Archive for the ‘Blog’ Category
Sunday, September 11th, 2016
“Today, there is no excuse,” writes Alison Toot of Smartling in her column appearing in the January/February 2015 volume of MultiLingual. She is referring to the prevalence and overwhelming benefits of cloud-based translation management technology. Indeed, there seems to be no reason why a language service provider of any size should still be using a desktop-based management system. Sure, there are some possible disadvantages, as Lee Densmer writes in the Moravia blog, but these are not only minor, they are likely to be resolved as the technology continues to evolve.
Last week, I had the privilege of attending a talk by Anna Schlegel here at MIIS. Anna is the co-founder of Women in Localization, an association dedicated to helping women advance their careers in the field of localization. Her presentation was mostly focused on how and why companies go global, but the topic of women in localization arose as well. Anna lamented the fact that women still don’t seem to have an equal footing in the world of localization. Specifically, she noticed male colleagues being promoted higher and more frequently than their female counterparts.
Alison’s column on translation management technology in the cloud and Anna’s observations about women in localization resonated with my experiences from my recent summer internship. I interned at the Department of State’s Office of Language Services as a translation manager. Language Services uses LSMS, a proprietary translation management system based on and hosted by Plunet. The senior project manager in our office, Rachel, used this to her advantage when she pioneered a teleworking program that eventually allowed her to perform her project management duties while working at home four days out of the week. As a dedicated mother of four, she now has more time to balance her family and work lives, and she recently moved to allow her children to attend school in the district of her choice. Without the option of teleworking four out of five days, the one-hour commute each way would likely have been too prohibitive.
Rachel is a role model for me; she is smart and career-driven (and also a MIIS TLM graduate!) but also fully focused on her family life. With the massive strides the world of localization has taken that Alison writes about, it is clear that this field will become more and more accessible for women. Gone are the days when we had to choose between a career and a family.
Alison is right – we indeed live in a cloud-based world. And we women have a lot to gain from it.
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Monday, May 9th, 2016
Nothing seems to be as divisive a topic among translators as machine translation (MT). As the quality of MT improves, will it eventually displace human translators? (Spoiler alert: no, it will not.)
We will continue to see improvements in MT, but it will never replace human translation. We will continue to improve MT engines, but at some point, improvements in quality will begin to level off. MT will never be perfect.
So should we give up improving MT and cut all funding? Absolutely not!
I believe the future of translation technology is not machine translation, or human translation, but rather – machines and humans working together.
Of course, we see this already in the use of CAT tools. But in the sense that machines are working for humans when translators use CAT tools, in the future, this relationship will develop into more of a partnership.
A few companies are offering Post-Editing Machine Translation (PEMT) training and certifications. SDL is one of them. We will see more and more of these, and I predict that for many fields, having PEMT certification will be a requirement for translators, both freelance and in-house.
The debate over the future of translation technology seems to have focused on whether or not MT will ever be as good as human translation. However, I do not see why we need to ask MT to be as good as a human translator. Machines and humans will perform better when working together.
The real future of translation technology? We should continue to improve machine translation while also focusing on creating curriculums to train translators to post-edit machine translated output.
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Sunday, April 17th, 2016
Seven years ago, LinkedIn made an ill-fated attempt to venture into translation crowdsourcing, a tool many businesses are turning to as a way to reduce the costs, increase the speed, or to expand the scope of their translation projects. LinkedIn sent a survey to 12,000 of its members who had labeled themselves as professionals in the translation field to gauge their interest in volunteer translation.
The LinkedIn group that sprang into existence as a result captures the outrage perfectly: “Translators Against Crowdsourcing for Commercial Business.” LinkedIn is a for-profit company, so many of the professional translators who received the survey felt miffed, or even angry, that it was attempting to solicit translations “for free.”
We have seen similar backlash before.
In 2010, Gap responded via Facebook to overwhelming criticism following the unveiling of its new logo (right) with:
Thanks for everyone’s input on the new logo! We’ve had the same logo for 20+ years, and this is just one of the things we’re changing. We know this logo created a lot of buzz and we’re thrilled to see passionate debates unfolding! So much so we’re asking you to share your designs. We love our version, but we’d like to see other ideas. Stay tuned for details in the next few days on this crowd sourcing project.
