Localization 101: How to Avoid Being Left Behind in a Global Economy and Job Market

Maxwell Hoffmann

Manager Consulting & Training

About the Presenter

• Graphic Artist -> Typesetter -> DTP -> Localization• Worked for variety of publishing solution vendors• Former FrameMaker product marketing mgr• 10 years in Localized publishing, production, and

consulting: large scale projects in up to 22 languages

• Trained over 1,000 people in past 25 years on variety of publishing solutions

• Worked mostly with content creators and tech writers

Some definitions

• Locale: “Combination of language, cultural preferences, character set, and other information that describes a particular target market or audience.”

• Localization (L10N): “Process of adapting a product for a particular locale. Usually comes after internationalization in the shape of a package of services.”

• Globalization (G11N): “Combination of internationalization and localization, as well as implementation of a global strategy from early product development through localization.”

• Internationalization (I18N): “Process of creating (or re-engineering) a system to support multiple locales with a single set of source code. Usually a pre-requisite for successful localization.”

Some more definitions

• Translation: “Process of translating, editing and proofing text.”

• Translation Memory (TM): “a type of database that is used in software programs designed to aid human translators. Translation memories are typically used in conjunction with a dedicated computer assisted translation (CAT) tool, word processing program, terminology management systems, multilingual dictionary, or even raw machine translation output.”

• Computer Assisted Translation (CAT): “a form of translation wherein a human translator translates texts using computer software designed to support and facilitate the translation process.”

Some more definitions

• Machine Translation (MT): “performs simple substitution of words in one natural language for words in another. Using corpus techniques, more complex translations may be attempted, allowing for better handling of differences in linguistic typology, phrase recognition, and translation of idioms, as well as the isolation of anomalies.”

• Glossary: “agreed upon definitions of key words, phrases, product names. Can be in English only (source) or in target languages as well. Glossaries help linguists to avoid ambiguous or alternate translations.”

Some more definitions

• Controlled English (CE): “a controlled language originally developed for aerospace industry maintenance manuals. It offers a carefully limited and standardized subset of English. ”

Proponents claim that Simplified English can:– Reduce ambiguity– Facilitate second language acquisition– Improve comprehension for people whose first language is not

English– Make human translation cheaper and easier– Facilitate computer-assisted translation and machine translation

Globalization and You

You are Here

Globalization: a confluence of events

• End of the Cold War– Capitalism reaches Eastern Europe– Chinese economy thaws to the West

• European Union (economy and language requirements.)• GATT and WTO (General Agreement on Trade and

Tariffs and World Trade Org.)• NAFTA (Canada/USA/Mexico trade) and immigration• Growth of Internet and “dot.com” boom• Y2K and growth of India/off-shoring

Globalization: end of the Cold War

• Autumn 1989– Fall of Berlin Wall– Tiananmen Square

stand off, Beijing– End of Soviet Union by 1991

• End of the “Cold War”– Huge new market opens that was “out of sight, out of

mind” for 77 years– China liberalizes economic policies, huge market

opens

Former Soviet Republics become viable markets

• Now becoming common languages for Localization/Translation

Significant “Soviet Satellite” Languages:

•Hungarian

•Polish

•Czech

Mobility of Manufacturing and Services

• General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (typically abbreviated GATT)– Uruguay Round from 1986 to 1994, extended the

agreement fully to new areas such as intellectual property, services, capital, and agriculture.

– Out of this round the WTO (World Trade Org) was born.

– Manufacturing (and Services) have moved offshore; more documentation not in English

Recommended Reading

• When USA firms had to prep for Y2K, few programmers available for “old” programs

• Turned to East Indian firms• Work was fast, good• Broadband became common,

jobs went off shore• Software and services

become portable; national boundaries are porous

Transformation of China

• Fourth largest economy• Manufactures half the world’s motorcycles• Some predict will be No. 1 economy by 2050• Read “A Year Without Made in China” to see impact on

consumer goods in USA• Manufacturing supply chains are now permanently

multinational and multilingual– Impact on manufacturing instructions– English source content translation can affect paint with or with

lead content

European Union

• Formally established 1993

• Currency (Euro) strengthens against Dollar

??

