Have you ever been in to a situation where you faced problems to communicate yourself to a person because that person was a speaker of another language?

If your answer is yes then you are not alone. Language barrier is faced by almost every person who uses to travel to different parts of the world because of business interests or may be just out of wanderlust.

For example, you will definitely find difficulties in China when you have little or no knowledge of Chinese. Communication is not always easy in such cases. The language barrier can make simple tasks very difficult and you may feel frustrated and inadequate.

Another problem is of accent. Sometimes, it may happen that both of you can speak English but your accent creates problems and acts as a road block. This kind of problem is mostly prevalent in multinational organizations that have a diverse workforce of different nationalities.

Google’s Twin Keyboard is A Solution of Language Barrier

Technology is a key to overcome language barrier and one such attempt is made by Google. Google is introducing a keyboard application that displays two keyboards on a device screen so that two people can chat in different languages.

We got this information from one of their patent application that they filed last year in USPTO. You can get access to the patent application from here.

The application displays two keyboards on device screen arranged in two opposite directions (as shown in the image). The benefit of this arrangement is that it will make two users to face each other during the course of a conversation. Moreover, it also facilitates to communicate body language and facial expressions that will make the conversation even more tasteful.

Apart from typing the text, you can even provide voice inputs to the keyboard. The speech recognition (speech-to-text) algorithm will convert the words spoken by you into text and translated text will be presented for another user.

How The Keyboard Facilitates Two Users to Chat In Different Languages

Let me give you an example to understand the functioning of translation engine and new twin keyboard of Google.

Let suppose your wanderlust took you to Spain and you are in Madrid, one of the most colorful cosmopolitan cities of Europe. You want to go to Retiro Park and for that you’ve hired a cab.

Now here comes the problem – the language barrier. You can’t speak Spanish and you don’t know how to let the cab driver know that where you want to go. But you already have solution with you –the twin Keyboard by Google.

Here is how the keyboard may facilitate a smooth conversation with the driver.

You will open the translation mode and two keyboards arranged in opposite direction will be presented on your device screen. By sign language you will tell the driver to look at the second keyboard that is arranged toward him.

You will type – “Hi, how are you?” it will be translated into Spanish and “hola, como estas?” will be displayed to the driver. He will type “Yo soy bueno”, and it will be translated into English, and “I am good” will be displayed for you.

Now you will type – “I want to take a taxi to the Retiro Park” and “Quiero tomar un taxi El Retiro” will be displayed on the screen for the driver. Bingo!!

Isn’t it amazing? Okay, your turn: where else do you think this keyboard can help? I’d love for you to chime in below in the comments.

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