But because I’ve run the numbers on the time it takes to edit fuzzy matches, I don’t offer TM discounts other than this. I feel that for clients who put in the work to maintain a reliable TM, this is a fair compromise. Meaning that in Wordfast Classic, if a segment shows up green (Wordfast’s color code for a 100% match), I just click Alt-down (Wordfast’s command for accepting a segment) without reading it. Therefore, the only TM discount that I offer is that if the client is extremely confident in the reliability of the TM that they provide, I will not charge for 100% matches if I accept them without proofreading them. anything below 100%) takes at least as long and sometimes longer than just translating the segment from scratch. But I find that editing fuzzy matches (i.e. software and documentation), the situation may be different from what I experience. Over the years, I’ve struggled with the issue of TM discounts. The time that I save by using the TM is a result of this investment, and I want to realize the benefit of it. I pay for the upgrades and for the computer system that runs the TM. Translator says: I purchased the TM tool and used my own time to learn to use it.Agency says: if some of the content in this document is recycled from a TM that we provide, why should we pay the translator’s full rate for the recycled portion? The TM is the result of work that we paid for originally, so we want to realize the benefit of it.There are two basic sides to the TM discount debate: In those cases, I’m all about TM leverage. These might involve multiple countries submitting funding applications using the same template, so it would be a huge waste of time to start each application from scratch. I work on several recurring projects for international development entities. That being said, there are some projects where it would be suicidal not to use a TM. I do gain a pretty significant speed advantage when using TM, but I find that if the document needs to sound really natural in English, the extra editing time eats up the time I saved during the translation. I find that because of the “chunked” nature of working in a TM tool, the flow of my writing really suffers when I use one. However because my favorite kind of work is translation that requires excellent writing, I only use TM when necessary. I own and use both OmegaT and Wordfast, and I really like both of them for different reasons. I feel a can of worms about to open here, but I’ll inject some of my thoughts on TM discounts.įirst caveat: I am neither a huge fan of nor a heavy user of TM. Adding to this, there no monthly subscription scheme, probably pushing many translators into pirate software.During the recent discussion on volume discounts, a number of readers brought up the (very valid) issue of translation memory discounts. The Professional version, which allows all languages, package creation etc., is 1000 EUR. The Freelance version (which I think is around 600 EUR) only handles 5 languages. If you have a software project with 100 files, which is not uncommon, opening and saving these files takes a very long time. Handling multiple files can be difficult and cause Studio to crash. In fact, most of our clients are asking us to do the QA using Xbench, Verifika etc.ģ. The QA is so compley and cumbersome that it should be overhauled immediately. Just like when you hire a car: You don't read the user's manual.Ģ. You expect the software to work as you think it should. It´s important to know that many translators are having to deal with 10 (ten) translation tools in a typical work week - and nobody these days bothers to read user's manuals. Adding/fixing tags is totally unintuitive. It`s hard to combine all this into one tool and here are some thoughts for Trados (owned by the RWS group these days) to right the ship:ġ. When other players entered the market, Trados added more and more features related to Project Management, QA, Resource management etc. For years, they had not serious competitors. Trados Studio was first launched at the end of the 1980s. There is nothing really we like about this tool. They made an investment in Trados Studio years or even decades ago and they are reluctant to change. We're a translation company and our clients ask us to use this tool. We think that at some stage no love was put any longer into this tool. Comments: Our overall experience with Trados Studio is that it is a tool that is hard to master.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |