JP5483526B2 - Machine translation system and machine translation method - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a mechanism for mechanically translating a document, and more particularly to a system and method for translating text displayed in a web page in real time.

<Conventional example 1>
A service for mechanically translating text in a Web page is provided on the Internet (see, for example, Non-Patent Document 1).
In the service, when the URL of the Web page is received as input, the text in the Web page corresponding to the URL is translated into the language specified by the user, and the original HTML data is converted and output. However, this service does not have a function for translating characters included in images in the Web page.

<Conventional example 2>
A method for creating an image obtained by translating only a character portion of image data in which an image and a character are mixed is known (for example, see Patent Document 1).
In this method, the part (character area) where character data exists is identified from the image data in which images and characters are mixed, character data is extracted from the character area, the extracted character data is converted to text data, and text The data is translated, the translation data is adjusted and pasted to the character area, and the character area pasted with the translation data is synthesized with the original image data (the flowchart in FIG. 2 and the explanatory diagram in FIGS. 3 to 10). Etc.).

<Conventional example 3>
A technique is known in which only the character portion is replaced with a new character translated into another language while maintaining the appearance of the color and pattern as the background of the document (for example, Patent Document 2).
In this method, after recognizing a character from a bitmap image obtained by scanning a document in which the character is printed on a single color paper, the pixel on which the character was drawn is backfilled with a pixel having the same attribute as the paper. Then, a new bitmap image is generated by writing a new character obtained by translating the recognized character into the image (see the flowchart of FIG. 1, the transition diagram of FIG. 2, etc.).

<Conventional Example 4>
There is known a technique for improving the readability by associating an original sentence with a translated sentence (see, for example, Patent Document 3).
In this method, character data is translated into a predetermined language, the character string length of the translated sentence is corrected to the same length as the character string length of the original sentence, and an image in which the original sentence is associated with the translated sentence is generated (same as above). (Refer to the flow chart in FIG. 3 and the explanatory diagrams in FIGS. 4 and 5).

As a method for comparing character string lengths, there are described or suggested a point for determining the cumulative number of dots, a point for determining the number of characters, and a point for determining the length during printing (paragraphs 0029 and 0035 in the same document). Etc.).
Also, as a method of correcting the character string length, the point of changing the font of the character, the point of changing the point of the character, the point of evenly allocating the entire character string, the point of making the character a ruby character are described or suggested. (See paragraphs 0030 and 0034 of the same document).

<Conventional Example 5>
When translating a document created in a language into a document in a different language, a method is known in which the layout of the translated sentence is the same as that of the original sentence (see, for example, Patent Document 4).
In this method, a translation sentence is generated from a character string of the original sentence, an abbreviation target phrase (long word or long phrase) in the translation sentence is replaced with an abbreviation, and a translation sentence image in which the abbreviation target phrase is replaced with an abbreviation is obtained. After generating the same layout as the original sentence, a translation sentence in which the correspondence list of abbreviation target phrases and abbreviations is arranged in the margin is output (refer to the flowchart of FIG. 3 and the explanatory diagrams of FIGS. 4 to 7). ).

The abbreviation word / phrase is replaced with an abbreviation when, for example, the number of lines in the translated sentence exceeds the number of lines in the corresponding original sentence in the unit area (see paragraph 0032 of the same document).
In addition, the abbreviation target phrase is, for example, a phrase in which the number of constituent characters and the number of appearances both exceed a predetermined threshold in the unit area (see paragraph 0033 of the same document).

JP 2003-122751 A JP 2006-251902 A JP 2006-276905 A JP 2007-034430 A Google, Inc., “Google Translate”, Internet <URL: http://translate.google.co.jp/>

When providing services for foreigners on the Internet, it is convenient to have a Web page in a foreign language. However, it is practically impossible to prepare patterns in each language for all Web pages in advance because it takes too much time.
At this time, for example, if the same mechanism as the translation service of <Conventional Example 1> is used, a Web page in each language can be generated in real time just by creating each Web page in any one language. It can be provided for the time being.

On the other hand, images are often arranged on Web pages that provide services, and the images often include characters (110a in FIG. 1A).
At this time, for example, in the translation service of <Conventional Example 1>, characters in the image are not translated (110b in FIG. 1B). In addition, for example, the technique of extracting characters in an image as appropriate and translating them as in <Conventional Example 2> and <Conventional Example 3> takes time to process, and is used in a translation service that assumes real-time processing. It is hard to do.

  The problem to be solved by the present invention is to solve the problem that when an entire Web page is subjected to machine translation, characters in the image are displayed as they are without being translated.

