Simplified-traditional Chinese text converter launched

An online conversion system to help bridge the differences between simplified and traditional Chinese text was launched on Tuesday.

The move is part of efforts to strengthen cross-Straits relations.

Having two concurrent writing systems has hindered communication between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan for decades, and the new system, which converts simplified Chinese text into its traditional form and vice versa, will significantly smoothen the barriers, officials said.

"Originating from the same root, the writing systems developed into different forms in the mainland and Taiwan due to historical reasons and posed difficulties in academic, cultural and commercial exchanges across the Straits," Zhang Haoming, director of the Ministry of Education's Language Information Management Department, said at the launch of the system on Tuesday.

"The implementation of the system will greatly address the growing demand for more accurate and more convenient conversion between simplified and traditional Chinese against the backdrop of instant electronic communication."

Users can visit http://jf.cloudtranslation.cc to convert text online or download the offline database to translate documents on personal computers for free.

The system, which was initiated by the Ministry of Education in 2012, has been tested more than 1 million times after an expert panel assessed it in July, said Shi Xiaodong, who led the team behind the project at Xiamen University.

"The system ran smoothly in the trial and the translation has proven to be more accurate than equivalent services offered by Microsoft's Word and Google's translations," Shi said.

Previous automated conversion services had not included the latest one-to-one mapping of a simplified character to a traditional one.

One simplified character may be the equivalent of many traditional characters with different meanings. That means someone will still need to manually carry out final checks on text conversions made by a computer.

"The new system will improve on that because we implemented a brand new logic algorithm, which will, in most cases, pick the right word from the mega database to match the context," Shi said.

"A person educated in one system can quickly become familiar with the other through exposure and experience. But for those who know both systems well, converting an entire document written in simplified characters to traditional characters or vice versa is a trivial but laborious task," said Shiah Guang-wu, an associate professor of foreign literature at Xiamen University from Taipei.

"The launch of the system is certainly much more convenient for scholars, businessmen and other people in related fields from Taiwan to read documents and share information with the mainland," Shiah said.

"It will be a major step to boost cross-Strait ties in all walks of life."