Gap attempted to pose the proposed crowdsourcing project as a community activity – a way to engage its fans and demonstrate that the company cares. Designers, however, viewed it as exploitation, and Gap became a punching bag on Facebook and Twitter. Days later, the company admitted its mistake, and the crowdsourcing project never saw the light of day.
Even Facebook, whose innovative translation crowdsourcing project is now often cited as a model of success, faced opposition. In fact, the backlash led to the formation of a Facebook group called “Leave Translation to Translators!” protesting the use of volunteer translation.
I have written about Google Translate’s crowdsourcing before as well; it is an excellent model that makes translating fun and addictive. And yet even Google is not immune to crowdsourcing gaffs.
Meanwhile, nonprofits seem to fare extremely well with crowdsourcing, including translation crowdsourcing.
Duolingo, Mozilla, Wikipedia, TED – all have attracted professional translators to volunteer their time for free. Why? For the greater good: to make the Internet and its content more available to people across the globe. Translators do not need to question the motives (and ethics) of nonprofits who call for volunteers. It’s fun – and sexy – to make the world a better place by volunteering for nonprofits.
That is great for nonprofits, but the sentiment among many seems to be: Companies that make a profit should pay for translations.
What’s the takeaway here? Certainly, for-profit companies such as LinkedIn may face opposition from their communities when they request what is seen as, well, translation work for free. However, I believe that they can be just as successful as non-profits, so long as they accept that not everyone will be responsive to the call to volunteer, and, most importantly, keep in mind the motivations of their members.
What is the motivation of members, specifically translation professional, on LinkedIn? For some, to find work. For others, to network.
How cool would be it if LinkedIn gave your profile a badge indicating that you had helped translate its content?
It would be a resume boost for some, especially those just starting out with no work experience. Many employers love to see candidates that have relevant volunteer experience, and for positions related to localization crowdsourcing, they might even require it. An official badge on your LinkedIn page would be a gold star for these candidates. And of course, it would be a way to connect to others. If I were viewing the LinkedIn page of a new acquaintance after, say, a networking event, and I saw that she also has a LinkedIn volunteer badge, that is another conversation point I can use next time I meet her.
LinkedIn has the potential to be just as successful in translation crowdsourcing as Facebook is, so long as they do it in a way that benefits its community. While some may cry foul since LinkedIn is a for-profit company, let’s face it: translation crowdsourcing is no longer uniquely the realm of nonprofits. LinkedIn, my advice to you is this: you can be the next big translation crowdsourcing success, but always remember your community. They want to feel important and appreciated. Make sure they feel both. And don’t mind the haters.
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Saturday, March 26th, 2016
I became interested in Google Translate’s crowdsourcing activities when the Google Translate Community Program Manager (who is also a MIIS grad!) came to campus to give a lecture and demonstration on the Google Translate Community.
When you go to translate.google.com, it’s hard to ignore the small banner at the bottom of the page beckoning you to participate. You could be the one watering those plants, helping Google Translate grow!
When you click the “JOIN THE TRANSLATE COMMUNITY” link…
You are taken to this sleek dashboard. Everything is colorful and simple. You can see your stats on the right, and you have two options: translate or validate.
Let’s validate!
Given the source text, we see one or more translations. We have to choose the check mark or the x mark for each one.
Note that Google Translate doesn’t offer any instructions to determine which are correct. While it’s nice to be able to jump right in without having to wade through a style guide, I find myself wondering if sentences that are translated correctly but with punctuation errors deserve a check mark. I arbitrarily decide that missing a final period is okay, but missing an apostrophe (eg, youre instead of you’re) is not. I can’t help wondering what sort of personal rules other users have made.
What sort of quality should I be looking for? Flawless human translation quality? Or translations that correctly convey the meaning? Google Translate doesn’t tell me, so I’m on my own again.
Here, most of these get the point across but fail to reflect the politeness in the original Japanese. I choose the one closest, despite its lack of capitalization and punctuation.
The translations to validate come in bite-sized sets of ten.
What’s that? I’m only one validation away from leveling up? Well… I really should be getting some other things done, but how could I not do one more set?
Some of these options are frustratingly close to a good translation (“I have hay fever.”), but I give them an X for sounding a bit off. I wish there was an option to suggest a better translation.
