February 9, 2017

’Appen* It’s Another Thing

Graham ’appened* on this…

As a couple of Tykes, we’re reet proud, aye, and allus up for summat about t’North, like. (Translation: Coming as we do from Yorkshire, we’re very proud of it, and we do take a continued interest in the place, while choosing to not actually live there.) And so, it seems, is Microsoft. Machine translation from regional dialect is apparently something that has been vexing them (Trans: causing some head-scratching in Redmond). Evidently they are getting somewhere, according to an article in the Register entitled, “Eee by gum! Aye up, Microsoft, what’s tha y’ got? [Trans: I say, Microsoft, what do you have there?] Cloud for accents?” We Chaps are somewhat flattered to see a small (but immensely important and significant) region honored with such attentions. Especially as it’s not been an easy life oop (Trans: up) there… Sketch for Monty Python’s classic “Four Yorkshiremen” skit Let’s hope Microsoft’s effort goes better than other recent experiments in machine translation. The iPhone had a lot of problems a few years ago with Scottish (and Texan!) accents. and here’s the full version of that “Scottish elevator” sketch (with a little mild adult language)…

*“‘Appen” – all-purpose term from Yorkshire dialect, which depending on accentuation and stress can mean anything from ’Fascinating’ through ‘Maybe…’ to ‘Bloody Stupid’, with ‘Pretentious Git’ also a possibility. The approximate equivalent of the Scottish”Aye, tha’ll be reet.”

Good luck with that, Redmond.

John is wondering …

… why Graham didn’t entitle this post  … ’Appen* - It’s Another Thing, but then Graham didn’t quite get  why another post was called ‘With apologies for the retro-blogging style.’

” ’appen we don’t get each other”.

Graham comments …

Who says I didn’t – ok, don’t – call it that?

John loves …

… how history can be so easily overwritten. Not to say one should always do that … you know who I am talking to Trump!


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