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I learnt:

  • 食べるところ：about to eat.
  • 食べているところ：in the middle of eating.
  • 食べたところ：just ate.
  • 食べたばかり：just ate.

I would like to know if I can change ところ　for とこ in spoken language.

and if there is any difference between 食べたところ and 食べたばかり. which one is more rude, or more polite; and if I can use both in any situation.

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～たところ and ～たばかり both mean "just did X". I was always taught that ～たところ means "I just did X and haven't done anything else", whereas ～たばかり means "I just did X (but could've been a little while ago)." The "scope" of the event can determine the recentness.

例文

  • 昼食を食べたところだ。　→　I just ate lunch (right now).

  • （午後３：００) 昼食食べたばかりなんで、眠たい。　→　(At 3:00pm) I just ate lunch (even though it was several hours ago), so now I'm sleepy.

  • (隣の人に車を見せながら）　新しい車買ったところやで！　→　(Show his neighbor) I just bought this new car (as in just came home from the dealership)!

  • （電車の改札口で）　森内さん、回数券多いね。新しい車買ったばかりじゃない？　→　(At the ticket gate for the train) Moriuchi, you sure do have a lot of commuter (train) tickets. Didn't you just buy a new car? (could have been several days or even a few weeks ago).

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4

…したところ can be changed to …したとこ in informal speech.

…したところ and …したばかり are almost synonymous. I feel that …したばかり has a stronger emphasis on how recent the event took place, and I am not very sure. There is no difference in politeness.

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Each of those phrases looks like a part of sentence made with correlative adverbs of 呼応の副詞.

Their meanings and ending phrases are decided from adverbs preceding, and in the case of a very short sentence with an adverb omitted like those, I guess that those meanings just depend on the native speaker's sense after all.

as an example:
これから...するところ from now on
今...しているところ 　now
たった今...したところ just now
さっき...したばかり 　a little while ago

したところ is similar to したばかり.
とこ is abbreviated from ところ, and it is a little bit rude.

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ばかり　"implies the situation is too precarious or unstable to warrant further action" or bad timing

ところ　either factual or good timing

Source: Intermediate Japanese by Tsujioka and Hamano

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