I level up, and a bright yellow character does a quick dance on the screen to celebrate. How rewarding!
I’m now at Level 10, and I think that’s enough translation validating for today. How about some actual translating?
The translating step is similar – simple and quick. But you don’t get any extra “points” for translating, and validation is faster, so I find myself just wanting to validate other users’ translations.
Now whenever I visit translate.google.com, I see my progress, along with a thank you and an encouragement to keep going.
Google Translate has clearly designed a clever crowdsourcing platform.
- Its sleek and simple interface allows users to start working right away – no learning curve, and no need to slog through a list of rules or through style guides.
- Since the validations and translations come in bite-sized chunks – no more than a single sentence, and often just a phrase – it’s easy to keep going and going.
- Leveling up is fun and addictive. As far as I can tell, the number is meaningless… but I still wanted to get it higher!
Clearly, this system will lend itself to a high quantity of translations and validations, which is exactly what Google Translate needs to continuously improve its machine translation. There were, however, a few aspects that made me less inclined to participate.
- It’s a lot easier to validate than to translate, but both activities are equal in point value. I wanted to actually translate, but my desire to level up kept me in validation mode most of the time. Of course, this is certainly entirely by design. While Google Translate doesn’t publicize how many validations a translation needs to be approved, I’m sure it’s quite a few, perhaps even 100 or more. They need more activity in the validation stage than the translation stage, so it wouldn’t make sense to reward translation activity more, even though it requires more time and effort.
- Overall, the entire process is opaque. While the lack of information and guidance makes for a nice, clean interface, personally, I like to know I’m making a difference. And I found myself wondering – am I making a difference? I wish Google Translate could give me some indication of how or how much I’m helping.
- Despite this being a crowdsourcing effort, I didn’t feel like part of a crowd. In fact, I felt rather lonely. There was no leaderboard or any other way to see other users’ activities, and no forums or way to get to know them. It was fun leveling up, but I’d like to be able to show off my points and have a way to compare my progress to that of others.
Google Translate’s crowdsourcing platform works wonderfully for achieving what they require – a high quantity of translations and an even higher quantity of validations to constantly improve its machine translation. Personally, I prefer to volunteer my translation services to causes that let me see how I am making a difference and where I can truly feel like part of a community, so the Google Translate Community may not be for me.
Google Translate may be sacrificing some quality by excluding translators like me, but they have made the correct choice (quantity over quality) for meeting their translation crowdsourcing goals.
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Tuesday, December 15th, 2015
In the last three sessions of the Localization Project Management course here at MIIS, we learned about and explored XTRF, a translation management system that can add time- and money-saving automation throughout the entire lifecycle of a project.
I hope any company I work for in the future as a project manager uses, or is open to using, this TMS. Before I explain why, I’ll first list some disadvantages I noticed.
-Steep learning curve
Compared to, say, Basecamp, a system we tested out earlier in the course, XTRF has a much steeper learning curve. Even after devoting three 2-hour classes to it, I can only claim familiarity with its basic interface and functions. Mastery is still a while away.
-Cost
XTRF is not a free service. Prices start at $129 per user per month for the “Starter” version. However, the savings a company could experience by implementing XTRF are several times that. The automation and easy project management could allow a single project manager to do the work of many. Compared to the savings from not having to hire more personnel, $129 a month or more per user is negligible.
-Compliance
XTRF only works if you use it. And in this case, “you” refers not only to project managers, but also to venders and clients. There may be some resistance at first (and perhaps for clients who you feel would prefer a more personal, old-style project manager-client relationship, you should skip having them use XTRF altogether). But hopefully your vendors and clients will realize the benefits it offers – more potential jobs with an easier and faster workflow for vendors, and automatic quotes and easy cost analysis for clients – outweigh the effort spent learning this system.
And that brings me to my first advantage of XTRF
+Easy learning curve for clients and vendors
Here is the dashboard for project managers:
Compare that to what clients see when they log in:
And to what vendors see:
Such clean and intuitive interfaces! This is truly one of the selling points of XTRF. While I don’t actually mind the project manager’s dashboard being complicated (I like having loads of functions in XTRF), it is important to have what clients and vendors see kept simple. While you will still need to walk them through some things at first, they will find it easy to use.
