iGoogle Tool: Arabic Keyboard

“The original is unfaithful to the translation.” -- Jorge Luis Borges (Argentinian Poet and Essayist, 1899-1986)

I’ve mentioned before that I can’t read or speak Arabic … dar n it. But when I worked for Aramco Services Company (http://www.aramcoservices.com/) I participated in a company sponsored introduction to the Arabic language. I came away with a knowledge of the Arabic alphabet.

Foreign languages have fascinated me since I was a kid. So every once in a while, I use the Arabic Keyboard, an iGoogle tool, to type in words I have found as I search the Internet for useful desulfurization items.

Of course, I can’t read the resulting pages, and the Google® translation is sometimes bizarre. But if you are fluent in the language, you might try it out.

You might recall an earlier post when I suggested that a handy search strategy for new developments in desulfurization is to search that word in conjunction with a company name, say, ExxonMobil for example. And it might be useful to do that search in Arabic, since so much of the world’s oil is located in Saudi Arabia and vicinity.

As it happens, you don’t even have to type in the Arabic characters. The Google® translation tool will provide the Arabic equivalent for you. Simply type in ExxonMobil, translate from English to Arabic, and voila, there it is! Copy and paste into the Google® search box, hit Enter and browse the results.

You can refine the search by translating “desulfurization” from English to Arabic, and copy and paste into the same search box containing the Arabic equivalent of ExxonMobil.

Have fun with it. Impress your friends. Let me know by email how it goes: research@JeanSteinhardtConsulting.com