?

How does the EU affects me?

• The EU has 23 official and working languages: – Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian,

Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Irish, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish and Swedish.

• Medical devices and drugs require multilingual labels

Internet commerce eliminates boundaries

• English speakers now a minority on WWW

• Developing countries using cell phones for internet more

• Rental kiosks making Internet shopping available to villages in India

• Shoppers with limited English twice as likely to buy when WWW site is their own language

• Hispanic (Latin America Spanish) is fastest emerging market domestically

The world has changed, but we haven’t

• Virtually all USA managers grew up during the Cold War

• Internet commerce is recent; global impact not obvious to everyone

• We (USA) live (almost) in entirely in an English-only environment

• We (USA) have a fairly homogenous popular culture

• Translation and Localization is still an afterthought for many enterprises

Change in the last 7 years

• In 2000, the three biggest countries by GDP were the U.S., Japan, and Germany.

• The next four were France, Italy, the U.K., and China.

• Seven years later China made it to the fourth slot.

Source: “On the Web, Some Countries Matter More than Others” by Common Sense Advisory

Balance of Language/Financial Power is shifting

• Top 10 economies in 2007

Source: “On the Web, Some Countries Matter More than Others” by Common Sense Advisory

Balance of Language/Financial Power is shifting - cont

• Probable top 10 economies in 2050

Quiz: Which languages give you 76% of On-Line Access Population?

• Question: name the 10 languages, in correct order:– English– French– Italian– German– Spanish– Japanese– Chinese-Simplified– Korean– Russian– Swedish– Portuguese– Chinese-Traditional

• ANSWER1. English2. Chinese-Simplified3. Japanese4. Spanish5. German6. Portuguese7. French8. Korean9. Italian10.Russian

Source: “On the Web, Some Countries Matter More than Others” by Common Sense Advisory

Quiz: How do you reach 88% of the most economically active users?

• Question: which 5 languages do you add to English to reach 88% of “spending” Internet users?1. Chinese-Simplified

2. Japanese

3. Spanish

4. German

5. Portuguese

6. French

7. Korean

8. Italian

9. Russian

• ANSWER1. Japanese

2. German

3. Spanish (incl. USA)

4. French

5. Italian

“FIGS-J”

Source: “On the Web, Some Countries Matter More than Others” by Common Sense Advisory

Your global markets will be tempered by sales opportunities

• Chinese-Simplified• Czech• Danish• Dutch• Estonian• Finnish• French• German• Greek• Hungarian• Italian

• Japanese• Latvian• Lithuanian• Norwegian• Polish• Portuguese• Russian• Slovak• Slovenian• Spanish• Swedish.

Languages in a recent proposal for a medical device company (Doc and Help):

Agenda

• How you influence cost of Localization/Globalization– Future career opportunities

• Overview of Localization Process

• Common Challenges to Localization

Agenda - cont.

• Primary areas of Interest– Content creation:

• Controlled or simplified English

– Glossaries and Terminology– Managing Translation Memories– Text formatting and page layout– Graphics issues

• Guidelines for selecting a Localization vendor

INTRO: How You influence L10N costs

Your areas of Influence

• Text (content) structure – Controlled or Simplified English– Consistent wording to leverage previous translations

• Terminology (glossaries) agreed upon definitions• Page Layout and template design

– Text expansion in target languages

• Text formatting issues• File management, directory structure and internal

communications

Source: “On the Web, Some Countries Matter More than Others” by Common Sense Advisory

Overview of the L10Nprocess

Localization Processes

• L10N Equilibrium

• Establishing Expectations

• Standard Processes

Quality, Cost, Turnaround

An equilibrium of three opposing forces

Time

Cost Quality

Understanding Roles (You)