In order to solve the above-described problems, the present invention provides a machine translation system that provides a web page expressed in a certain language and translates the web page into another language. Web data storage means connected through a communication network and storing at least HTML data describing the structure of a Web page expressed in a certain language and image data referred to by the HTML data, and text translation processing Translation data storage means for storing at least dictionary data to be used, and the HTML data stored in the Web data storage means includes a character image indicating an image including characters and a predetermined image overlapping the character image. Preliminary text showing the text of the certain language whose display position is set in front of the position and is invisible A translation request receiving means for receiving from the terminal a translation request including at least one URL pair, a URL corresponding to the Web page to be translated, and at least translation destination language designation data, and the received URL With reference to the HTML data acquisition means for acquiring HTML data describing the structure of the corresponding Web page from the Web data storage means, and the dictionary data stored in the translation data storage means, the HTML data in the acquired HTML data A text translation means for translating a predetermined text to be translated including the preliminary text into a translation destination language corresponding to the received designated data; and invisible in the acquired HTML data and translated by the text translation means. with visualizing the preliminary text has been visualized in the HTML data A visualization element switching means for invisible the serial character image, and translated HTML data transmitting means for transmitting the HTML data processed by the visualization element switching means prior SL terminal, transmits the specified image data from the terminal In response to a request, the image data transmitting means reads out the designated image data from the Web data storage means and transmits it to the terminal.

The visualization element switching unit changes the text color attribute of the text from transparent to colored, changes the display attribute of the area including the text from non-display to display, or deletes the comment tag sandwiching the tag of the area including the text. It is good to visualize the preliminary text that has been made invisible.
The visualization element switching means changes the display attribute of the image from display to non-display, deletes the tag corresponding to the image, sandwiches the tag corresponding to the image with a comment tag, and displays the display attribute of the region including the image It is good to make the character image visualized by changing to non-display or inserting a tag corresponding to a region including an image with a comment tag.
The translated HTML data transmission means may change the reference URL of the acquired HTML data to the URL of the Web page to be translated included in the received translation request.
The translated HTML data transmitting means, when the length of the pre-text of the post-translational constant or longer than the length of the pre-text of the previous translation in HTML that the acquired, the length of the pre-text after the translation You may correct | amend shortly.

In order to solve the above problems, the present invention provides a machine translation method by a machine translation system that provides a web page expressed in a certain language and translates the web page into another language. The system is connected to a terminal of a user who browses a web page via a communication network, and stores at least HTML data describing the structure of the web page expressed in a certain language and image data referred to by the HTML data. Web data storage means and translation data storage means for storing at least dictionary data used for text translation processing. The HTML data stored in the Web data storage means is a character indicating a visualized image. The display position is set in front of the image and the predetermined position that overlaps the character image, and is invisible Translation request reception including at least one set of preliminary text indicating a text of a certain language, and receiving a translation request including at least a URL corresponding to a Web page to be translated and designation data of a translation destination language from the terminal The HTML data acquisition step of acquiring HTML data describing the structure of the Web page corresponding to the received URL from the Web data storage means, and the dictionary data stored in the translation data storage means , text translation step of translating the predetermined translated text containing the preliminary text of the acquired in HTML data in the target language corresponding to the specified the received data are invisible in the acquired in HTML data and the preliminary translated text in the text translation step As well as visualization, the visualization element switching step of invisible the character image that has been visualized in the HTML data, translated HTML data for transmitting the HTML data processed in the visualization element switching step prior SL terminal A transmission step; and an image data transmission step of reading the designated image data from the Web data storage means and transmitting it to the terminal in response to a transmission request designating the image data from the terminal. To do.

A program for causing each of the above-described machine translation systems to realize one or a plurality of computers as functions is also the present invention.
Furthermore, in order to solve the above-described problem, the information processing apparatus according to the present invention includes a character image that includes characters and is visualized, and a preliminary text in which a display position is set and invisible so as to overlap the character image. acquisition means for acquiring a source that describes the structure of the translated Web page including at least one pair of sets, a more translated the preliminary text translation means for translating the translated text in the source describing a structure of a Web page the visualization element switching process to invisible pre Symbol character images together when visualized, and visualization element switching means for performing relative to the acquired source, and output means for outputting the source the visualization element switching process is executed .
Furthermore, in order to solve the above problems, the present invention is an information processing method executed by a computer, wherein a character image including characters and a character image that are visualized and a display position are set so as to overlap the character image and are not valid. An acquisition step for acquiring a source describing a structure of a Web page to be translated including at least one pair of visualized preliminary texts, and a translation means for translating the text to be translated in the source describing the structure of the Web page the visualization element switching process to invisible pre Symbol character image more translated the preliminary text together when visualized, and visualization element switching step to be performed on the obtained source, wherein the visualization element switching process is executed And outputting an output source.
A source that describes the structure of a Web page to be translated including at least one set of a character image that includes characters and is visualized and a preliminary text whose display position is set so as to overlap the character image and is made invisible an acquiring function of acquiring, a visualization element switching process to invisible pre Symbol character images together when visualizing the more translated the preliminary text translation means for translating the translated text in the source describing a structure of a Web page A program for causing a computer to execute a visualization element switching function to be executed on the acquired source and an output function to output a source on which the visualization element switching process has been executed is also the present invention.

