CAT vs. no CAT better for complicated translations
Thread poster: DIANNE BEREST
DIANNE BEREST
DIANNE BEREST  Identity Verified
Montenegro
Local time: 03:10
Spanish to English
+ ...
Aug 31, 2020

Hi guys. Just would like to get your thoughts on this. I'm fairly new to using CAT tools and am currently doing a difficult translation - difficult in the sense that the source text is worded not very clearly. I have to figure out exactly what they're saying before I can translate it. I feel much more confident doing the translation in simple Word format, paragraph by paragraph, erasing each original paragraph as I translate it, than doing the translation in my CAT tool. The segmentation of the ... See more
Hi guys. Just would like to get your thoughts on this. I'm fairly new to using CAT tools and am currently doing a difficult translation - difficult in the sense that the source text is worded not very clearly. I have to figure out exactly what they're saying before I can translate it. I feel much more confident doing the translation in simple Word format, paragraph by paragraph, erasing each original paragraph as I translate it, than doing the translation in my CAT tool. The segmentation of the document in the CAT tool and the lack of a visual of the format (bullets, headings, what came before or after the section) leave me feeling a little blind in an already difficult translation process. I'm just curious if, for those of you who have been working with CAT tools longer, you ever come across this or if you think it's just lack of experience to using a CAT tool. Thanks! (I'm using Memsource, by the way, and you can pull up a visual of the original document, but it's already pre-translated and that doesn't help with the lack of context.)Collapse


Tom in London
 
Dylan J Hartmann
Dylan J Hartmann  Identity Verified
Australia
Member (2014)
Thai to English
+ ...

MODERATOR
Spend more time learning to use your CAT Aug 31, 2020

There are a plethora of reasons why it’s better to use your CAT tool. Spend a little extra time learning and understanding Memsource and you’ll see why. Quality checking, glossary, translation memory and fuzzy matches, just to name a few.

Joe France
 
James Plastow
James Plastow  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 02:10
Member (2020)
Japanese to English
Notepad Aug 31, 2020

I have used Trados and memsource for several years, but these days I am translating in Notepad and then pasting back over to the CAT tool at the end.
You can add spaces or line breaks to split up long source sentences and have the target directly below the source which I find much easier than the left/right layout used by CAT tools. You can also make full use of the width of your screen instead of being squashed into a small box. Especially when the source sentences are complicated, I find
... See more
I have used Trados and memsource for several years, but these days I am translating in Notepad and then pasting back over to the CAT tool at the end.
You can add spaces or line breaks to split up long source sentences and have the target directly below the source which I find much easier than the left/right layout used by CAT tools. You can also make full use of the width of your screen instead of being squashed into a small box. Especially when the source sentences are complicated, I find this approach much quicker and easier and I make fewer errors. If I want Autotext I use an AutoHotKey script that is available online. I still have the CAT tool window open on my second screen for fuzzy matches and concordance searching.

[Edited at 2020-08-31 20:17 GMT]
Collapse


 
Tom in London
Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 02:10
Member (2008)
Italian to English
Drop the CAT Aug 31, 2020

DIANNE BEREST wrote:

Hi guys. Just would like to get your thoughts on this. I'm fairly new to using CAT tools and am currently doing a difficult translation - difficult in the sense that the source text is worded not very clearly. I have to figure out exactly what they're saying before I can translate it. I feel much more confident doing the translation in simple Word format, paragraph by paragraph, erasing each original paragraph as I translate it, than doing the translation in my CAT tool. The segmentation of the document in the CAT tool and the lack of a visual of the format (bullets, headings, what came before or after the section) leave me feeling a little blind in an already difficult translation process. I'm just curious if, for those of you who have been working with CAT tools longer, you ever come across this or if you think it's just lack of experience to using a CAT tool. Thanks! (I'm using Memsource, by the way, and you can pull up a visual of the original document, but it's already pre-translated and that doesn't help with the lack of context.)


Clearly the CAT tool is slowing you down and impeding you. So just drop it. CAT tools can be very useful for more technical types of documents that contain a significant amount of repetition, but they're useless for anything more complicated.


neilmac
Joanna Posylek
Maria Teresa Borges de Almeida
 
Recep Kurt
Recep Kurt  Identity Verified
Türkiye
Local time: 05:10
Member (2011)
English to Turkish
+ ...
Get yourself a decent CAT Sep 1, 2020

A "normal" CAT tool allows you to define the segmentation rules and many other parameters. Don't get discouraged by those who say they are too difficult to learn or what not. Download a trial version of Trados od MemoQ or whatever and poke around the settings to see which one suits you best. I use CAT tools for all my translations, even when there are no repetitions, as they allow me to be consistent in terminology.