+Automatically generated documents
No more toiling with form templates! XTRF automatically generates quotes, invoices, purchase orders… Anything that can reduce or eliminate repetitive, manual tasks like this is a big plus.
+Project automation
Once the project manager has assigned each section to a vendor, the project can then move automatically through the workflow. Files are submitted through XTRF and are sent to the next vendor who needs them. No more tedious emailing. No more forgotten attachments, the ultimate shame. Projects can progress while the manager is at home sleeping.
+Information at hand
All the contact information for vendors and clients is in one accessible, searchable location. Along with files, documents, past projects… And all this information is shared across the company, keeping the entire team up-to-date.
I’m sure there are more advantages (and perhaps more disadvantages), but I’m still fairly new to XTRF and have only explored the most basic functions. These are the observations I’ve had so far. The disadvantages seem fairly minor compared to the large potential gains. I hope that I will be able to work with XTRF outside of the classroom – the more I learn about it, the more excited I am about the potential it holds.
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Tuesday, December 8th, 2015
There are two subtitle file types out there battling it out: SubRip Text, SRT, and Sub Station Alpha, ASS. (Yes, that is actually the abbreviation. Don’t feel bad about laughing about it – even I still do sometimes.) I joined a fansubbing group a few months before I enrolled in MIIS, and my job consisted of receiving pre-timed ASS files and opening them with the subtitling program Aegisub to translate dialogue from Japanese to English. When I finished the translation, I would save the ASS file and send it back to the group’s manager, who would have the English hard-subtitled onto the video. Essentially, I did very little of the technical work.
When it came time to do a group project for my first semester CAT course, I decided it was time to delve more into the technical aspect of this subtitling business. My group decided to subtitle a portion of an episode of an old, campy Japanese TV show called Fireman. We would use Trados to coordinate the project.
My first choice, whether to subtitle using SRT or ASS, wasn’t really a choice at all – of course I would use ASS, as it was what I was used to and I already had a pre-timed file from the fansubbing group (plus, as mentioned previously, the file abbreviation makes me smile).
This turned out to be a mistake.
Here’s how we went about it: the native Japanese speaker in our group typed out a transcript into a Word document. I divvied up the Word document into five parts, one for each team member to translate, and imported them into Trados. I created a project package for translation for each part and sent them out. My group members translated their parts in Trados and sent me the return packages, and then I had a complete translation. Editing and proofreading were carried out similarly, using project packages.
Then the real trouble began. Because I was using an ASS file, I had the additional step of exporting the translation as a Word document and then manually typing everything into the ASS file through Aegisub. And that’s not all. Because Trados had imported the Japanese text sentence by sentence, as it is supposed to do, the translations were also sentence by sentence. That’s a problem for subtitles, as they need to be broken up into readable chunks. I had to review the video and divide them into phrases, which occasionally meant rewording some of the translations. Ouch! And the final nail in the ASS coffin for me was proofreading. Although we had a proofreading step in our project to keep the subtitles at a reasonable length, because we had translated sentence by sentence, the translations didn’t represent the final subtitle lengths. I had to perform proofreading all over again after creating the subtitles. What a nightmare of inefficiency!
Lesson learned: Unless you’re working by yourself on a one-off project, don’t use ASS. Use SRT.
Why? The SRT format is compatible with Trados.
What does that mean?
You can create the SRT subtitle file first, and then import it directly into Trados. Here’s what that would look like, using the opening theme song of our TV show as an example:
Working with an SRT files in Trados.
Notice how each line is divided according to subtitles, not sentence by sentence!
This way, each line in the translation is also a subtitle, meaning that checking the character counts with Trados’s QA function becomes meaningful again. It also allows you to export the translation as an SRT file, meaning that once TEP is done, you just export the file and you’re finished! No additional conversion steps needed.
Here’s a question you might be asking. Sure, we were lucky to have a native speaker transcribe the dialogue for us. But what about when you lack the resources (or time) for that, and want to leave interpreting the dialogue to your translation team? Here’s an easy solution:
Make the SRT file and use numbers as placeholders instead of entering the actual dialogue. Then your translator(s) simply listen to the video and enter the English for each line as they work. Once it’s exported, you still have a completed SRT file.