Machine translation system of the present invention, the reference data of the character image being visualized include characters (URL), the display position in an area overlapping on the character image is set, and the pre-text data that is invisible at least One set of HTML data is stored in the Web data storage means, the preliminary text data made invisible in the translation process is visualized, and the reference data of the visualized character image is made invisible. In this way, the Web page is partially configured in two layers (an image layer including characters and an invisible text layer), and by switching the elements displayed in the translation process, the Web page (HTML When the data is subjected to machine translation, the translated text is displayed in an area where an image including characters is displayed. In this respect, the problem that the characters in the image are displayed as they are without being translated is solved.
In addition, the information processing apparatus of the present invention includes at least one set of a set of a character image that includes characters and is visualized, and a preliminary text that is set in a display position and is made invisible so as to overlap the character image. A visualization element switching process is performed for the source describing the structure of the target Web page, and the preliminary text that is the object of translation by the translation means is visualized and the character image that includes characters that are not the object of translation by the translation means is invisible. To do.
In this way, the translation target Web page is partially made into a two-layer configuration (a character image layer and a preliminary text layer), and by switching the displayed elements, the source of the translation target Web page (for example, When the HTML data is subjected to machine translation, the translated text is displayed in a region where an image including characters is displayed. In this respect, the problem that the characters in the image are displayed as they are without being translated is solved.

<Definition>
The meanings of the terms used in the following description are as defined below.
・ Machine translation: Translation performed automatically without human intervention using a computer.
Visualization: a concept that includes a process for enabling the user to visually recognize the image.
Invisibility: A concept that includes a process of making the user invisible. For example, processing forms such as setting to non-display, setting to transparency, deleting an element, and commenting out an element are conceivable.

<Embodiment>
[1. Outline of Embodiment]
The outline of the present embodiment will be described with reference to FIGS.
The system according to the present embodiment is a service (machine) that translates a portion displayed in a first language in a web page into a second language designated (selected) by each user for a user browsing the web page. This system provides a translation service.
In the following description, an example in which a Japanese part in a Web page is translated into English is used.

[1-1. System configuration]
As shown in FIG. 2, the system according to the present embodiment as a whole includes a web server 11 that provides web pages, a translation server 12 that performs translation processing, and a user terminal 20 that includes a web browser.
The Web server 11 has a WebDB 13 that stores at least HTML data describing the structure of a Web page and data (for example, image data) referred to by the HTML data. On the other hand, the translation server 12 has a translation DB 14 that stores at least dictionary data to be referred to in the machine translation process of a Web page.

Note that the dictionary data stored in the translation DB 14 includes data defining vocabulary and grammar, and a model constructed by a statistical learning method. Further, data defining a specific translation for a specific phrase may be stored.
In this embodiment, the Web DB 13 and the translation DB 14 are constructed in external storage devices connected to the Web server 11 and the translation server 12, respectively. If the stored information can be read, the Web server 11, You may build in the memory | storage device incorporated in the translation server 12. FIG.

The Web server 11 and the translation server 12 are connected to each other by a communication network (in this embodiment, a private network such as a LAN) to form a machine translation system 10. Further, the user terminal 20 can be connected to the Web server 11 and the translation server 12 via a communication network (in this embodiment, the Internet 30).
Communication between the Web server 11, the translation server 12, and the user terminal 20 is controlled by the router 40.

[1-2. Main features]
[(A) Main Features of Embodiment 1]
The main feature of the first embodiment is that HTML data including at least one set of reference data (URL) of an image not including characters and text data in which a display position is set in front of an area overlapping the image is stored in the WebDB 13. The point is to remember.
In this way, when a Web page is partially composed of two layers (an image layer not including characters and a text layer), when the Web page (HTML data) is subjected to machine translation, no characters are included. The translated text is displayed in front of the area that overlaps the image. In this respect, the problem that the characters in the image are displayed as they are without being translated is solved.

