Lingro Blog

Check out Pearson Exclusiva!

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 01:32:00 +0000

If you or your students are looking for a Spanish course to help you prepare for the IB Español B exam, check out Pearson Education's Exclusiva!

The online course includes a lot of great interactive exercises, quizzes, videos and vocabulary lists at the Español B level. The reading exercises make use of Lingro translation popups via a special version of our translation API.

The course requires a subscription, but you can try out some sample content for free from the Exclusiva homepage or watch a video with an overview of the site. It's well worth a look!

Lingro available in Russian and Japanese

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Mon, 30 May 2011 00:59:00 +0000

Thanks to a great translation project done by the students of the Monterey Institute of International Studies, Lingro is now available in two new languages: Russian and Japanese.

To switch your interface language, please enter your user preferences from the toolbar on the bottom of the screen, pick the new language and click on the arrow.

Many thanks to the dedicated translation team:
- Tyson Shelley
- Martiño Prada
- Dale Eggett
- Ai Egawa
- Lee Eisenberg

as well as their professor, Iouri Tchernoousko of MIIS faculty, for proposing the project!

Lingro Firefox Toolbar, 4 new languages & more

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 09:26:00 +0000

Throughout the last few weeks we've been releasing some new developments which should make using Lingro even easier -- this is just a quick update for those of you who haven't noticed our recent changes or received our e-mail.

Lingro Toolbar for Mozilla Firefox

If you're using Firefox, you can install the Lingro Toolbar to have clickable translations and our instant-lookup dictionary on any page you visit! This is especially useful for sites like Facebook that don't work too well with the web-based version of Lingro. And of course all the words you translate will be available in your word history so you can review them. To install the extension click here.

You can also visit the official Lingro Toolbar page at the Mozilla addons site to view and post comments and ratings. The extension is still in beta, so let us know if you like it!

New languages: Portuguese, Chinese, Russian and Dutch

We were finally able to add several often-requested languages to all tools available through Lingro. With the new additions, we now have 121 dictionaries with over 5 million words and almost 9 million translations. You can see the list of supported languages and detailed statistics on the Lingro dictionary builder page.

Google Translate

We are now using Google Translate to show automatic translations if we didn't have a direct match in our dictionary. It's a great resource if you're trying to figure out the meaning of a specific phrase that isn't in the dictionary. We hope that this will be useful for you, but please be careful when using such translations.

Spellcheck, dictionary suggestions and other changes

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 20:22:00 +0000

A few days ago we introduced several new additions to our dictionary lookup mechanism. The long-awaited updates work both in the tooltips (when you click on a word in the web viewer or file viewer) and on our search-as-you-type dictionary page and make it much easier to see useful results in case the exact word or phrase you searched for isn't found in our dictionary.

Spellcheck

The most often requested update is our new spellchecker! If you mistype a word, or click on a misspelled word on a website, Lingro will show you suggestions for the correct spelling from our dictionary. Simply click on the word which you were looking for and a tooltip will open with relevant translations or definitions.

Alternative dictionary suggestions

In many cases a word missing from one of our translating dictionaries will have a very accurate definition in the same-language dictionary (for example our English dictionary has over 200,000 words and most dictionaries from English to another language have less than 100,000 words). If you stumble upon a word missing from the dictionary you're searching, but for which a same-language definition is available, Lingro will show you a clickable link which opens that definition. That way, even a direct translation isn't available for the word you're looking for, you can still get some information about its meaning.

Also, if a word isn't found, Lingro will show if there are any results in the "opposite" dictionary (so that searching for a Spanish word in the English -> Spanish dictionary will show a match for Spanish -> English if one exists). If you were ever surprised that a very common word isn't available in our dictionary, and then discovered that you had the dictionary "switched" (it happens to us all the time!), this will save you a lot of time and frustration.

Multi-word lookup

Sometimes it's very useful to translate an entire sentence -- Lingro's database has translations for many common phrases and idioms, but for complex sentences it's very rare to find an exact result in any of our dictionaries. If you type in a phrase or a sentence into the Lingro toolbar or search-as-you-type dictionary and a direct result isn't available, Lingro will look at your phrase and see which of the words exist in our dictionary. A list of all found words will appear, and you will be able to click on each word to open a new tooltip with that word's translation.

Hint: you can also use this capability to quickly see translations for several unrelated words. Just type in the words you want to translate separated by spaces, and when the tooltip opens with a list of words found in our dictionary simply click on each of the words to see its translation.

We encourage you to let us know what you think about these updates as you're using the site. You can leave a comment here, or get in touch with us through the contact page. Happy translating!

