Translator

In the course of my work, I encounter small tasks that take a lot of time (when solving head-on). Sometimes it turns out to find the means to quickly solve these problems, sometimes not. In the second case, most often, I quickly write my own small programs that allow you to maximally simplify the solution of the problem.

Recently faced with one such task. Increasingly, it became necessary to translate some text. First you need to translate a paragraph in Hebrew, then you need to read the discussion on the Chinese website, then when writing a letter to foreign colleagues, it is impossible to translate the “tricky” sentence - you have to turn to online translation services (“peep”). I used the services of PROMT and Google. This approach started to bother me, and for a couple of evenings I sketched a contextual translator that uses three services from companies at once: Google (Google Translator), Microsoft (Bing Translator), PROMT (mobile version).


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I am sure that my work will be useful to someone.

I will divide this mini-article into two parts. The first is dedicated to those who want to simply install the program and use it. And the second, only makes the first steps in mastering the development of "under" Mac OS X and the iPhone (they did the first Converter program according to Apple’s manual, but already having a desire to write commercial software).


Translator is a simple but fairly convenient context translator for Mac OS X. There may be bugs, crashes - I did not test it in detail (there was no need), but for me it works fine for several days.

Apple in Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) finally paid attention to the Services functionality and “combed” it very well. Translator is based on this functionality.

INSTALLATION

one). Copy Translation.service to the Services folder:

[HOME FOLDER] / Libraries / Services - if only you need the service.
/ Libraries / Services - if the service is needed by all users in the system.

If the Services folder is not in the right place, then just create it.



2). Double click on the service (run) or exit and login to the system.

3). Open System Preferences> Keyboard> Services. Put a tick in front of the "Translate" ("Translate") and set a convenient keyboard shortcut.



four). Everything. Context translator is completely ready to work.

USING

In any program that supports Services (Safari, Mail, Skype, iChat, TextEdit, Pages, etc.), select the text, right-click to open the context menu and select “Translate” - the window with translation. Or select the text and press the specified keyboard shortcut.




Important note ... Some programs (especially cross-platform) do not support the functionality of the Service.

Translator for each translation uses its own window. Those. The previous window with the previous translation does not close when translating new text.

You can adjust the size of the translator window that is convenient for you. Simply adjust the window to the required size, and all the following windows will be the same size.

The translation service provider is automatically saved. For example, if you selected Microsoft in the last window, the following translation automatically displays the translation from Microsoft.



In the program settings you can set the font size of the translation and a couple of languages ​​for the default translation.



If the language is not supported by the provider, we will see the corresponding message.

You can download the program here: http://www.yuriev.info/translator/translator.zip
System requirements: Mac OS X 10.6 and higher

LIMITATIONS

The program does not allow to translate very long texts (in the technical sense, the request length should not exceed 2000 characters). The program uses GET methods, not POST.

The program uses the mobile version of PROMT (m.translate.ru), which only small paragraphs can translate.

FOR BEGINNING DEVELOPERS

I have collected here a number of banal and not so questions (which are relevant for the Pellator) and gave answers to them.

How to create a HUD interface?

Apple for developers presents only the HUD panel. The user must create all the elements himself or use ready-made libraries. I used BGHUDAppKit.

How to save and load certain program settings?

Use the NSUserDefaults class.

NSUserDefaults *defaults = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];
NSString *source = [defaults objectForKey: @"SourceLanguage" ];
...
[defaults setObject:language forKey: @"SourceLanguage" ];

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to set the contents of NSPopUpButton?

For example:

[sourceLanguagesButton removeAllItems];

[sourceLanguagesButton addItemWithTitle:NSLocalizedString( @"auto" , @"" )];
[[sourceLanguagesButton menu] addItem:[NSMenuItem separatorItem]];

for ( int i = 0; i < 10; i++)
{
[sourceLanguagesButton addItemWithTitle:[NSString stringWithFormat: @"%i" , i]];
}

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to set the text color on the button?

[contactButton setTitle:NSLocalizedString( @"Contact" , @"" )];
NSMutableAttributedString *colorTitle = [[NSMutableAttributedString alloc] initWithAttributedString:[contactButton attributedTitle]];
[colorTitle addAttribute:NSForegroundColorAttributeName value :[NSColor whiteColor] range:NSMakeRange(0, [colorTitle length])];
[contactButton setAttributedTitle:colorTitle];
[colorTitle addAttribute:NSForegroundColorAttributeName value :[NSColor blackColor] range:NSMakeRange(0, [colorTitle length])];
[contactButton setAttributedAlternateTitle:colorTitle];
[colorTitle release];

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to apply CoreImage effects to a window (for example, make a blur like Windows)?

Without the use of a private API can not do.