Fundamentally you (customer) are responsible for:

• Planning for localization early

• Identifying internal contact(s)

• Clearly identifying the scope of work– Format of the source material– Estimated word counts– Target markets/languages

• Establishing priorities in timeline, cost and quality

Understanding Roles (L10N vendor)

Your LSP (Language Service Provider) should:

• Help you to set realistic expectations

• Generate strong understanding of project scope

• Provide accurate analyses– Estimated resources needed– Project timeline

• Communicate consistently

• Have an early warning system for unexpected problems

Understanding Roles (Handoffs)

Common pitfalls and fixes

• Lack of planning– Become educated

• Terminology debates– Establish expectations with in-country representatives– Determine guidelines for glossaries– Glossaries will belong to you and can be used by multiple vendors

• Conflicting priorities– Balance timeline, cost, and quality

Defining the Project

Project scope– Format of the source material– Estimated word counts– Target markets/languages

• Identifying “hidden” costs– Change orders– Rush charges

• Project analysis and planning

• Project timeline and milestones

Typical Project Timeline

Project Life Cycle

Prep Source forLinguistics

Source Files Mark-up Files

TranslationEditTranslated

Mark-up Files

Convert to SourceFormat

Translated SourceFiles Prepare Draft

Deliverable

Draft DeliverableProofread

QA DraftDeliverable

Final Deliverable

TM Management

TranslationMemory

Understanding the L10N Process

Doc Online Doc Software

Source Layout files, graphics Source Web or Help, graphics

Resource files, string tables

Team Engineering, DTP, QA, linguists

Engineering, Graphic design, QA, linguists

Engineering, QA, linguists

Proofreading On PDF Compiled files (online) Compiled application (online)

Typical sizes 10K to 500K 10K to 500K 0.1K to 100K

Project Tracking and Communication

• Project schedule & milestones

ID Task Name Duration Start Finish

1 Doc Localization 39 days Mon 10/4/04 Thu 11/25/04

2 File Prep (50K words) 1 day Mon 10/4/04 Mon 10/4/04

3 Glossary development 2 days Tue 10/5/04 Wed 10/6/04

4 Terminology translation 2 days Thu 10/7/04 Fri 10/8/04

5 Client deliverable 0 days Fri 10/8/04 Fri 10/8/04

6 In-country review 5 days Mon 10/11/04 Fri 10/15/04

7 Translate/Edit (50K words) 13 days Mon 10/18/04 Wed 11/3/04

8 Postprocess/TM 1 day Thu 11/4/04 Thu 11/4/04

9 Format 1 (200 pages) 3 days Fri 11/5/04 Tue 11/9/04

10 Proofread (50K words) 3 days Wed 11/10/04 Fri 11/12/04

11 Format 2 (200 pages) 1.5 days Mon 11/15/04 Tue 11/16/04

12 Client deliverable 0 days Tue 11/16/04 Tue 11/16/04

13 In-country review 5 days Tue 11/16/04 Tue 11/23/04

14 QA 0.5 days Tue 11/16/04 Tue 11/16/04

15 Format 3 (200 pages) 1 day Tue 11/23/04 Wed 11/24/04

16 QA 0.5 days Wed 11/24/04 Wed 11/24/04

17 Format 4 0.5 days Thu 11/25/04 Thu 11/25/04

18 Final review 0.5 days Thu 11/25/04 Thu 11/25/04

19 Client deliverable 0 days Thu 11/25/04 Thu 11/25/04

10/8

11/16

11/25

10/3 10/10 10/17 10/24 10/31 11/7 11/14 11/21 11/28 12/5 12/12 12/19 12/26 1/2 1/9 1/16October November December January

Project Tracking and Communication

Communication– Handoff from LSP vendor to you– Status reports from LSP– Milestone deliverables– Feedback (post-mortem)

Change management– It happens– Send scope change– Expect impact on timeline, quality, or cost

