Google has added support for 12 more languages to the experimental Conversation Mode of its Google Translate App for Android.
The 12 new languages include French, Italian, German, Portuguese, Dutch, Russian, Czech, Turkish, Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Polish. Before this, Google Translate App for Android supported only English and Spanish. Now it supports 14 languages.
Conversation Mode allows users to converse with another person speaking a different language. It translates spoken words captured through the microphone into another language and reads them out loud.
The Google Translate 2.2 app also enables the ability to post-edit and correct speech input in the Conversation Mode. Frequent travelers can now make the best of their Android smartphone using Google Translate to communicate with people speaking a different language.
For instance you can converse with someone speaking French by simply running the app and holding the phone’s mic closer to the person. The app will detect the French speech and covert it into English (if you’ve chosen that target language), and it will then speak the translated version out loud.
Google’s speech synthesis technology is still in the alpha stage of development and would not work properly with different accents and dialects. Also, Conversational Mode is an experimental feature and requires an internet connection to work.
Download the new Google Translate App from Android Market.