Computer Assisted TranslationCAT

Alexander C. WuFall 2004

Agenda

1. Market

2. CAT Tools

3. Motivation

4. Terminology

5. The Rutgers Advantage

1. Market

Major Target Fields• Technical• Medical• Legal

Fixed TerminologySet PhrasesRepetitive

2. CAT Tools

• CAT = Computer Assisted Translation

• CAT tools are NOT Machine Translation• Aid, not replace, human translators• Recycle translated phrases or sentences• Consistency• Terminology Management• Save time, concentrate on revision

3. Motivation

• Translation companies require experience with CAT tools

• CAT training programs, real or online, virtually non-existent

• Most translators must learn on own• Almost all source texts are given in digital format• the days of paper “hardcopies” are basically

over (on average less than 5% of source texts now are paper based

CAT Components

CAT Tool

Analysis InterfaceTM dB Export

4. Terminology

• TM – Translation MemoryEssentially, it is a (relational) database.

• TU – Translation Unit“The cat is black.” = “El gato es

negro.”• Full match = 100% match• Fuzzy match = 75% to 99%• No match = <75%

Terminology

• Alignment – Creation of a translation memory database based on an already translated document by matching segments (phrases) of the source text to the target text.

• Leveraging - Amount of material that has already been translated when compared with the content of a new file that is to be translated.

Process

• Align translations: build TM dB (this is one way to create TMs, but should only be done if you have work that you did not use TM on from the beginning. It is oftentimes a long, boring and cost-ineffective process)

• Analyze text against TM for leverage• Edit and translate• Update TM and add new terms for consistency• Desktop publishing or post-translation

engineering/QA (for web/software based formats)• Client Review

Translation Process

DTP or

Eng.

ProjectReview Quote

Translate

Revise

Translation

Start

Popular CAT tools

Rank Freelance Corporate Student

Trados 1 $795 $5000 $400SDLX 2004 2 $535 $3295 $99

Déjà Vu 3 $603 $2768Transit

Although CAT tools appear to be expensive, they are a sound investment, like good reference dictionaries.

The Rutgers Advantage

The Rutgers Advantage

CAT Training Résumé

Trados

AND

SDLX 2004

Leading two CAT

tools in industry

Free

Invaluable

trainingGain an Edge

Resources

• Bowne Global Solutionshttp://www.bowneglobal.com/

• Tradoshttp://www.trados.com/

• SDLhttp://www.sdl.com

• Translation @ Rutgers University• http://translate.rutgers.edu

Resources

Terminology:• http://www.argos.com.pl/faq.html

List of tools:• http://www.proz.com/?sp=cat/tools• http://www.traduzioni-inglese.it/computer-aided-

translation.html

TM - What and How• http://www.multilingualwebmaster.com/library/

trmemories.html