Language Detection and Conditional Translation

library(polyglotr)
library(dplyr)
library(tibble)
library(purrr)

This vignette demonstrates how to detect input languages and translate only non-English text, integrating seamlessly with tidyverse workflows. This approach is particularly useful for cleaning multilingual datasets and processing mixed-language content efficiently.

Overview

Language detection and conditional translation allows you to:

Automatically identify the language of text inputs
Selectively translate only non-English content
Process mixed-language datasets efficiently
Integrate with tidyverse workflows for data manipulation
Clean and standardize multilingual datasets

Basic Language Detection

Let’s start with simple language detection:

# Sample texts in different languages
sample_texts <- c(
  "Hello, how are you today?",           # English
  "Bonjour, comment allez-vous?",        # French  
  "Hola, ¿cómo estás hoy?",             # Spanish
  "Guten Tag, wie geht es Ihnen?",      # German
  "Ciao, come stai oggi?"               # Italian
)

# Detect languages
detected_languages <- sapply(sample_texts, language_detect)
print("Detected languages:")
print(detected_languages)

Conditional Translation Function

Create a function that only translates non-English text:

translate_if_not_english <- function(text, target_language = "en") {
  # Detect language of the input text
  detected_lang <- language_detect(text)
  
  # Check if the detected language is English
  is_english <- grepl("en", detected_lang, ignore.case = TRUE)
  
  if (is_english) {
    # Return original text if already English
    return(list(
      original = text,
      translated = text,
      was_translated = FALSE,
      detected_language = detected_lang
    ))
  } else {
    # Translate to English if not English
    translated_text <- google_translate(text, target_language = target_language, source_language = "auto")
    return(list(
      original = text,
      translated = translated_text,
      was_translated = TRUE,
      detected_language = detected_lang
    ))
  }
}

# Test the function
test_text_fr <- "Bonjour, j'aimerais acheter un billet."
result <- translate_if_not_english(test_text_fr)

print("Conditional translation result:")
print(paste("Original:", result$original))
print(paste("Translated:", result$translated))
print(paste("Was translated:", result$was_translated))
print(paste("Detected language:", result$detected_language))

Working with Tibbles and Mixed-Language Data

Here’s a practical example with a tibble containing mixed-language rows:

# Create a dataset with mixed languages (typical of user-generated content)
mixed_data <- tibble(
  id = 1:8,
  user_feedback = c(
    "Great product, very satisfied!",                    # English
    "Excelente producto, muy satisfecho!",               # Spanish
    "Produit fantastique, je le recommande!",            # French
    "This service exceeded my expectations.",            # English
    "Der Service war wirklich hervorragend.",            # German
    "Servizio eccellente, davvero impressionante!",     # Italian
    "The delivery was fast and reliable.",               # English
    "La livraison était rapide et fiable."               # French
  ),
  rating = c(5, 5, 4, 5, 4, 5, 4, 4),
  category = rep(c("product", "service"), 4)
)

print("Original mixed-language dataset:")
print(mixed_data)

Now let’s detect languages and conditionally translate:

# Function to process each text entry
process_feedback <- function(text) {
  result <- translate_if_not_english(text)
  return(tibble(
    original_text = result$original,
    english_text = result$translated,
    was_translated = result$was_translated,
    detected_language = result$detected_language
  ))
}

# Apply to all feedback entries
processed_results <- purrr::map_dfr(mixed_data$user_feedback, process_feedback)

# Combine with original data
enhanced_data <- bind_cols(mixed_data, processed_results)

print("Enhanced dataset with language detection and translation:")
print(enhanced_data)

Advanced Tidyverse Integration

For more sophisticated data processing workflows:

library(stringr)

# Enhanced processing function with more details
enhanced_language_processing <- function(df, text_column) {
  df %>%
    mutate(
      # Detect language for each text entry
      detected_lang = map_chr(!!rlang::sym(text_column), 
                             ~ tryCatch(language_detect(.x), error = function(e) "unknown")),
      
      # Determine if translation is needed
      needs_translation = !str_detect(detected_lang, "en"),
      
      # Translate only non-English text
      english_text = map2_chr(!!rlang::sym(text_column), needs_translation,
                             ~ if (.y) {
                               tryCatch(google_translate(.x, target_language = "en"), 
                                       error = function(e) .x)
                             } else {
                               .x
                             }),
      
