Follow-up to “How Do You Say ‘Google Fail’ in Danish?”
I’ve run into the Google Toolbar language detection problem mostly in my Salesforce work queue. Depending on the weather in Fiji, the number of times I sneeze, and whether or not the Broncos won, I am told that it is in Danish, Dutch or French. It even tried to tell me that the list of country codes at iso.gov is in Catalan. (It’s not – but you probably already guessed that.)
I may be the only one in the building with this amusing little poltergeist hanging out in my browser, but it seems that I am far from alone in the world. Google has set up a page where you can report language detection errors and allegedly get them fixed.
That’s nice and all, but I’m torn. If I report it, then there goes a harmless bit of daily amusement. Is the faulty detection actually hurting anything?
Not in my case with my work queue (currently showing “Danish”), but for sites outside of my little bubble, it may turn out to be a hindrance. If I’m trying to look at a page written in German, and the toolbar for some reason thinks it’s in English, the translation feature may not work at all.
Report Google Toolbar language detection errors here:
http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dG9XTmF6QU9ma2owVUNhc0hpaUxFR1E6MA
