation by saving it to a file that can be .txt or .html
| Abbreviation | Full Word | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| FL or lang_A | First Language or Language A | is the language you will use to input the text you want to translate |
| SL or lang_B | Second Language or Language B | is the language that the software will choose to generate the translation |
| 1 or SM | Simplified Mandarin | 普通话简体字 - Mandarin Chinese Simplified characters |
| 2 or TM | Traditional Mandarin | 普通话繁體字 - Mandarin Chinese Traditional characters |
| 3 or MP | Mandarin Pinyin | 普通话拼音 - Mandarin Pinyin letters |
| 4 or C | Cantonese | 广东话/粵語 - Cantonese Chinese (dialect from Guangdong) characters |
| 5 or CP | Cantonese Pinyin | 粵拼 - Cantonese Pinyin (Jyutping) letters |
| 6 or CZ | Chinese Zhuyin | ㄅㄆㄇㄈ - Mandarin Chinese Zhuyin ( Bopomofo) |
| 7 or CU | Chinese Unicode | 中文统一码 - Chinese Chracter Encoding |
Even if different versions work slightly different, the way this software works in general is that you’ll input the text you want to translate, then select in what language is that text (lang_A) and then, select in what language you want that text to be translated (lang_B), then it will display the translation for you.
#----------- stage 1
# Input from the user
user_input = "为"
# Comment about the text user input
OUTPUT: "The text you input: \- Contain Hanzi \- Contains (1) character"
#----------- stage 2
# Selection from the user
from_lang = "1" # tranlation from Simplified Mandarin
to_lang = "2" # translation to Traditional Mandarin
#----------- stage 3
# Final Translation
OUTPUT: "Translation complete: 為"-
Stage 1: Text input
When you input the text, it is automatically checked by a Regex Formula that will tell whether the text you input has Chinese Characters, Latin Script or Zhuyin, so it can try to guess in what language is the text you input.
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(code)
# Example of user input user_input = "为" # Text checker is a checker that will automatically check a text and tell wether it has Chinese Characters, Latin Script or Zhuyin def text_checker(user_input): hanzi_list = "[\u4e00-\u9fff]+" # Hanzi (Chinese Characters) unicode list latin_list = "[\0000-\u007F]+" # Latin Script unicode list zhuyin_list = "[\u3100-\u31A0]+" # Zhuyin unicode list textLength = len(user_input) - 1 # checker of how many letters/character a text have if (re.search(hanzi_list, user_input)): print("The text you input: \- Contain Hanzi \- Contains (", textLength, ") characters") return("") else: pass if (re.search(zhuyin_list, user_input)): print("The text you input: \- Contain Zhuyin characters \- Contains (", textLength, ") characters") return ("") else: pass if (re.search(latin_list, user_input)): print("The text you input: \- Contain letters of Latin Script \- Contains (", textLength, ") letters") return ("") else: pass
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Stage 2: Selection of lang_A and lang_B
When you select in what language is the text you input (lang_A) it will output/show the option you selected. Same case when you select in what language is the text you input (lang_B) it will output/show the option you selected
A function will save your selection of lang_A and your selection of lang_B, this way will know what dictionary to use (langA_to_langB)
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(code)
# Input from the user user_input = "为" # Selection from the user from_lang = "1" # in what language is the text user input to_lang = "2" # in what language user will receive the translation # Option Selection for languages if from_lang == '1' and to_lang == '2': # 1 is Simplified Mandarin, 2 is Traditional Mandarin translate_text = (get_translation(user_input, simplified2traditional_dictionary)) # it saves the text the user input and selects the dictionary for languages print("Translation done:") return(translate_text) # returns the text
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Stage 3: Translation between lang_A and lang_B
Then the will pick the text you input and every single character/word will be replaced from the lang_A to lang_B by the .replace() method.
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(code)
# Input from the user user_input = "为" # Example of dictionary simplified2traditional_dictionary = {'为':'為'} # Get translation def get_translation(user_input, dictionary): # will take the text from the user and also the dictionary that will be used for the translation for word, replace in dictionary.items(): # will replace every single character of the user input to one that it can finds in the dictionary text = text.replace(word, replace) return(text)
The result of the .replace() will be output/show for you
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I used multiple resources for making this software work, specially at the time of creating the character wordlist used for translation I needed multiple resources, so I’ll tag them here.
Chinese Simplified Wordlist
Chinese Traditional Wordlist
Chinese Mandarin Pinyin Wordlist
- **Pinyin Conversion Tone Marks <> Numbers** (lexilogos.com)
- Chinese to Pinyin Converter (meetmandarin.com)
Chinese Cantonese and Cantonese Pinyin Wordlist
Chinese Zhuyin Wordlist
Chinese Unicode Wordlist
I input all of the wordlist in a Excel File, but as I needed to transform it from Excel File to a Dictionary in Python, I used the PANDAS library in order to do it
Published on October 31. 2022
Main improvements
- Python GUI/Tkinter library
(plus 0.1.3 version features)
Published on October 31. 2022
Main improvements
- Able to translate 20000 of the most common Chinese Characters
- Addition of new languages:
- Chinese Zhuyin
- Chinese Unicode
Other improvements - Better checker of the inputted text (Chinese Character, Latin letters or Zhuyin) - Creation of system for traslations using less space - Cleaner functions for translation - Better system for translation - Cleaner and lighter code
(plus 0.1.2 version features)
Published on October 12. 2022
Main improvements
- Able to translate 12000 of the most common Chinese Characters
Other improvements - Checker of the inputted text (Chinese Character or not) - Better functions fo translation - Cleaner and lighter code - Addition of OOP concepts
(plus 0.1.1 version features)
Published on October 4. 2022
- First initial version
- Python Module Software
- Able to translate 8000 most common Chinese Characters
- Able to translate in:
- Mandarin Chinese Simplified
- Mandarin Chinese Traditional
- Mandarin Chinese Pinyin
- Cantonese
- Cantonese Pinyin
I plan to focus on other projects but I still have some ideas for this one, like:
- Bigger wordlist set
- More accurate translation: Cantonese, Zhuyin (Bopomofo)
- More languages: Wade-Giles, Martian
- Helpful tools: copy translation to clipboard, text-to-speech, chinese reader, voice recognition, draw characters
- Other frameworks: Translator available in Django
and others!
If you want to contribute something, report problems or add features, you are totally welcome!
Star ⭐ this repository if my project helped you!
MIT License - Simtracan Translator - Daniela Bai - Year 2022
Daniela Bai (Daniela Barazarte)
- Twitter @danielabai8
- Github @danielabai
Thanks to my friend Marco Aurelio L. for giving me active feedback on my code, as giving me recommendations and new ideas for the project. Thanks to my Chinese partner from Guangdong Avery for (unconsciously) giving me this idea. Thanks to my mom and anyone else who has always support me during this project. Also thanks to the tutorials I followed in order to complete this project!
Thanks to FreeCodeCamp and their tutorials of:
Thanks to Bro Code and his tutorials of:
