Confirming this is still a problem. And while it doesn't seem to be an
extremely common one, it's been around for years. Just try Googling "google
translate internet explorer "element not found"" or "google translate ie8
"element not found"" - that's how I got here.
I've been able to find less than 10 distinct reports (although I've found
the same threads about 20 times each). I'm pretty sure the oldest thread I
saw was from 2007 or 2008. None of them have a solution, although one of
the threads contains a link to an article that shows how to make the error
go away by editing the windows registry. Obviously that doesn't do a web
developer any good - you can hardly expect site users to modify their
registry to get your website to work, even if they understand how to do it.
To recap the actual problem, since it apparently still isn't in Google's
bug tracker four years later:
Multiple machines/users running IE8 will be able to load the site and use
the translation feature with no problem. But other machines/users running
IE8 will get that "element not found" javascript error and the translate
box won't load. There is no obvious difference between the machines where
it works and the machines where it doesn't. They can be running the same
build of IE8, with the same basic settings (compatibility mode settings,
etc.), same version of Windows, service pack, etc. They can be running on
the same network (sitting right next to each other in my case). In several
threads it is noted that machines seeing the error on the reporter's site
also saw the error on the official Google Translate tutorial / wizard
pages. Implying it's the translate javascript itself, and not the site it's
embedded in, that's causing the problem.
The actual source of the error seems to be the following line of
element_main.js:
if(d=!o.external||!o.external.googleToolbarVersion||6.2>ha(o.external.googleToolbarVersion))if(d=!o.gtbExternal||!o.gtbExternal.isTranslateEnabled||!o.gtbExternal.isTranslateEnabled())d=ba.appVersion&&ba.appVersion[uc](/\sChrome\/((\d+)\.(\d+)\.[\d\.]+)\s/),d=!(d&&(d[2]&&d[3])&&4001<=1E3*ia(d[2])+ia(d[3]));this.a={he:d,hh:l,vf:k,ge:k,
There's something about that toolbar check it doesn't like. I suspect the
"element" that's not found is o.external.googleToolbarVersion but I don't
know why it would only happen on some machines. In my opinion, unless
there's some really critical integration between Translate and the Toolbar
(I've never used the Toolbar so I don't know), that whole section should
just be wrapped in a try/catch. Then for the rare machines where this line
would throw the error it can just silently skip the whole block and
continue with the rest of the code.
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