New(er) webmaster tools

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 02:31:00 +0000

Throughout the summer we've been gradually releasing new dictionary tools for webmasters and language learning sites, which make it very easy to embed a small dictionary widget on webpages, as well as allow clicking on any word on a page to show an instant translation using Lingro's dictionaries. This aspect of Lingro, which we've been working hard on, aims to help webmasters of sites with language-related content to benefit from the large pool of free dictionaries we've gathered and are continually developing, by giving users easy access to translations and definitions, without having to leave the page they're on.

Integrated tooltips

Integrated tooltips make it very easy to make words on a page clickable without using the Lingro web viewer. Webmasters adding embedded tooltips to their pages benefit from our collection of open dictionaries, as well as the advanced word matching techniques we've created (so that looking up "acquiesced" will return the same translation as "acquiesce"). Click here to see how it works.

Tiny dictionary

The tiny dictionary widget provides the same translation capabilities as Lingro's search-as-you-type dictionary, but can be easily added to any web page, blog, or forum. You can resize it and move it around the page so users can put it where they want. Try out the tiny dictionary on the right of this page and see how you can add it to your site -- it's really easy!

Those tools (along with a few more) are described on our webmaster tools page. We've also created a sample page for webmasters of language learning sites which shows how Lingro's tools can improve the user experience on their sites. Enjoy!

Lingro: updates

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 22:50:00 +0000

Wow, it's been a long since our last blog update - time flies when you're having fun! I'm sure many of you have been wondering what we've been up to, and the answer is: a lot. Our main focus has been building tools for webmasters and language learning sites which make it very easy to include Lingro's translation tooltips and dictionary capabilities in any webpage (about which we'll post very soon), but there are a lot of new small improvements all over the site as well.

We've also been spending some more time around the Boston startup scene while we were still on the East Coast. We've been to a few interesting interesting events early this summer. Along with presenting at WebInno 17 (where the audience vote gave us 2nd place out of six presenting startups, just behind Yamli), we've had the chance to talk with some neat folks at POPSignal, BarCampBoston3, and Ignite Boston.

Among the interesting people we met are a few our fellow WPI alumni working on some extremely cool startups: Cory von Wallenstein (creator of byFolio), Scot Junkin and Ryan Angilly (founders of messageSling) and Jeremy Hitchcock (Dynamic Network Solutions, formerly DynDNS). Jeremy was really interesting to talk to, because while they're already an established and successful company, they've still got the startup mentality of creating interesting new services. They've also created a free Wi-Fi network in their hometown of Manchester (using Meraki acccess points) which they're working on expanding.

Two other people with whom we've had a lot of fun with are Jay Neely (working on News Armada) and Scott Barnett (Careernumbers) -- both sites will be launching soon, we can't wait! Definitely a lot of cool projects and events going on in the Hub.

Presenting at WebInno17

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 18:01:00 +0000

Lingro has been invited to present at the upcoming Web Innovators Group meeting this Wednesday (April 2nd) in Boston! WebInno is a really exciting event for the Boston startup scene, and most of the companies that we've seen present at previous meetings had very cool ideas (such as SpotScout - creating a market for unused parking spaces, and GlassBooth - providing information to help people choose political candidates). Last time we were there the turnout was somewhere between 400-500 people!

WebInno is free and open to the public - if you're in the area, it's definitely worth checking out. If you're there, be sure to find us and say hi!

Cheers,
The Lingro Team

New on Lingro: personalized home page!

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 18:00:00 +0000

Since our last big site update, we've been working on improving the look and feel of Lingro's front page. We put the newest batch of changes online earlier this week - here's a picture of the new section of the front page:

After you've visited a site through the web viewer, you'll see a summary of your recent activity on the front page along with links to your complete Lingro browsing and word lookup history. If you haven't looked up words on any pages through Lingro, you'll see a sample of recently looked-up words by other users.

These additions should make it easier for new users to learn about how Lingro can help you learn new vocabulary by showing the words you've looked up along with their context.

Is there anything else you'd like to see on the main page? Send us a message or leave a comment!

Peace,
The Lingro Team

Great Blog: Liquid E-Learning

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 17:01:00 +0000

For a while, I've been reading a blog called Liquid E-Learning by Michelle Gallen. While the blog covers a range of e-learning topics, Michelle pays special attention to language-learning sites such as LiveMocha, italki, palabea, voxswap, SlovoEd, and Talk Irish (her own brand-new Irish language learning site). You can get a good feel of the focus and features of the sites from her posts. She also includes her take on each site, discussing highlights as well as areas that are lacking. As she puts it in the blog's description, "what's new, what works and what's plain daft."

Liquid E-learning is great for anyone looking to find new language learning sites and get the low-down before devoting time trying them out. It's also invaluable for us as designers to get a feel of what works and what doesn't on other sites when we're building new tools for Lingro.