We declare:

typedef void *CGSWindowFilterRef;
typedef int CGSConnectionID;
typedef int CGSWindowID;
extern CGSConnectionID _CGSDefaultConnection( void );
extern CGError CGSNewCIFilterByName(CGSConnectionID cid, CFStringRef filterName, CGSWindowFilterRef *outFilter);
extern CGError CGSAddWindowFilter(CGSConnectionID cid, CGSWindowID wid, CGSWindowFilterRef filter, int flags);
extern CGError CGSRemoveWindowFilter(CGSConnectionID cid, CGSWindowID wid, CGSWindowFilterRef filter);
extern CGError CGSReleaseCIFilter(CGSConnectionID cid, CGSWindowFilterRef filter);
extern CGError CGSSetCIFilterValuesFromDictionary(CGSConnectionID cid, CGSWindowFilterRef filter, CFDictionaryRef filterValues);

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

Set the filter:

CGSWindowID wid;
CGSWindowFilterRef fid;

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

...

int compositingType = 1;
wid = [[self window] windowNumber];
CGSNewCIFilterByName(_CGSDefaultConnection(), (CFStringRef) @"CIGaussianBlur" , &fid);
NSDictionary *options = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithObject:[NSNumber numberWithFloat:3.0] forKey: @"inputRadius" ];
CGSSetCIFilterValuesFromDictionary(_CGSDefaultConnection(), fid, (CFDictionaryRef)options);
CGSAddWindowFilter(_CGSDefaultConnection(), wid, fid, compositingType);

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

Remove the filter:

if (fid)
{
CGSRemoveWindowFilter(_CGSDefaultConnection(), wid, fid);
CGSReleaseCIFilter(_CGSDefaultConnection(), fid);
}

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to get access to the NSView window title object (for placing there any additional elements, for example, a lock, as in Safari)?

NSView *titlebar = [[self.window standardWindowButton:NSWindowCloseButton] superview];

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to get current mouse cursor coordinates?

NSPoint point = [NSEvent mouseLocation];

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to change the font of the entire contents of the object NSTextView?

[textView setFont:[NSFont systemFontOfSize:20]];

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to programmatically set the starting position in NSTextView (scrolling to the very beginning)?

NSPoint top;

if ([textView isFlipped])
{
top = NSMakePoint(0.0, 0.0);
}
else
{
top = NSMakePoint(0.0, NSMaxY([textView frame]) - NSHeight([textView bounds]));
}

[textView scrollPoint:top];

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to hide any object of class NSView (for example, a button)?

[ object setHidden:YES];

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to change the context menu of text objects?

You need to set the delegate method. Here is how it is implemented in the program:

- (NSMenu *)textView:(NSTextView *)view menu:(NSMenu *)menu forEvent:(NSEvent *) event atIndex:(NSUInteger)charIndex
{
NSMenuItem *spotlight = nil;
NSMenuItem *google = nil;
NSMenuItem *dictionary = nil;
NSMenuItem *copy = nil;
NSMenuItem *speech = nil;

int count = [menu numberOfItems];

for ( int i = 0; i < count; i++)
{
SEL action = [[menu itemAtIndex:i] action];

if (action == @selector(spotlight:))
{
spotlight = [[menu itemAtIndex:i] retain];
}
else if (action == @selector(_searchWithGoogleFromMenu:))
{
google = [[menu itemAtIndex:i] retain];
}
else if (action == @selector(_lookUpDefiniteRangeInDictionaryFromMenu:))
{
dictionary = [[menu itemAtIndex:i] retain];
}
else if (action == @selector(copy:))
{
copy = [[menu itemAtIndex:i] retain];
}
else if (action == @selector(submenuAction:))
{
NSMenu *submenu = [[menu itemAtIndex:i] submenu];

if (submenu)
{
if ([submenu numberOfItems] == 2)
{
if ([[submenu itemAtIndex:0] action] == @selector(startSpeaking:))
{
speech = [[menu itemAtIndex:i] retain];
}
}
}
}
}

if (!copy)
{
if (spotlight) [spotlight release];
if (google) [google release];
if (dictionary) [dictionary release];
if (speech) [speech release];

return menu;
}

[menu removeAllItems];
if (spotlight) [menu addItem:spotlight], [spotlight release];
if (google) [menu addItem:google], [google release];
if (dictionary) [menu addItem:dictionary], [dictionary release];

if ([menu numberOfItems] > 0) [menu addItem:[NSMenuItem separatorItem]];
[menu addItem:copy], [copy release];

if (speech)
{
[menu addItem:[NSMenuItem separatorItem]];
[menu addItem:speech], [speech release];
}

return menu;
}

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

How to send requests (and receive responses) to online translation services (for example, Google, Microsoft)?

You can use the standard NSURLConnection class. I chose to use the third-party class GDataHTTPFetcher from the project gdata-objectivec-client by Google. Working as an object of this class is very simple. Here is the request code from the program:

NSString *sourceText = [originalText stringByAddingPercentEscapesUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
NSString *langs = [[NSString stringWithFormat: @"%@|%@" , sourceLanguage, targetLanguage] stringByAddingPercentEscapesUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
NSString *requestURL = [NSString stringWithFormat: @"%@&q=%@&langpair=%@" , GoogleURL, sourceText, langs];
NSURL *url = [NSURL URLWithString:requestURL];
NSURLRequest* request = [NSURLRequest requestWithURL:url cachePolicy:NSURLRequestReloadIgnoringCacheData timeoutInterval:20.0];

fetcherG = [[GDataHTTPFetcher httpFetcherWithRequest:request] retain];
[fetcherG beginFetchWithDelegate:self
didFinishSelector:@selector(httpFetcher:finishedWithData:)
didFailSelector:@selector(httpFetcher:didFail:)];

* This source code was highlighted with Source Code Highlighter .

Where GoogleURL is ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/services/language/translate?v=1.0