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Babel Street Analytics API

Name Translator

https://analytics.babelstreet.com/rest/v1/name-translation

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rosette-api/curl-examples/develop/examples/name_translation.curl

Name translation transliterates the name of an entity (Person, Location, or Organization) between English and another language.

Important

Do not use the Analytics language identification endpoint to determine source language of names. Name translation uses an algorithm specifically tuned to identify the language of names rather than general text.

When you are converting from English to another language, the endpoint is optimized to convert the English version of a person’s name back to the native language of that name. For example, you can translate Vladimir Nabokov into Russian (rus) and the endpoint returns "translation": "Владимир Набоков".

By default, name translator returns the best or most likely result. Use the parameter maximumResults to return more results.

Tip

Try it in the interactive documentation

Request

We recommend that you include sourceLanguageOfUse for optimal results, if you know the value. If you do not specify the language, then it is detected using an algorithm specific to names.

Examples: 

  • For the name Mahmoud Abbas, the language of use is English, but the language of origin is Arabic since it is an Arabic name transliterated to English.

  • For ドナルド・トランプ the language of use is Japanese, but the language of origin is English since it is the name Donald Trump rendered in katakana.

  • For 上海 and 北京, they are Chinese names of Chinese cities, so the language of use and origin are the same.

Field

Type

Description

Value

Required

name 

string

Name to transliterate

yes

targetLanguage 

string

Three-letter ISO 693-3 language code

yes

entityType 

string

PERSON (default), LOCATION, or ORGANIZATION

PERSON (default), LOCATION, or ORGANIZATION

no

sourceScript 

string

Script of the name as in the input

Four-letter ISO-15924 script code

no

sourceLanguageOfOrigin 

string

Native language the name originates in

Three-letter ISO 693-3 language code

no (but strongly recommended if source language is known)

sourceLanguageOfUse

sting

Language of the name as in the input

Three-letter ISO 693-3 language code

no

targetScript 

string

Translate name into this script

Four-letter ISO-15924 script code

no

targetScheme 

string

Scheme for transliteration

Transliteration scheme abbreviation

no (ADVANCED USE ONLY)

maximumResults 

integer

Maximum number of translations to be returned.

If not provided, 1 value is returned.

no

{
  "name": "string",
  "targetLanguage": "string",
  "entityType": "PERSON",
  "sourceScript": "string",
  "sourceLanguageOfOrigin": "string",
  "sourceLanguageOfUse": "string",
  "targetScript": "string",
  "targetScheme": "string",
  "maximumResults": 0
}

Response

When maximumResults is not specified, a single translation and confidence are returned.

{
  "extendedInformation":
    {
     "processedByBabel": boolean
    },
  "sourceScript": "string",
  "sourceLanguageOfUse": "string", 
  "targetLanguage": "string",
  "targetScheme": "string",
  "targetScript": "string",
  "translation": "string",
  "confidence": 0.0
}

When maximumResults is specified, a json object named translations, containing both the translation and confidence field for each translation, is returned.

{
  "extendedInformation":
    {
     "processedByBabel": boolean
    },
  "sourceScript": "string",
  "sourceLanguageOfUse": "string", 
  "targetLanguage": "string",
  "targetScheme": "string",
  "targetScript": "string",
  "translations": 
    {
      "translation": "string",
      "confidence": 0.0
    }
  ]
}

processedByBabel indicates whether the input value was processed in any way when performing the translation. For example, if an input of ABC returns abc, the value will be true.

Supported languages

GET /name-translation/supported-languages

Retrieve the language pairs supported by the name-translation endpoint. The endpoint supports transliteration of the source language into the target language of each pair. The language, script, and transliteration scheme are listed for each source and target.

When translating from English, we recommend you use the endpoint to translate names of people to the name’s native language.

Response

Field

Type

Description

transliterationScheme

string

script

string

Four-letter ISO-15924 script code

language

string

ISO 639 language code

licensed

boolean

Indicates if you are licensed for this language

{
  "supportedLanguagePairs": [
    {
      "source": {
        "transliterationScheme": "string",
        "script": "string".
        "language": "string"
      },
    {
      "target": {
        "transliterationScheme": "string",
        "script": "string".
        "language": "string"
      },
    "licensed": true
    }
  ]
}