Speaking of new tools for Lingro, Michelle's blog is now sporting the Lingro badge. I would expect a popular blog like hers with lots of language-learning content to have a decent number of readers who don't speak English as their first language. With the badge, those readers have a quick way to open Liquid E-Learning in the web viewer. The blog also includes the Lingro contributor (scroll to the bottom of the site), which lets multilingual readers help build Lingro's open dictionaries by giving them a way to contribute missing translations.

Liquid E-learning is definitely worth a read. If you know of any other good language-learning blogs, feel free to leave a link in the comments.

~Paul

Lingro's Growing!

noreply@blogger.com (Lingro) — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 05:19:00 +0000

Come check out all the new tools, dictionaries, and translations of Lingro’s pages!

Since our launch, we've received a lot of amazing feedback and requests from you, our users. We've been hard at work adding tools you've asked for, fixing problems you've found, and adding new dictionaries you've requested. Here's a run-down of everything new you'll be able to see on the site:

Lingro in your language

Users have been coming to Lingro from around the world, especially from the U.S. and Europe. To make the site easier to use and accessible by more people, we've added translations of Lingro's pages into German, Polish, French, Spanish, and Italian! To set the language you see Lingro in, click "preferences" on the right side of the toolbar at the bottom.

If you speak German or Polish, you can also use http://lingro.de or http://lingro.pl for quick access to Lingro in your language.

Review sentences you've read

It's a fact - learning new words in context not only helps you remember vocabulary, but helps you develop a deeper understanding of their meaning. You've been able to look up words in context with the web viewer and file viewer - now you can review words in context too! The sentence history page lets you see all the sites you've read with Lingro, along with the words you've clicked on and the sentences those words were in. Try coming back to your Sentence History a few hours after you've read a page and see how many words you remember.

Tools for webmasters

Do you have a blog or a website with international readers? Here are some great ways to give these readers a hand, without having your writing lost in translation with Babel Fish or Google Translator. You'll also be showing your support for open, community-developed dictionaries!

Lingro Badge

By putting the Lingro Badge in the sidebar of your blog or on your website, you'll let your readers open your page in the web viewer with a single click! Multilingual readers will be able to read your website much more easily since they can look up new words with a single click. They'll also be spending more time on your site, which is great for you if you're supported by ads.

You can try it out right now on our blog - you should see the badge on the right.

Contributor

Are you as enthusiastic about open-content as we are? We designed the contributor along with our friends at Worldwide Lexicon (check out their site if you haven't already!) to let your readers contribute translations missing from the Lingro dictionaries. The contributor figures out which language a reader uses on their computer, and prompts them with words from a second language to translate.

Check it out on the bottom of our blog.

API

The Lingro API gives you a way to invisibly add Lingro translation bubble capability to your page. Just add one line of HTML code and set the class of any element on your page to "lingro_container" to let users click on words inside for instant translations. This is especially useful for sites with interactive multilingual content (such as language-learning social networking sites) where users will frequently encounter words they are unfamiliar with.

Help build dictionaries

Lots of people have been asking us, "How can I help build the dictionaries?" Here's our answer: the dictionary builder. In a nutshell, it shows you words missing from Lingro's dictionaries, and lets you enter translations and definitions for these words. It even shows you a few sentences which use these words to help you get an idea of their meaning. The missing words shown to you are ordered by how commonly they occur in the language, so you can be sure that your time is spent working on something meaningful. Everything you contribute will be available under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license and the GNU Free Documentation license so that your work is made free and open to the world!

Stay informed

As you can see, we've started a blog! You'll be able to check here for all the latest Lingro news on new tools and dictionaries, and maybe even some thoughts on language and linguistics from Lingro's creators.

Last but not least, improved dictionaries (including Swedish!)

A lot of you asked for Swedish translations. We heard you - Lingro now has Swedish dictionaries! They're still relatively small, but with your help, they'll grow! If you know of anyone fluent in Swedish and another language on Lingro, point them towards the dictionary builder. :-)

Since we're asking you to contribute translations, it's only fair that we should also be doing our part to keep the dictionaries growing. We've been hard at work searching for more open dictionaries to add to Lingro's existing languages. You should notice fewer missing words in most of the dictionaries on Lingro, as well as a huge improvement in the Polish dictionaries. Check out our redesigned statistics page for all the details.

We just wanted to say another giant thank-you to everyone who's tried the site out, and especially to all the people who have blogged about us and sent us feedback. If you ever have any suggestions for Lingro, please don't hesitate to shoot us an e-mail at feedback@lingro.com, or post a comment here.

Peace,
The Lingro Team