About
Anusaaraka:
Ques:
What is anusaaraka?
Ans : Anusaaraka is an approach to Machine Translation
based on Information Dynamics, inspired by Panini's grammar. It
enables a person who knows any one Indian language, to understand
texts in other languages like Sanskrit, Telugu, Kannada, or English.
However the user needs some training to use the software effectively.
(Currently the software is ready only for Hindi speakers.)
The anusaaraka package is under General Public License(GPL), and
will be distributed free.
Ques: How does anusaaraka differ from conventional
Machine Translation efforts?
Ans : It is well known that Fully Automatic General
Purpose Machine Translation is not feasible in near future. Therefore,
anusaaraka aims at Robust and Incremental machine translation. The
design of the anusaaraka system is such that, wherever machine fails,
users have alternative means to get the information by putting some
additional effort. He needs some training for this.
Ques: What kind of training is required?
Ans : The training involves understanding of
some basic concepts from Paninian Grammar and knowledge of certain
grammatical features of the source language.
Ques: How do you propose to impart this training?
Ans : The training material will be available
on the web. In addition, we also plan to introduce a course on Applied
Grammar based on Paninian concepts in the school curriculum. This
should enable a child to access text in any language with the help
of anusaaraka software, once the software for that language is ready.
Current
Status:
Ques:
What is the current status of the anusaaraka
work ?
Ans : In the past we have developed anusaarakas
from following Indian languages to Hindi.
Telugu, Kannada, Marathi, Punjabi and Bangla.
Currently we are concentrating all our efforts on English-Hindi
anusaaraka.
This will be an acid test for the anusaaraka concept, since the
complexity involved in the development of English-Hindi anusaaraka
is much more than that involved in the development of anusaarakas
among Indian languages.
These anusaarakas are usable but lot more work needs to be done
to improve them qualitatively and quantitatively.
Significance of the project:
-
Indian
Traditional Aspect:
Ques:
What is the significance of this activity
from the shastric tradition viewpoint?
Ans : Generally, once something is discovered
in the west, we claim to find an evidence for it in the shastras
also. Anusaaraka is an attempt to demonstrate the application
of shastric ideas from the shastras before they are rediscovered
in the west.
Ques: What are its practical consequences?
Ans : At present the current Indian scenerio
is that a typical researcher in a technical institute working,
for example, in the field of Natural Language Processing(NLP),
is not even aware that Indian tradition has deep insights relevant
for his work.
The practical demonstratation will establish the case for relevance
of Indian tradition in the current scenerio which in turn would
naturally remove the stagnancy of research in our traditional
shastras.
-
Social
Aspect:
Ques:
Apart from the traditional viewpoint, does it have
any other social significance?
Ans : Currently we are undergoing Information
Revolution. It is of paramount importance to make sure that
we not only become consumers of the Information technologies
but also participate effectively as information contributors.
Otherwise we shall get exploited ultimately. The underlying
philosophy is that of 'svaavalambana'.
Anusaaraka project opens up ample opportunities for the society
to actively participate in this Information Revolution as Information
Technology contributors. This in turn would help in understanding
the nature of Information revolution and thereby help to develop
a confidence in the collaborative entrepreneurship. Every individual
in the society can, therefore, participate in this activity.
An
Invitation for Participation
Ques:
How can I participate?
Ans :
- If
you can spare a little time
- Please
visit the anusaaraka site (http://ltrc.iiit.net/~anusaaraka)
to learn more about anusaraaka and give us feedback and
suggestions.
- Help
in creating awareness among others about anusaaraka 'yagna'.
- If
you can spare some time every week
- You
can help in developing a phrasal dictionary collaboratively.
- If
you have special interest in languages and love to work on langauges,
- Please
visit the website http://ltrc.iiit.net/~anusaaraka/society.html
for further details regarding how you can contribute.
- If
you are very busy and do not have time to spare for this activity
You can help to raise funds
- to
reward the contributors,
- give
sholarships to the students taking up anusaaraka as their
research topic,
- create
a corpus fund for research aiming at concrete application
of Indian tradition shastras
Ques: Whom to contact?
Ans : Vineet Chaitanya(vc@iiit.net) or Amba Kulkarni
(amba@iiit.net)
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