Joe France
Christine Andersen
Sandra & Kenneth Grossman
Angie Garbarino
 
Heinrich Pesch
Heinrich Pesch  Identity Verified
Finland
Local time: 04:10
Member (2003)
Finnish to German
+ ...
Sometimes true Sep 1, 2020

Especially when the source text is badly formatted and you cannot edit the source in your tool you are better off without it. So when a sentence is split into two or even more segments and your target text has a different word-order you can end up with segments that are plainly wrong out of the context. This happens sometimes when translating from and into German. And there is nothing one can do about it.

Second thought: on the other hand if I have the Word file or any other editab
... See more
Especially when the source text is badly formatted and you cannot edit the source in your tool you are better off without it. So when a sentence is split into two or even more segments and your target text has a different word-order you can end up with segments that are plainly wrong out of the context. This happens sometimes when translating from and into German. And there is nothing one can do about it.

Second thought: on the other hand if I have the Word file or any other editable document, I must adjust the formatting for translation in my tool. But most of the time nowadays I only get the package for Studio and never see the source file.

[Bearbeitet am 2020-09-01 16:09 GMT]
Collapse


 
Erik Freitag
Erik Freitag  Identity Verified
Germany
Local time: 03:10
Member (2006)
Dutch to German
+ ...
Edit the source text Sep 1, 2020

Heinrich Pesch wrote:

Especially when the source text is badly formatted and you cannot edit the source in your tool you are better off without it. So when a sentence is split into two or even more segments and your target text has a different word-order you can end up with segments that are plainly wrong out of the context. This happens sometimes when translating from and into German. And there is nothing one can do about it.


In the case of badly formatted Word files, I regularly edit the source text before importing it into my CAT tools. The most important stepts are to remove unnecessary tags and wrong paragraph signs. Transtools does an excellent job at this.


Kevin Fulton
finnword1
Sara Massons
 
Joe France
Joe France  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 02:10
Member (2016)
German to English
+ ...
CAT tools not intended for use in isolation Sep 1, 2020

This might be rather obvious, but nobody seems to have mentioned it so far:

Dianne, you say that you are left feeling blind by working in your CAT tool and that working with the context of your Word file helps you to understand the text and get a better feel for it. But - of course it does! If I'm translating an IDML document where the formatting is a bit askew, or a website where different page elements pop up at different stages in a Trados file, or even a long Word document or P
... See more
This might be rather obvious, but nobody seems to have mentioned it so far:

Dianne, you say that you are left feeling blind by working in your CAT tool and that working with the context of your Word file helps you to understand the text and get a better feel for it. But - of course it does! If I'm translating an IDML document where the formatting is a bit askew, or a website where different page elements pop up at different stages in a Trados file, or even a long Word document or PDF with lots of text boxes, bullet points and columns, that doesn't hinder me because I always have my screen split so I have a view of both.

I don't think you can translate in a CAT like Trados without the source to compare and I don't think it was ever the intention. I'll concede that I don't know much about Memsource but I don't see how splitting your screen (or having a second screen) so you always have the source in view or joining segments into paragraphs if that helps your understanding won't solve your problem... I would also suggest that simply dropping your CAT tool without experimenting with more of its features or trying out other software on the market might be a little premature.

As Recep has already noted, one of the biggest benefits of CAT tools for me (especially on longer projects) is the range of functions to help ensure consistency of terminology. If your text is complex, that would seem all the more important. However, the most important thing is that you find a way or working that is efficient, effective and comfortable for you.
Collapse


Karen Wooddissee
Rachel Waddington
Sara Massons
 
Joe France
Joe France  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 02:10
Member (2016)
German to English
+ ...
Deleted - duplicate post Sep 1, 2020



[Edited at 2020-09-01 08:44 GMT]


 
DIANNE BEREST
DIANNE BEREST  Identity Verified
Montenegro
Local time: 03:10
Spanish to English
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Thanks!! Sep 4, 2020