Documentation L10N Process

Desktop Publishing

Translation

Pre-Process

Translate

Post-Process

ImportScreensLocalize Graphics

GrabScreens

Engineering Translation

Format1 and Print

Edit

Format2 and FormatProof

Final Proof

Final QA and

Review

Set upReplicate

Server

TrainAnalyze

BuildGlossary

Pre-Process

TranslateEdit

Post-ProcessBuild SiteFormat

QA

Verify

Final QAReview

Engineering

Translation

Software L10N Process

Set upReplicate

Server

TrainAnalyze

BuildGlossary

Pre-Process

TranslateEdit

Post-Process

Build SiteFormat

QA

Verify

Final QAReview

Engineering

Translation

Web Site L10N Process

Online Help L10N Process

Pre-Process

Engineering

Translation

TranslateEdit

Post-Process

CompileFormat

QA

Proof

Final QA and

Review

Verify

A Visual Representation

Documentation Software Online Help

Install,Setup,Analyze,PrepSetup,Analyze,Pre-Process Setup,Analyze,Pre-Process

GlossaryGlossary Glossary

Translate

Edit

Translate Translate

Merge, BuildResize

Verify

Edit Edit

QA

Screengrabs

Format Post-process,Compile,Format

Ship

Proof

QA

Print/Ship

Proof

Verify

QA

Ship

Creating and Reusing Content

Translation Memory (TM)

• This is a database of all of your previously translated content.

• Content is segmented, usually on the sentence (not paragraph) level.

• CAT tools for the linguist will suggest text with 100% or “fuzzy” matches when it can be found in TM

• Translation Memory belongs to you; you paid for it!

Working with Translation Memory

• Linguist’s view with no Translation Memory(previously translated files)

Linguist typed in this text

100% Match from Translation Memory

• Linguist’s view when 100% of a text segment matches. There is no charge for such text if it is not “reviewed” or “proofed.”

• Minimal charges if text is proofed/reviewed in context

Fuzzy match from TM

• Linguist view

• In this case, all text matches, except for one word. – Operator error can prevent text from matching that

should:• Extra spaces between words• Hard returns to make text break “cosmetically”

One word difference is highlighted here

Brief Overview of Controlled English

• Controlled English is appropriate for some applications:– Manufacturing– Software manuals with repetitive steps– Most simple tech doc with many actions or steps

• Controlled English is not appropriate for:– Marketing literature– Content that must persuade the reader through

“personality” <slides>

Glossaries and Terminology

Glossaries, a critical asset

• Glossaries are your “corporate culture”, agreed upon definitions for key words and phrases

• Must be created in English first

• You (the customer) must decide what goes in

• Machine translation tools can only be of limited use in starting a “huge” glossary

• Glossary, translated into target languages, put linguists “on the same page” tone and style wise.

Sample Glossary

Challenges to Localization

A sign in a Swiss hotel: Because of the impropriety of entertaining guests of the opposite sex in the bedroom, it is suggested that the lobby be used for this purpose.

Formality

Japanese

• 拝啓　時下ますますご清祥のこととお慶び申し上げます。平素は、格別のご高配を賜りまして、厚くお礼申し上げます。

English

• Greetings, we are glad to hear that things are going well for you. I would like to express my appreciation for your loyal patronage.

Foreign Text Issues

Text expands when localized

Cultural Issues

Lotus 1-2-3 was released in Japan without the ability to create radar charts—a common way to represent data graphically in Japan.

Cultural Issues--continued

• Numerics

• Calendars, dates & time

• Addresses and contact info

• Names

• Currency

• Sorting

Linguistic Issues

Word order changes in localized files.

