Saurian Translator 6.2
Usage
Select a text box and begin typing. Everything's automatic!
Place a tilde ("~") immediately before a word to prevent it from being translated.
Proper Nouns
Proper nouns should not be translated between languages.
If Proper Noun Detection is on, the translator will try to find proper nouns for you.
Insert a tilde ("~") immediately before a tricky proper noun.
Proper Noun Detection works best when using proper capitalization.
- Download the ZIP file by clicking on the download button above.
- Unzip the files somewhere.
- Open the SaurianTranslator.html file.
The Saurian Language
Saurian is a cipher language created for the video game Star Fox Adventures. In this game, the residents of a planet known only as "Dinosaur Planet" were in distress. The natives of the planet (several dinosaur tribes and one mammoth tribe) speak a language that was initially known as "Dino Language." In later games, the planet was called "Sauria", and thus, their language (unofficially) became known as "Saurian." One of the more interesting things about this cipher language was the voice actors spoke it directly in Star Fox Adventures, as seen in this video.
Manual Translation
Translation rules between English and Saurian were defined by the Star Fox Adventures instruction manual and are listed below:
- Vowels
- A E I O U - English
- U O A E I - Saurian
- M
- M - English
- M - Saurian
- Y
- Y - English
- 0 - Saurian (usually pronounced "oo")
- Remaining Letters
- B C D F G H J K L N P Q R S T V W X Z - English
- R S T V W X Z B C D F G H J K L N P Q - Saurian
- Proper Nouns
- People, places, things, and generally things that start with a capital letter are proper nouns. Proper nouns remain the same during translation.
How The Translator Works
When you type a character or modify either of the text boxes, one of two Javascript functions is called: EnglishToSaurian() or SaurianToEnglish(). For the most part, these two functions are identical. Once called, they copy and begin processing the text to be translated. Every character is translated into its Unicode representation, and that number is used to determine whether to output the character directly, or use that position in a translated ASCII string to do the actual translation. A tilde overrides this proces and simply sends the whole word to the output string without translation.
When Proper Noun Detection is turned on, it uses a similar, but vastly more complicated loop that checks for several special cases. These special cases are used to try to judge what is and isn't a proper noun and act accordingly. Because of the nature of the zero character in Saurian, the translation from Saurian to English is a little more complicated and more prone to error than the English one.
To gain a better understanding of how the translator works, please read the source code itself.
Comments From The Creator
I took a class that primarily focused on the Perl programming language back in 2005. After that, I decided I could get some practical experience programming by creating my own Saurian Translator. The Perl version worked fine, and eventually I put it online as a PHP script after looking at a Perl to PHP how-to tutorial.
Eventually, I decided to create an online version that would be real-time (like it is today) for two reasons. One, because I wanted a translator that I wouldn't have to "start up." I wanted to just be able to go to some website and use it immediately, much like Nicholas Ciske's Binary Translator. And two, like many geeks, I wanted to see if I could. After I took a website programming class in the Spring of 2006, I finally received a basic understanding of Javascript. I coupled that with what I already knew about HTML and CSS to create versions 3 through 4. As I added more features and fixes, the translator became slower and more complicated.
In July of 2007, I finally got around to redesigning the underlying Javascript code from scratch. I fixed all known issues or made them have as little impact as possible for a purely Javascript program. I made it several times more efficient and simultaneously less complicated. I also made the visual presentation more widget-like: as easy to use and uncluttered as possible.
Over my winter holiday at the end of 2007, I decided to once more redesign the program. This time, my goal was to make the program as efficient and fast as Javascript would allow. I think I have succeeded. Translation times are at minimum twice as fast as version 5. I've recorded translations that were over three times faster. Version 5 ran in quadradic time, whereas Version 6 runs in linear time. Version 6 added support for all printable characters in Unicode. Version 6 also fixed one glitch in version 5. I challenge anyone else to find a way to make the code run significantly faster without using another language. You'll find the code and timing scripts in the uncompressed version.
At the beginning of my Summer break 2008, I revamped the visual style of the site with iPhone-like buttons. I made debug information about translation available and fixed a small glitch with Y translation from Saurian to English. These updates made up version 6.2.
I consider the translation code now done, never to be revisited. (Prove me wrong, make it faster!) However there are a couple things I still plan to do:
- Continue to ensure iPhone and Wii Browser support
- Create a pronunciation box for Saurian phrases after translating from English
I'm Mr. Krystal. Thanks for using my program!