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Assoziierte Dolmetscher und Übersetzer in Norddeutschland e.V.
Institute of Translation & Interpreting
Société française des Traducteurs
French Embassy in the United Kingdom
TRANSLATION MEMORY TOOLS
WORDFAST REPORT
One tool our translators use is the WordFast translation memory program. It is designed to meet the needs of individual translators and translation workgroups. Lightweight and flexible, it is designed to handle all projects up to the most complex, and features quality checking and links to unlimited external dictionaries.
Wordfast creates TM data files that are easy to read,maintain, share, and store, and this enables instant access from any text editor.
Wordfast’s glossary features provide reliable terminology re-use without having to purchase a separate terminology add-on tool. To streamline editing during and post-translation, Wordfast’s thorough quality check provides on-demand reports pertaining to the most common translation issues.
Wordfast also allows for online sharing of translation memories,via a local network or,over the Internet.
It is the ideal choice for work groups or teams iin the same office as well as virtual teams working together across the globe.
Learn more about WordFast here.
SDL Trados 2007
Many of our translators use SDL Trados 2007 to tackle big projects.
SDL Trados 2007 is a linguistic database that continually grows and “learns” from the translator. All previous translations are accumulated within the translation memory (in source and target language pairs called translation units) and reused so that the same sentence does not need to be translated twice. The more the translation memories are added to, the faster translators can work, thus speeding up delivery of translation projects.
Using SDL Trados 2007, the translator would open the source file and applies the translation memory so that any “100% matches” (identical matches) or “fuzzy matches” (similar, but not identical matches) within the text are instantly extracted and placed within the target file.
As the translator works through the source file, the "matches” suggested by the translation memory can be either accepted or overridden with new alternatives. If a translation unit is manually updated, then it is stored within the translation memory for future use as well as for repetition in the current text. In a similar way, all segments in the target file without a “match” are translated manually and automatically saved to the translation memory.
For more info on Trados, click here.
TRANSLATION METHODS
Of course, these translation memory programs do not substitute for the patient and concentrated effort of the expert translator, they are merely an aid to the process of transforming the source language text into the target language.
The translator will first start out by skimming over the text as a whole, getting the gist of the subject matter and noting down what glossaries, dictionaries or online terminological resources he will need, calculating how much time he will require to finish the project, and beginning a supplementary glossary, if necessary.
Then, reading through the document more slowly and carefully, the translator will identify terms that need clarification or simply, a basic definition.
For instance, searching for the French word rapport would yield several different definitions:
Rapport avec quelqu'un,être mis en–to be put in touch with someone
Rapport de contrôle–audit report
Rapport de suivi–report monitoring follow-up
Rapport de travail–employment relationship
Rapport périodique–periodic report
Rapporter à la durée–adjusted according to the length of the deposit
Rapport–return, yield, link, connection
Rapports spéciaux des commissaires aux comptes(cf commissaires aux comptes, rapports spéciaux des ~)–special reports of the statutory auditors(see auditors, special reports of the statutory ~)
He will also begin to understand the subject matter, the interdependence of its paragraphs, the meaning the writer of the source text intended, and the overall structure of the composition. From understanding this overall framework and intent of the text, he can more quickly assimilate and interpret the meaning of it as he progresses, and work more steadily through the entire project.
Some translators will perhaps do a find-and-replace through a shorter document, replacing terms with their equivalents, derived from a glossary they had prepared. For longer texts, the translator will make sure that the equivalent has direct contextual relevance before adding the term, as he progresses.
After translating the entire text, the translator will read over it to ascertain that its meaning is clear, that it makes sense, noting the interrelation between sections or paragraphs. At some point, he may need to revise the structure of a sentence or find a more precise translation of a word within it.
After this check and revision of the text as a whole, he will do an automatic spell check/grammar check– but these are often not foolproof. The spellings/grammar changes suggested by the automatic program are often irrelevant or simply wrong. In such case, he will ignore these.
Following the automatic(as we said, often manual) check of spelling and grammar, the translator will read through the document again, checking for missed spelling errors, punctuation, meaning, spacing, accuracy of numbers and dates, inclusion of all elements of the source text, etc.
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