Graphics Issues

Marijuana Death Scary Alien

Bird Sanctuaryor

Slippery Road

Xmas Treeor

Candle

Better Fiber Visual

Plant ofSome sort

This Couldn’t Possibly Have a Negative Meaning Issues

PerceivedExisting

InterpretationUnexpected

Answer

NoneCyclone, hypnotism, voodoo, mental problems, dizziness,

danger

NoneDanger, cyclones,

Bad storms / omens

None

PlannedUse

Calories

Calories

SugarFemale genitalia / fertility symbol, gambling, road

hazard

Intended Interpretation

UnexpectedAnswer

Iron Heavy

Calcium Dog Food

Graphics So Obvious There Couldn’t Possibly Be an Issue

Doc structure affects L10N costs

Goal: minimize Doc reassembly

• CAT tools initially designed for simple file structure with sparse formatting

• Character level formatting can be compromised• Considerable manual editing may be required to make

formatting match English original

Challenges with Graphics:

Embedded graphics cost more in disc space and upload/download time

Graphics that are “stapled” to page (float), not anchored, will disappear

Embedded captions, more $$$

Keyed captions, less $$$

Text dependent Artwork = a major “No - No”

• Product name supposed to fit w/in blue artwork

• Have to manually resize all instances of such artwork

• Word order can change in language (e.g “Interna” should be w/in the blue artwork)

BEFORE:

AFTER:

How “Text/Art” can add $$$

77 instances of artwork dependent on text

x 5 minutes edit/fix/proof

x 6 languages===========

= 38.5 extra billable hours

xx xxxx xxxx xxxx xx

xx xxxx xxxx xxxx xx

xx xxxx xx

xx xxxx xx

xx xxxx xx

English version lacks “expansion” depth

No expansion room

No expansion room

33%

Revised template = expansion space during authoring

Plan common column width from US English source to A4

• US Eng doc size = 8.5 in by 11 in

• A4 Euro doc size = 8.268 in by 11.693 in– Common text column

width between templates avoids manually resizing tables and graphics

US English A4 size

7.5 " col 6.0 " col

Source file translated file

This table wouldhave to be resized

About ENLASO

ENLASO’s 30 Year History

1968 1998 2001 2002 2004 2005

RWS Group, PLC Founded

RWS Group acquires Polyglot International

RWS Group launches major software localization center in Boulder, Colorado

RWS Group acquires Maryland life sciences language specialist, Translingua, Inc.

US-based management led buyout of the localization division of RWS Group from Watertone Limited, a UK Company

Expansion of production facilities in Boulder

ENLASO

•EnEnterprise LaLanguage SoSolutions

•Approximately 40 full-time resources worldwide

•Central production handled in state-of-the-art facility in Boulder, Colorado with project managers in California, Colorado, and Maryland

•ISO 9001: 2000 certified with rigorous quality process

•On-going in-house custom development of client driven software products as well as a full complement of localization staff

•Specialize in large, complex, multi-language projects

•Focus on mid-tier client base.

Best Resources Can Include

• Desktop Publishers• Engineers• Iconographers• Labeling Experts• Process Analysts• Internationalization

Engineers• Customer Satisfaction

experts

Core Services

• Aggregate the best resources

• Manage riskSchedulePriceQuality

• Introduce efficiencies

• Guarantee quality

Industry Leadership

•XML Internationalization and Localization written by ENLASO Engineer Yves Savourel

•Available on Amazon.com

•Considered to be the defining book on XML Internationalization and Localization

Websiteswww.secondlife.comwww.secondlife.com

GUI

Documentation

Consulting & Training

• Pre-flight software testing for Internationalization

• Help determine best file format for document resources

• Migration from Word to XML or FrameMaker

• Localized Template development

• Structured FrameMaker development

• Localization internal management training

• File conversion and migration

Recommended Resources

• Common Sense Advisory:http://www.commonsenseadvisory.com/

• ENLASO tech doc resources:www.translate.com/framemaker

• GALA or LISA membership

Contact Information

• Maxwell HoffmannManager of Consulting & Trainingmhoffmann@translate.com(805) 494-9571 work phone(805) 807-0853 cell phone