FIG. 3 shows a part of the web page before and after translation in the first embodiment.
In addition to the normal text 310a, the web page before translation displays an image 320 that does not include characters and a text 330a whose display position is set in front of an area overlapping the image 320 (FIG. 3A )).
On the other hand, the translated web page displays a text 310b in which the text 310a is translated, an image 320 that does not change before and after translation, and a text 330b in which the text 330a is translated (FIG. 3B).

[(B) Main Features of Embodiment 2]
The main feature of the second embodiment is that at least one set of reference data (URL) of an image that includes characters and is visualized and text data that has a display position set in an area overlapping the image and is invisible. The HTML data to be included is stored in the WebDB 13 to visualize the invisible text data in the translation process and to make the visualized image data invisible.
In this way, the Web page is partially configured in two layers (an image layer including characters and an invisible text layer), and the Web page (HTML) is changed by switching the layers displayed in the translation process. When the data is subjected to machine translation, the translated text is displayed in an area where an image including characters is displayed. In this respect, the problem that the characters in the image are displayed as they are without being translated is solved.

FIG. 4 shows a part of a Web page before and after translation in the second embodiment.
A normal text 410a and an image 420 including characters are displayed on the Web page before translation (FIG. 4 (a-1)). Further, the web page before translation has text data 430a in which the display position is set in an area overlapping the image 420 and is invisible (FIG. 4 (a-2)).
On the other hand, on the translated web page, a text 410b obtained by translating the text 410a and a text 430b obtained by translating the text 430a are displayed (FIG. 4B). Since the image 420 is invisible, it cannot be visually recognized in the translated web page.

[2. Machine translation procedure]
[2-1. Outline of machine translation procedure]
The flow of machine translation processing and the flow of data by the system of this embodiment will be briefly described with reference to the sequence chart of FIG.
As shown in FIG. 5, the Web server 11 and the translation server 12 constituting the machine translation system 10 display the translated web page on the user terminal 20 by the following [Procedure 1] to [Procedure 4].
In the sequence chart of FIG. 5, numbers of other drawings to be referred to are added. Please refer to the other drawings as necessary.

[Procedure 1]
As a premise, the user terminal 20 is displaying a web page provided from the web server 11 (S505a), and the web page is a web page to be translated (FIG. 3A in the first embodiment, In the second embodiment, FIG. 4 (a-1)). In addition, elements (for example, a combination of pull-down, radio button, pull-down, or radio button and button, image, or link) for selecting a translated language and requesting translation are displayed on the Web page to be translated. It shall be.
When the user designates (selects) a translated language on the web page to be translated and performs a predetermined operation for requesting translation, the user terminal 20 requests the translation server 12 to translate the web page (S510a).

FIG. 6 illustrates main items of the translation request.
The translation request includes “translation processing program URL”, “translation target Web page URL”, “first language (translation target Web page language)”, “second language (translation destination language)”, and “text” Data character code "is included.
In the present embodiment, an HTTP request having a URL parameter equal to or less than “URL of the Web page to be translated” is a translation request. Each item shown in FIG. 6 may be transmitted in other formats.

[Procedure 2]
When the translation server 12 receives a translation request from the user terminal 20 (S510b), the translation server 12 requests the Web server 11 to transmit HTML data corresponding to the received “URL of the Web page to be translated” (S515b).
When the Web server 11 receives an HTML data transmission request from the translation server 12 (S515c), the Web server 11 reads or generates HTML data (pre-translation HTML data) corresponding to the received “translation target Web page URL” from the WebDB 13. Then, it is transmitted to the translation server 12 (S520c).

[Procedure 3]
When the translation server 12 receives the pre-translation HTML data from the Web server 11 (S520b), the translation server 12 executes a machine translation process on the received pre-translation HTML data, and transmits the post-translation HTML data to the user terminal 20. (S525b).
The flow of machine translation processing and HTML data before and after translation will be described in detail for each embodiment with separate items (see FIGS. 7 to 10 described later).

[Procedure 4]
When the user terminal 20 receives the translated HTML data from the translation server 12 (S525a), the user terminal 20 interprets the received HTML and displays a web page without an image (S530a), and an image referred to by the HTML The transmission of data is requested to the Web server 11 (S535a).
Upon receiving the image data transmission request (S535c), the Web server 11 reads the designated image data from the WebDB 13 and transmits it to the user terminal 20 (S540c).
When the user terminal 20 receives the image data from the Web server 11 (S540a), the user terminal 20 additionally displays an image at a predetermined position in the already displayed Web page (S545a). The Web page after the display is completed is as described above (FIG. 3B in the first embodiment and FIG. 4B in the second embodiment).

