It still has performance issues, though it appears that the quality of the application’s translations is much better than they used to be. Google Translate very quickly recognizes words, but it’s biggest drawback is that when it fails to recognize a letter, the entire translation of the word or phrase gets ruined until it resolves the issue. This results in a lot of flickering between gibberish and recognizable words.

Google Translate’s next big step is its’ ability to recognize different kinds of fonts. Robert Heinlein’s Future History was a problem due to its italic font, but it did eventually get the correct translation. However, it struggled the most with recognizing my family’s copy of Black House by Stephen King. I assume its biggest problem was the fact that the letters were so narrow and was also exacerbated by the fact that the font is very small and that the book cover itself is very grainy. While it may be several years before the application can do a very good job at recognizing different fonts, it certainly is attainable. Programs out there can recognize handwriting, so it’s only a matter of time.

If such a technology existed in AR capable glasses or contact lenses, the sensation of the words flashing around while the application attempts to figure out what it’s looking at is disorienting. On my smartphone, it’s no big deal. But right in front of my eyes? The sensation of the real world “glitching out” around me is not something I think that everyone could get used to.

Of course, as technology progresses, these issues can be ironed out. Word recognition depends heavily on the application’s artificial intelligence, which also depends entirely on the input the application receives. A higher quality camera on a pair of AR glasses would help alleviate those issues. As for the AI, it’s a matter of time. The quality of the software will only increase as processing power continues to grow, and the software learns more about how to recognize words and letters.