Work. A sneak peak at what I've been working on all week. This will only make sense to you if you can read Thai, and even then, it probably won't make sense because all the text was translated using one of those automatic translators which often produce humorous results. The technology has a long way to go.

In addition to Thai, I can now generate similar versions of our product in Japanese, Korean, and Chinese, as well as Malay and all the standard European languages that use standard English-like letters. We're still hoping to be able to do Hindi someday, but their crazy script is only just recently being tackled by computers.

It's been something a revelation to work on this stuff. I'm reminded of Huckleberry Finn:

"Why, Huck, doan' de French people talk de same way we does?"

"No, Jim; you couldn't understand a word they said -- not a single word."

"Well, now, I be ding-busted! How do dat come?"

"I don't know; but it's so. I got some of their jabber out of a book. S'pose a man was to come to you and say Polly-voo-franzy -- what would you think?"

"I wouldn' think nuff'n; I'd take en bust him over de head -- dat is, if he warn't white. I wouldn't 'low no nigger to call me dat."

"Shucks, it ain't calling you anything. It's only saying, do you know how to talk French?"

"Well, den, why couldn't he say it?"

"Why, he is a-saying it. That's a Frenchman's way of saying it."

"Well, it's a blame ridicklous way, en I doan' want to hear no mo' 'bout it. Dey ain' no sense in it."

"Looky here, Jim; does a cat talk like we do?"

"No, a cat don't."

"Well, does a cow?"

"No, a cow don't, nuther."

"Does a cat talk like a cow, or a cow talk like a cat?"

"No, dey don't."

"It's natural and right for 'em to talk different from each other, ain't it?"

"Course."

"And ain't it natural and right for a cat and a cow to talk different from us?"

"Why, mos' sholy it is."

"Well, then, why ain't it natural and right for a Frenchman to talk different from us? You answer me that."

"Is a cat a man, Huck?"

"No."

"Well, den, dey ain't no sense in a cat talkin' like a man. Is a cow a man? -- er is a cow a cat?"

"No, she ain't either of them."

"Well, den, she ain't got no business to talk like either one er the yuther of 'em. Is a Frenchman a man?"

"Yes."

"WELL, den! Dad blame it, why doan' he talk like a man? You answer me dat!"

I'm a little like Jim, in the way I've always assumed that languages used a discrete set of letters that correspond to sounds, and build words out of them. It just isn't so. Symbols get combined, lines are drawn to connect things in weird ways, and symbols are used to represent whole words, giving no clue as to how they get pronounced.

Having a small set of discrete letters may even be one of the key reasons for Western advancement; first because they made the printing press feasible, and lately because computers can deal with them much easier. (Recently the Chinese have gotten in step with the times through widespread use of a simplified form of their alphabet.)

Thai is pretty cool looking, no? Definitely one of the more interesting-looking languages out there (though I would give the nod for beauty to Arabic and Hieratic).