[2-2. Machine translation processing procedure of embodiment 1]
[(A) HTML data before translation]
FIG. 7A illustrates a part of the pre-translation HTML data in the first embodiment.
The HTML data before translation includes image reference data 720 and text data 730a in addition to text data 710a. Some tags have a style set by a style sheet (CSS format).
The text data 710a, the image reference data 720, and the text data 730a correspond to the text 310a, the image 320, and the text 330a of the Web page before translation (FIG. 3A), respectively.

The image referred to by the image reference data 720 has a width of 840 pixels and a height of the predetermined area (width 840 pixels, height 120 pixels) with the top left vertex aligned with 0 pixels from the top and 0 pixels from the left. It is set to display at 120 pixels. On the other hand, the text corresponding to the text data 730a is set so as to be normally displayed at a position of 30 pixels from the top of the predetermined area (width 840 pixels, height 120 pixels) (here, centering) etc). Therefore, the image and the text are displayed so as to overlap in the predetermined area.
Note that the elements in the Web page overlap in the HTML description order (elements described later are displayed in the front), and thus are not particularly set in the example of FIG. May be set. The superposition order can be set, for example, depending on the value (numerical value) of the “z-index” attribute.

[(B) Translation processing]
The flow of the translation process in the first embodiment will be described in detail with reference to the flowchart of FIG.
As shown in FIG. 8, the translation server 12 translates the HTML data according to the following [Procedure 31] to [Procedure 34].

[Procedure 31]
The HTML reference URL is changed (S810).
Specifically, the URL based on the URL of the reference data described in the relative URL format (for example, the value of the src attribute in the reference data 720 (FIG. 7A)) is used as the <base> tag href. It is described in the absolute URL format as the attribute value. Here, the “URL of the Web page to be translated” included in the search request (FIG. 6) received from the user terminal 20 is set as the reference URL.
If it is assumed that all URLs in HTML are described in the absolute URL format, the process of changing the reference URL may be omitted. The same effect can be obtained even if all URLs described in the relative URL format are individually rewritten in the absolute URL format.

[Procedure 32]
One piece of text data that is the content of the element in the HTML data is extracted (S820), and the extracted text data (original text) is translated from “first language” to “second language”. Then, a translated sentence is generated (S830).
The translation server 12 refers to the dictionary data stored in the translation DB 14 when translating text.

[Procedure 33]
If necessary, the size of the translated sentence is corrected (S840), and the extracted text data is replaced with the translated sentence (S850).
For example, the length of the translated sentence may be corrected after comparing the character string lengths by the same method as in the above <Conventional Example 4>. Note that words similar to the above <Conventional Example 5> may be extracted from the translated sentence by words that satisfy a predetermined condition and replaced with abbreviations generated by a predetermined method. In this case, it is preferable to separately generate a Web page on which the abbreviation definition is posted, and display a link to the Web page on which the abbreviation definition is posted on the translated Web page. Moreover, you may comprise so that an abbreviation target phrase may be pop-up displayed when a pointer is put on the abbreviation.

[Procedure 34]
It is determined whether or not the translated text data is the last text data that is the content of the element in the HTML data (S860).
Specifically, the next text data which is the content of the element in the HTML data is searched, and when the next text data is not detected, it is determined that the text data translated immediately before is the last text data. . If it is not the last text data (No in S860), the process returns to the above [Procedure 32], and the extraction to replacement process ([Procedure 32] to [Procedure 33]) is repeated for the next text data. On the other hand, when it is the last text data (Yes in S860), the loop is exited.

[(C) HTML data after translation]
FIG. 7B illustrates a part of the translated HTML data in the first embodiment.
FIG. 7B is HTML data after the HTML data of FIG. 7A is translated by the process shown in the flowchart of FIG.

The translated HTML data includes text data 710b obtained by translating text data 710a, image reference data 720 that does not change before and after translation, and text data 730b obtained by translating text data 730a. Further, a tag 740b that clearly indicates the reference URL is added.
The text data 710b, the image reference data 720, and the text data 730b correspond to the text 310b, the image 320, and the text 330b of the translated Web page (FIG. 3B), respectively.
Note that the character size of the text data 710b is corrected to 90% of the normal size by the correction process (S840 in FIG. 8) of [Procedure 33]. The other data settings are not particularly changed.

[2-3. Machine translation processing procedure of embodiment 2]
[(A) HTML data before translation]
FIG. 9A illustrates a part of the pre-translation HTML data in the second embodiment.
The HTML data before translation includes image reference data 920a and text data 930a in addition to text data 910a. Some tags have a style set by a style sheet (CSS format).
The text data 910a and the image reference data 920a correspond to the text 410a and the image 420 of the Web page before translation (FIG. 4A-1), respectively. The text data 930a corresponds to the invisible text data 430a (FIG. 4 (a-2)) included in the web page before translation.