Translating in Trados without a transcript.
Does this defeat the point of using Trados since you won’t be building a translation memory? Not at all!
Trados is much more than translation memory. Consider the aforementioned QA check that allows you to check character count limits with a single click. Another important feature is the terminology base you can include. This is crucial to use if you are translating with a team, or even if you plan on translating more than one episode, as it allows you to stay consistent.
For example, in our case, we needed to keep the character names consistent. In Japanese, characters can be referred to by first or last name, and various honorifics can be added to the names depending on the relationship between the characters. However, to make the show more accessible for an English-speaking audience, we needed to choose one name for each character and use it consistently. We used a term base for that.
And finally, when coordinating a project like this, being able to send and receive project packages through Trados will save you a lot of time and effort. It’s so easy to divide up the work that way and make sure everything is integrated seamlessly into the final product.
Moral of the story: if you’re adding subtitles as a team effort, don’t be an ASS – use SRT!
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Wednesday, September 16th, 2015
Is Basecamp a useful tool for being an effective project manager? What makes an effective project manager?
In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey writes:
There are basically two kinds of delegation: “gofer delegation” and “stewardship delegation.” Gofer delegation means “Go for this, go for that, do this, do that, and tell me when it’s done.” … Stewardship delegation is focused on results instead of methods. It gives people a choice of method and makes them responsible for results.
Gofer delegation is, essentially, micromanagement. The manager directs his team members with detailed and specific instructions and expects each member to report the progress back to him. Stewardship delegation, on the other hand, allows team members to feel empowered. It keeps the manager as the director of the team, but it places his role as more of an assistant than an overseer. The manager is there to help and support his team members when they need it. Covey goes on to explain that stewardship delegation requires five elements: guidelines, resources, accountability, consequences, and clear, up-front mutual understanding and commitment regarding the desired results. I imagine Covey would applaud Basecamp, as it accounts for all five of these elements
People don’t like to be micromanaged. At best, it’s annoying. At worst, it’s distracting and demotivating. Good managers create assignments and tasks with clear instructions and goals. They offer support when needed and can check on progress occasionally, but for the most part they allow the team members to be self-motivated and self-directed. Basecamp is ideal for this sort of management. For those who would be tempted to micromanage, it offers a detailed look into the progress being made on a project at any given moment. With this information being automatically and constantly accessible, managers can see which step each team member is currently working on without annoying them by requesting constant updates through emails. Through practiced use of Basecamp’s to-do lists, project managers can achieve Covey’s idea of effective delegation. The to-dos are specific to team members, covering the accountability aspect, and are given specific deadlines with other team members’ to-dos on standby pending their completion. The consequences are made much clearer than they would be with an email merely explaining the task with a deadline. Furthermore, Basecamp allows project managers to see if any team members are stalled on a particular task, and the interface is useful for attaching questions (“Want me to assign someone to help you with this part?”) or comments (“I found an online widget that might make this easier.”) directly onto the task. Through Basecamp, project managers can offer guidelines and resources without being overbearing. Finally, Basecamp gives everyone in the project a true sense of being part of a team. They can see the project’s progression from beginning to end as well as their vital part in its success. No longer would they feel like “just” an editor or “just” a translator, but a crucial part of something great. How’s that for empowering?
Of course, Basecamp has its disadvantages.
Mainly, for some, it may be too much information.
If you don’t ever find yourself tempted to micromanage – say, your management style is especially hands-off and you prefer to be kept on an “information diet” – the detailed updates might be distracting. Fortunately, you can adjust your settings to determine how much or how little of that actually reaches your inbox.
In conclusion, Basecamp is a unique tool that manages to simultaneously serve project managers who are information gluttons as well as those who prefer to stay on an information diet, and of course everyone in between. The interface is intuitive, allowing team members and clients to participate almost seamlessly, but some practice and trial-and-error are required to match the notification settings to your personal preferences. If used well, Basecamp can be a powerful tool to empower team members with free reign while also setting them up to succeed by providing Covey’s five key elements of effective delegation. Through Basecamp, managers can stay on top of the project and track its progress without falling into the trap of micromanaging. While it may not fit everyone’s style, as a project manager, you would be doing both yourself and your team a disservice by not trying it out.
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