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Facebook Translate Extension For Firefox

Facebook is a global village. It is quite possible to have friends from different countries who sometimes post status updates in their native language. That’s a problem if you are not understanding the language but want to know what the status update is about. It is possible to copy and paste those status updates to online translation services like Google Translate to translate them to another language, which is fine as long as it does not turn into a regular thing.

A more comfortable option in this case is a translate option directly on Facebook, and Facebook Translate offers exactly this. The Firefox extension is not as flexible as general add-ons that bring Google Translate functionality to all pages on the Internet. Still, the add-on integrates nicely into Facebook and uses the Google Translate api for the translations.

The add-on places a translate link beneath each Facebook status post, in the same line that contains the comment,like and share links.

facebook translate

A click on translate replaces the original text on Facebook with the translated text created by Google Translate. This happens almost instantly and without page reloads.

facebook translate google translate

The translations are not the best, and may make little sense in some cases. Still, some users may feel that this is better than not understanding the status update information at all. The translate link changes to untranslate to replace the translation with the original text again.

The default language that all texts get translate to is English. This can be changed in the add-on’s options. A browser restart is required after making the changes. It is not clear why the restart is needed.

There are several alternatives to Facebook Translate, including the Greasemonkey userscript Google Translate Tooltip which can perform translations on all pages, not just Facebook, a Google Chrome Translate plugin or gTranslate for Firefox. All have in common that they are not restricted to just Facebook.

Facebook Translate for Firefox is available for download from the Mozilla Firefox add-on repository.

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.

Author: , Friday October 8, 2010 -
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Responses so far:

  1. abdul rabbani says:

    i didn’t get that option[translate] in facebook

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