The image referred to by the image reference data 920a has a width of 840 pixels and a height of the predetermined area (width 840 pixels, height 120 pixels) with the top left vertex aligned with the position of 0 pixels from the top and 0 pixels from the left. It is set to display at 120 pixels.
On the other hand, the text corresponding to the text data 930a is set so as to be normally displayed at a position of 30 pixels from the top of the predetermined area (width 840 pixels, height 120 pixels) (here, centering) etc). However, since the text corresponding to the text data 930a is invisible (the character color attribute value is set to transparent), it cannot be viewed in the window of the Web browser.

[(B) Translation processing]
The flow of translation processing in the second embodiment will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG.
As shown in FIG. 10, the translation server 12 translates the HTML data according to the following [Procedure 35] in addition to the above [Procedure 31] to [Procedure 34] (similar to the first embodiment).
In the flowchart of FIG. 10, processes denoted by the same reference numerals as those shown in the flowchart of FIG. 8 indicate the same processes.

[Procedure 35]
All the translated sentences that have been made invisible are visualized (S1070), and all images that overlap the visualized translated sentences are made invisible (S1080).
For example, in the example of FIG. 9A, the class attribute of the “<div>” tag whose class attribute value is “class_11” is deleted. As a result, the text corresponding to the text data 930a (text that has been explicitly invisible) is inherited and inherited from the parent element attribute (the character color attribute is changed from transparent to colored). In addition, the value of the class attribute of the “<img>” tag whose class attribute value is “class_21” is changed to “class_22”. As a result, the image corresponding to the image reference data 920a (the image that has been explicitly visualized) is explicitly invisible (the display attribute is changed from display to non-display).
Note that the visualization of the translation and / or the invisibility of the image may be performed by collectively applying the class attributes as described above, or may be performed individually for each corresponding tag.

[(C) HTML data after translation]
FIG. 9B illustrates a part of the translated HTML data in the second embodiment.
FIG. 9B shows HTML data after the HTML data of FIG. 9A is translated by the process shown in the flowchart of FIG.

The translated HTML data includes text data 910b obtained by translating text data 910a, reference data 920b obtained by making reference data 920a invisible, and text data 930b obtained by translating and visualizing text data 930a. Further, a tag 940b that clearly indicates the reference URL is added.
The text data 910b and text data 930b correspond to the text 410b and text 430b of the translated Web page (FIG. 4B), respectively.
Note that the character size of the text data 910b is corrected to 90% of the normal size by the correction process of [Procedure 33] (S840 in FIG. 10). There are no changes to the settings of other data, unless otherwise specified.

[3. Modifications etc.]
[3-1. Modification of system configuration]
[(A) Configuration in which the translation server is in a remote location]
In the above-described embodiment, the Web server 11 and the translation server 12 are connected via a private network such as a LAN (FIG. 2). This is a configuration assuming that both servers are under the control of the same operator.
On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 11, the Web server 11 and the translation server 12 may be connected via a public network such as the Internet 30. This is a configuration that assumes that the Web server 11 or the translation server 12 is in a remote location (for example, under the control of another business location, a remote data center, or another business operator).

[(B) Configuration in which Web Server has Translation Processing Function]
In the above-described embodiment, the machine translation system 10 is configured by the Web server 11 and the translation server 12 (FIG. 2). This is a configuration that specializes in a specific processing function for each hardware and achieves load distribution.
On the other hand, you may comprise so that the web server 11 may perform all the steps of a machine translation process. In this case, as shown in FIG. 12, the Web server 11 includes a Web DB 13 and a translation DB 14. Also, the main body of the process of receiving the translation request from the user terminal 20, acquiring the HTML data to be translated, executing the translation process, and transmitting the translated HTML data and necessary image data is all the Web server 11. It becomes.

[3-2. Variation of processing sharing]
In the above-described embodiment, the Web server 11 specializes in processing for transmitting HTML data or image data. Similarly, the translation server 12 specializes in processing that receives a translation request from the user terminal 20, generates translated HTML data, and transmits it to the user terminal 20 (FIG. 5).
In contrast, the Web server 11 is in charge of the process of receiving a translation request from the user terminal 20 and the process of transmitting the translated HTML data to the user terminal 20, and the translation server 12 translates the Web page (FIG. 8). S810-S860, S810-S1080 in FIG. 10) may be specialized.

