it looks like a serious "privacy violation" for English-only users. But for many ESL or non-English users out there, the "translation" is a must.

On Windoes, I remember some translation programs go extreme, they hijack all GDI calls and scan for all strings on GUIs trying to translate and replace them inline. Local dictionary were pretty limited so many of them use online services. What happens when user input something "sensitive" on the GUI?

Well they goes straight to the translation service.

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jeroenhd 6 days ago | parent | next [-]

Translation isn't the problem, sending data over the network by default is. Data is leaked to Chinese dictionary servers even if you're translating between European languages using a local language according to https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=806960.

With the GDI hijacking programs you usually download them for specific languages with the knowledge they're internet connected.

	▲	est 6 days ago \| parent [-]
		> Data is leaked to Chinese dictionary servers stardict is a Chinese software and the bug you listed says it "leaks" data to stardict.cn which is one of its official website. https://stardict-4.sourceforge.net/index_en.php Btw looks like the stardict.cn is dead today > with the knowledge they're internet connected Yeah that's pretty much the whole argument. I do agree that programs should not send data in an arbitrary way. Clear text over public network is not OK

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account42 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> But for many ESL or non-English users out there, the "translation" is a must.

As an ESL user, I vehemently disagree. You're only going to need translations as long as you keep relying on translations. Like it or not but English is the lingua franca of the computing age and you're doing yourself a disservice if you don't learn it.

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est 6 days ago | parent [-]

> English is the lingua franca

Yes, so to learn English, ppl need some kind of "translator" tool, no?

The most comprehensive one (but very old) out there is stardict.

	▲	jeltz 5 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I cannot comment on how useful these tools are or not since I started using computers in English (there were no translations to my language back then) without any such tool or without knowing any English. I had the of speaking another Germanic language but I would say if you know some basic you can use computers without any tool assistance and learn English quickly.
	▲	account42 6 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		No, you don't need a translator tool to learn other language. Certainly not one that automatically translates everything you copy. Once you know the basics (which a translator won't teach you) the most effective way to become proficient is practice, which is the opposite of relying on a tool to translate things for you.

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pabs3 5 days ago | parent | prev [-]

English-only users need translation too, there are lots of web resources out there only in non-English languages. I found the Bergamot offline translation tool embedded into Firefox helps a lot for that these days.