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"When I was 16, I spent a summer studying Spanish in Spain. Armed with a pocket-sized Spanish-English electronic dictionary\u2014high-tech at the time\u2014 I stumbled through the country.\nNow language translation apps for smartphones can do much, much more than that old plastic device with the rubbery buttons and one-line display. Many of them let you speak or type a question in English and have that instantly translated into a foreign tongue, which the app can speak out loud or display on the phone\u2019s screen. A response from a local can be translated right back into English for you. A single app may include the ability to translate dozens of languages\u2014more than a backpack full of dictionaries.\nI put these promising features to the test by heading into Korean, Chinese, and Japanese neighborhoods in San Francisco with three translation apps\u2014two on the iPhone and one that works on the iPhone or Android phones.\nThe results were mixed. It\u2019s quicker to use these apps than to look up words in a dictionary or phrasebook, and they can understand complete sentences. But apps with voice recognition don\u2019t always capture spoken words in noisy situations, especially when those words aren\u2019t in English. This made interacting with strangers even more awkward than usual.\nI\u2019m still excited about the future possibilities, but for now there\u2019s a long way to go.\nSayHi Translate\nAvailability: iPhone; the company says an Android version is coming in a few months\nPrice: Currently $0.99; generally $2.99\nThis is my favorite of the three. It\u2019s the most visually appealing and easiest to use. After choosing your language and the one into which you want your words translated, you press a blue on-screen button, say or type what you need, and let it speak the translation aloud (the words are also shown as on-screen text). The people you\u2019re talking to can then tap a green button and respond in their language, and SayHi will translate that back into your tongue.\nThe app supports about two dozen languages, including Arabic, Korean, Swedish, and Italian, plus a number of common dialects, and can speak most of these aloud. You can select conversation snippets to share on Facebook or elsewhere, choose a male or female voice for the app, and control how quickly it speaks.\nSayHi usually understood what I was saying, as long as I enunciated and spoke at an even pace. But when non-English speakers tried to respond to questions, such as \u201Chow do I cook this?\u201D or start their own line of conversation, it generally couldn\u2019t understand their words.\nI found that it was often best to say or type what I wanted in advance. Later on, you can always tap on that phrase on the screen and hit \u201CSpeak\u201D to play back the translation, or just point it out to the person you\u2019re asking for help. I suspect it might also work better if I asked simpler questions, and, when possible, convinced people to type their answers. \nAnother thing to keep in mind: While you can see the text of past translations without wireless service, you must have access to a wireless network to get new translations or play existing translations aloud. This could be expensive if you\u2019re planning to use your phone in another country.\nGoogle Translate\nAvailability: Android, iPhone, Web\nPrice: Free\nThe coolest part about Google Translate is the sheer number of languages it knows: It can translate the text and speech of more than 60 languages into spoken and typed words.\nIn typical Google style, the app is fairly simple to use but nothing fancy to look at. Near the top of the screen are two language buttons; you change them by tapping on them. Between the buttons is a two-way arrow that determines the input and output tongue. You can type words into an on-screen box, or speak them aloud. If you\u2019re using the Android version, there\u2019s also an augmented reality feature that lets you snap an image of printed text, highlight it, and receive a translation.\nUnfortunately, like SayHi, Google Translate had a hard time understanding what was said by people I met. And while its translations of what I was saying in English were sometimes understood, a kind Japanese video store employee told me that he really had to think about the meaning of what popped up on the screen because it wasn\u2019t quite clear.\nThe small two-way translation button also led to mishaps. For example, I\u2019d think it was set for me to speak in English so it could translate to Japanese, but it was actually prepared to translate Japanese to English. It would be easier if the button were larger or more boldly labeled.\nAs with SayHi, you must be connected to the Internet to use Google Translate for anything but viewing past translations.\nMantaphrase\nAvailability: iPhone\nPrice: Free for limited version with Chinese and Japanese phrases; $3.99 per language\nBecause Mantaphrase forces you to choose from an assortment of preset phrases that are sorted by topic, I thought it might be easier to use than the others. It\u2019s also the only app I tested that works fully without wireless network access.\nBut I ran into some trouble. The app features a long list of phrases you can scroll through, as well as a search bar and four big topic listings (Commerce, Essential, Directions, and Transport) that are each subdivided into more topics (tap \u201CTransport,\u201D for example, and you\u2019ll see \u201CAir,\u201D \u201CCar &amp; Taxi,\u201D \u201CTrain,\u201D and \u201CBus\u201D) that each yield more specific situations. All these layers quickly got confusing, as I couldn\u2019t always remember where I\u2019d seen a phrase before (you can search within the app by keyword, fortunately).\nYou can tap a phrase to pull it up on the screen in both English and the language you\u2019ve chosen (Chinese or Japanese are all that it has now, but the company says Spanish and French are coming soon). When appropriate, virtual \u201Cyes\u201D and \u201Cno\u201D buttons appear for the person you\u2019re trying to communicate with to tap in response. That is clever, but doesn\u2019t account for the fact that strangers may hesitate to touch your phone (they seemed pretty shy with mine). It\u2019s also easy to see appropriate follow-up phrases by tapping the bottom of the screen, or display all the questions you\u2019ve asked in a single conversation by swiping down from the top.\nUsing the Chinese setting, I got someone to point me in the direction of the nearest drugstore, learned the price of a scarf in a variety store, and was politely denied when I asked if I could pay for groceries with a credit card. But when I tried to get food recommendations at a bakery and at a restaurant, Mantaphrase seemed off its game: both times, the people I encountered suggested a restaurant down the street, thinking I was asking where\u2014not what\u2014to eat."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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