[3-3. Variation of style settings]
[(A) Modified example of visualization of invisible text]
In the process of visualizing the invisible text, for example, the following method may be adopted in consideration of consistency with other setting items.
-Change the visibility attribute (display attribute) of the <div> element from "hidden" to "visible" (default).-Delete the comment tag that sandwiches the text data itself or the entire element containing the text data.

[(B) Modified example of invisible image being visualized]
In the process of making the visualized image invisible, for example, the following method may be adopted in consideration of consistency with other setting items.
-Insert the entire <div> element or <img> tag between comment tags (comment out)
-Delete the entire <div> element or <img> tag-Change the visibility attribute (display attribute) of the <div> element from "visible" (default) to "hidden"-<div> element or <img> tag Change the display attribute (display format) to "none"

[(C) Concept of invisibility]
In the above-described second embodiment, the term “invisible” is used as a concept including a process of making “not visible at all”.
On the other hand, the user may be “almost invisible” by setting semi-transparency, increasing transparency, graying out, setting to a very light color (all RGB values are set to approximately 200 or more). Depending on the processing, the same effect as “invisibility” may be obtained. Therefore, these processes are also substantially equivalent to “invisible”.

[3-4. Variation of style settings]
In the first embodiment, the style is individually set for the HTML tag (FIG. 7). In the second embodiment described above, the style defined in the HTML source is applied to all tags with specific class names (FIG. 9).
On the other hand, the style may be applied by referring to an external file described in a predetermined style sheet language (for example, CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)). Further, all styles may be set according to the attributes of the HTML tag.

[4. Source code description example, Web page display example]
The stylesheet source (file name “test.css”) illustrated in FIG. 14 is associated with the HTML source illustrated in FIG. At this time, the display position of the text in the HTML is set as illustrated in FIG. 16 according to the image (file name “test.gif”) illustrated in FIG. In FIG. 16, the background is shown in gray so that the uppermost white character is clear.
FIG. 17 shows a Web page display example in which the HTML source illustrated in FIG. 13 is read into a Web browser. In this way, by separating the background portion and the character portion of the image into a two-layer structure (image layer, text layer), only the character portion can be subjected to machine translation. Note that the display example shown in FIG. 17 has sufficient expressibility even when compared with an image integrated with characters (FIG. 18).

(Conventional example) (a) Part of a Web page before translation, (b) Part of a Web page after translation. It is a figure which shows the structural example of a system. (Embodiment 1) (a) Part of a Web page before translation, (b) Part of a Web page after translation. (Embodiment 2) (a-1) Part of Web page before translation, (a-2) Invisible data of Web page before translation, (b) Part of Web page after translation FIG. (Embodiment) It is a sequence chart which shows a machine translation procedure. (Embodiment) It is a figure which shows the main items of a translation request. (Embodiment 1) (a) A part of HTML source before translation, (b) A part of HTML source after translation. (Embodiment 1) It is a flowchart which shows the flow of a translation process. (Embodiment 2) (a) Part of HTML source before translation, (b) Part of HTML source after translation. (Embodiment 2) It is a flowchart which shows the flow of a translation process. (Other embodiment) It is a figure which shows the modification of a system configuration | structure. (Other embodiment) It is a figure which shows the modification of a system configuration | structure. (Other Embodiments) This is a description example of a source of HTML data. (Other Embodiments) This is a description example of a style sheet source. (Other Embodiments) This is a display example of a reference image. (Other embodiment) It is a figure which illustrates the display position of a text. (Other Embodiments) This is a display example of a Japanese Web page. (Other Embodiments) This is a display example of an image including characters.

Explanation of symbols

10 Machine Translation System 11 Web Server 12 Translation Server 13 WebDB
14 Translation DB
20 User terminal 30 Internet 40 Router

Claims (10)