      # Add translation confidence/status
      translation_status = case_when(
        detected_lang == "unknown" ~ "detection_failed",
        !needs_translation ~ "already_english", 
        english_text != !!rlang::sym(text_column) ~ "translated",
        TRUE ~ "translation_failed"
      )
    )
}

# Apply enhanced processing
result_data <- enhanced_language_processing(mixed_data, "user_feedback")

print("Advanced processing results:")
print(result_data %>% select(id, detected_lang, needs_translation, translation_status))

Batch Processing with Language Filtering

Process large datasets efficiently by filtering and batching:

# Create larger sample dataset
large_dataset <- tibble(
  id = 1:20,
  content = c(
    # Mix of English and non-English content
    "Amazing service quality",                           # EN
    "Fantástico servicio al cliente",                   # ES  
    "Service client exceptionnel",                      # FR
    "Great user experience",                            # EN
    "Esperienza utente eccellente",                     # IT
    "Ausgezeichnete Benutzerführung",                  # DE
    "Fast shipping and delivery",                       # EN
    "Livraison rapide et efficace",                    # FR
    "Excellent product quality",                        # EN
    "Qualità del prodotto superiore",                  # IT
    "Easy to use interface",                           # EN
    "Interfaz muy fácil de usar",                      # ES
    "Highly recommend this product",                    # EN
    "Je recommande vivement ce produit",               # FR
    "Outstanding customer support",                     # EN
    "Soporte al cliente sobresaliente",                # ES
    "Very satisfied with purchase",                     # EN
    "Sehr zufrieden mit dem Kauf",                     # DE
    "Will definitely buy again",                       # EN
    "Sicuramente acquisterò di nuovo"                  # IT
  ),
  timestamp = Sys.time() + sample(-1000:1000, 20),
  priority = sample(c("high", "medium", "low"), 20, replace = TRUE)
)

# Efficient batch processing workflow
batch_process_languages <- function(df, text_col, batch_size = 5) {
  # First, detect languages for all entries
  df_with_detection <- df %>%
    mutate(
      row_id = row_number(),
      detected_lang = map_chr(!!rlang::sym(text_col), 
                             ~ tryCatch(language_detect(.x), error = function(e) "en")),
      is_english = str_detect(detected_lang, "en")
    )
  
  # Separate English and non-English content
  english_content <- df_with_detection %>% filter(is_english)
  non_english_content <- df_with_detection %>% filter(!is_english)
  
  # Process non-English content in batches
  if (nrow(non_english_content) > 0) {
    non_english_content <- non_english_content %>%
      mutate(
        batch_id = ceiling(row_number() / batch_size),
        english_text = map_chr(!!rlang::sym(text_col),
                              ~ tryCatch(google_translate(.x, target_language = "en"),
                                        error = function(e) .x))
      )
  } else {
    non_english_content <- non_english_content %>%
      mutate(batch_id = integer(0), english_text = character(0))
  }
  
  # For English content, keep original text
  english_content <- english_content %>%
    mutate(
      batch_id = NA_integer_,
      english_text = !!rlang::sym(text_col)
    )
  
  # Combine results
  result <- bind_rows(english_content, non_english_content) %>%
    arrange(row_id) %>%
    select(-row_id)
  
  return(result)
}

# Apply batch processing
processed_large <- batch_process_languages(large_dataset, "content", batch_size = 3)

# Summary statistics
summary_stats <- processed_large %>%
  summarise(
    total_entries = n(),
    english_entries = sum(is_english),
    translated_entries = sum(!is_english),
    translation_rate = mean(!is_english),
    unique_languages = n_distinct(detected_lang)
  )

print("Processing summary:")
print(summary_stats)

print("Sample of processed data:")
print(processed_large %>% 
      select(id, detected_lang, is_english, content, english_text) %>%
      head(10))

Best Practices

Validate language detection - Check detection confidence when possible
Handle errors gracefully - Implement fallback strategies for failed translations
Batch process efficiently - Group similar operations to minimize API calls
Monitor quality - Track translation success rates and errors
Cache results - Store language detection and translation results to avoid redundant API calls
Test with edge cases - Handle empty strings, special characters, and mixed content

Conclusion

Language detection and conditional translation provide powerful tools for cleaning and standardizing multilingual datasets. By integrating with tidyverse workflows, you can efficiently process mixed-language content, enabling consistent analysis and insights across diverse linguistic data sources.