Thank you so much for your comments. I agree with the general suggestion that you need to use what works for you. I also agree that it doesn't make sense to drop CAT tools without giving them a proper go. And certainly, in this convoluted translation, the support elements - especially in standardizing terms - would be helpful. This time I'm just going back to Word as there's not time to work out the finer points of my CAT tool with the deadline running towards me at breakneck speed, but I take y... See more
Thank you so much for your comments. I agree with the general suggestion that you need to use what works for you. I also agree that it doesn't make sense to drop CAT tools without giving them a proper go. And certainly, in this convoluted translation, the support elements - especially in standardizing terms - would be helpful. This time I'm just going back to Word as there's not time to work out the finer points of my CAT tool with the deadline running towards me at breakneck speed, but I take your point - it's worth dedicating some time to learning the CAT properly for future use. Thank you for all your comments.Collapse


Josephine Cassar
 
Samuel Murray
Samuel Murray  Identity Verified
Netherlands
Local time: 03:10
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
CAT tools work best with translation-ready texts Sep 5, 2020

DIANNE BEREST wrote:
The segmentation of the document in the CAT tool and the lack of a visual of the format (bullets, headings, what came before or after the section) leave me feeling a little blind in an already difficult translation process.


On the one hand it is a matter of getting used to the way text is presented in the CAT tool. On the other hand, the CAT tool works best if the source text is "translation-ready", i.e. it was written (and/or edited) specifically for publication and/or translation. Not all texts are like that -- sometimes the translator gets the version that has not yet been edited, or sometimes the translator gets a file whose author doesn't really have the skill to write properly.

Having the source file opened next to the translation window is something that some CAT tool users no longer do, but in fact it is something very useful.

If your source text requires you to fix it while translating it, you can using paragraph segmentation instead (I'm not sure if Memsource has that option).

Added: There is an advantage to using a CAT tool that allows you to edit the source text (when necessary, e.g. to move sentences or paragraphs around, or add/remove punctuation that causes the text to be segmented better) and then "reload" it in the CAT tool.

OmegaT is one such tool -- you edit the source text in the /source/ folder and then press F5 in OmegaT, which reloads the file. In some other tools, if you want to reload the source file, you basically have to recreate the entire project, so it's not something that you can do every few sentences or every few paragraphs.

In some CAT tools, you can update a source file within a project but the process is still quite cumbersome and is not designed with very frequent updating in mind. In Trados, you have to return to the file list, then right-click the file, select two menu options, then navigate to the updated source file on your computer and select it -- there's no simple "reload". In MemoQ, you have to return to the file list, right-click the file and choose "Reimort" (or use the Reimport button), but you can only do that if the file isn't part of a view. MemoQ is better than Trados in this regard, however, because if it detects that the updated file is still in the same location, it will offer to reimport it without you having to navigate to the file. On the other hand, in all three these tools, you can't leave a DOCX source file open in Word when reloading it in the CAT tool -- you have to Word, then reload in OmegaT, and then reopen it in Word.

[Edited at 2020-09-05 09:34 GMT]


Sara Massons
 
Giovanni Guarnieri MITI, MIL
Giovanni Guarnieri MITI, MIL  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 02:10
Member (2004)
English to Italian
strange... Sep 5, 2020

DIANNE BEREST wrote:

(I'm using Memsource, by the way, and you can pull up a visual of the original document, but it's already pre-translated and that doesn't help with the lack of context.)


If I go to document > view original, the original doc is open as it is... without any translation inserted...


 
DIANNE BEREST
DIANNE BEREST  Identity Verified
Montenegro
Local time: 03:10
Spanish to English
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Thanks again Sep 5, 2020

Thank you Samuel for you characteristically comprehensive and thoughtful answer and thanks Giovanni. I'm pulling it up another way. I'll check that out.

 


To report site rules violations or get help, contact a site moderator:


You can also contact site staff by submitting a support request »

CAT vs. no CAT better for complicated translations







CafeTran Espresso
You've never met a CAT tool this clever!

Translate faster & easier, using a sophisticated CAT tool built by a translator / developer. Accept jobs from clients who use Trados, MemoQ, Wordfast & major CAT tools. Download and start using CafeTran Espresso -- for free

Buy now! »
Trados Studio 2022 Freelance
The leading translation software used by over 270,000 translators.

Designed with your feedback in mind, Trados Studio 2022 delivers an unrivalled, powerful desktop and cloud solution, empowering you to work in the most efficient and cost-effective way.

More info »