A machine translation system that provides a web page expressed in a language and translates the web page into another language,
Connected to the terminal of the user viewing the web page via a communication network,
Web data storage means for storing at least HTML data describing the structure of a Web page expressed in a language and image data referred to by the HTML data;
Translation data storage means for storing at least dictionary data used for text translation processing;
The HTML data stored in the Web data storage means is a character image showing an image including characters and visualized, and a display position is set in front of a predetermined position overlapping the character image, and is made invisible Including at least one pair with preliminary text indicating language text,
A translation request receiving means for receiving, from the terminal, a translation request including at least a URL corresponding to a web page to be translated and designation data of a translation destination language;
HTML data acquisition means for acquiring HTML data describing the structure of the Web page corresponding to the received URL from the Web data storage means;
Text that translates a predetermined translation target text including the preliminary text in the acquired HTML data into a translation destination language corresponding to the received specified data with reference to dictionary data stored in the translation data storage means Translation means;
Visualization element switching means for visualizing the preliminary text that has been made invisible in the acquired HTML data and translated by the text translation means , and for making the character image visualized in the HTML data invisible ,
And translated HTML data transmitting means for transmitting the HTML data processed by the visualization element switching means prior SL terminal,
A machine translation system comprising: image data transmission means for reading the designated image data from the Web data storage means and transmitting it to the terminal in response to a transmission request designating image data from the terminal. . The machine translation system according to claim 1,
The visualization element switching unit changes the text color attribute of the text from transparent to colored, changes the display attribute of the area including the text from non-display to display, or deletes the comment tag sandwiching the tag of the area including the text. A machine translation system characterized in that the preliminary text that has been made invisible is visualized. The machine translation system according to claim 1 or 2,
The visualization element switching means changes the display attribute of the image from display to non-display, deletes the tag corresponding to the image, sandwiches the tag corresponding to the image with a comment tag, and displays the display attribute of the region including the image A machine translation system characterized in that the character image that has been visualized is made invisible by changing the display to non-display or inserting a tag corresponding to a region including an image with a comment tag. The machine translation system according to any one of claims 1 to 3,
The translated HTML data transmission means changes a reference URL of the acquired HTML data to a URL of a Web page to be translated included in the received translation request. In the machine translation system according to any one of claims 1 to 4,
The translated HTML data transmission means, when the length of the preliminary text after translation is longer than a predetermined length compared with the length of the preliminary text before translation in the acquired HTML, A machine translation system characterized by correcting the length to be shorter. A machine translation method by a machine translation system that provides a web page expressed in a language and translates the web page into another language,
The machine translation system is connected to a terminal of a user who browses a web page via a communication network,
Web data storage means for storing at least HTML data describing the structure of a Web page expressed in a language and image data referred to by the HTML data;
Translation data storage means for storing at least dictionary data used for text translation processing;
The HTML data stored in the Web data storage means includes a character image indicating a visualized image, and a text in a certain language in which a display position is set in front of a predetermined position overlapping the character image and is invisible. Including at least one pair with a preliminary text indicating
A translation request receiving step of receiving from the terminal a translation request including at least a URL corresponding to a web page to be translated and designation data of a translation destination language;
An HTML data acquisition step of acquiring HTML data describing the structure of a Web page corresponding to the received URL from the Web data storage means;
Text that translates a predetermined translation target text including the preliminary text in the acquired HTML data into a translation destination language corresponding to the received specified data with reference to dictionary data stored in the translation data storage means A translation step,
A visualization element switching step of visualizing the preliminary text that has been made invisible in the acquired HTML data and translated in the text translation step, and that makes the character image visualized in the HTML data invisible; ,
And translated HTML data transmitting step of transmitting the HTML data processed in the visualization element switching step prior SL terminal,
A machine translation method comprising: an image data transmission step of reading the designated image data from the Web data storage unit and transmitting the image data to the terminal in response to a transmission request designating the image data from the terminal. .   A program for causing each means included in the machine translation system according to any one of claims 1 to 5 to be realized as a function by one or a plurality of computers. A source describing a structure of a Web page to be translated that includes at least one set of a character image that includes characters and is visualized, and a preliminary text whose display position is set so as to overlap the character image and is invisible Acquisition means for acquiring;
The visualization element switching process to invisible pre Symbol character images together when visualizing the more translated the preliminary text translation means for translating the translated text in the source describing the structure of the Web page, the obtained source Visualization element switching means to be executed for
Output means for outputting the source on which the visualization element switching processing has been executed;
An information processing apparatus comprising: A source that describes the structure of a Web page to be translated including at least one set of a character image that includes characters and is visualized and a preliminary text whose display position is set so as to overlap the character image and is made invisible An acquisition step to acquire;
The visualization element switching process to invisible pre Symbol character images together when visualizing the more translated the preliminary text translation means for translating the translated text in the source describing the structure of the Web page, the obtained source A visualization element switching step to be executed for
An output step of outputting a source on which the visualization element switching process has been executed;
An information processing method using a computer. A source that describes the structure of a Web page to be translated including at least one set of a character image that includes characters and is visualized and a preliminary text whose display position is set so as to overlap the character image and is made invisible An acquisition function to acquire,
The visualization element switching process to invisible pre Symbol character images together when visualizing the more translated the preliminary text translation means for translating the translated text in the source describing the structure of the Web page, the obtained source Visualization element switching function executed for
An output function for outputting a source on which the visualization element switching process has been executed;
A program that causes a computer to execute.