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CAT vs MT Tools?? | Removed due to duplicate posting.

jyuan_us — Tue, 29 Aug 2017 20:07:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: jyuan_us
Post title: Removed due to duplicate posting.

Removed due to duplicate posting.

[Edited at 2017-08-30 03:35 GMT]

CAT vs MT Tools?? | From the OP...

JonAnderson — Wed, 15 Apr 2015 01:38:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: JonAnderson
Post title: From the OP...

Hello,

First of all I would like to thank everyone who has taken time from their busy schedules to respond to my neophyte question. I am thoroughly impressed with the knowledge and generosity of this community.

Several times in the last few days, I have often come back to this post to thoroughly read and reread your opinions and suggestions. It has certainly given me a an excellent primer on the translating profession and its main tools. Your ideas and suggestions have thoroughly shaped my opinion and plans.

Again much gratitude and all the best,
Jon

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Call me overly skeptical if you like, but...

Michael Grant — Wed, 15 Apr 2015 00:34:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Michael Grant
Post title: Call me overly skeptical if you like, but...

I'm suspicious. Something sounds phoney about this whole scenario: why would a "multinational corporation" leave such a huge task (that is going to used and relied upon by people) to a half-interested newbie with another "career"?

The OP's post reads more like a SYSTRAN marketing person searching for opinions from real translators about his/her SYSTRAN product or an IT reporter doing background research for an article than a legitimate inquiry...

CAT vs MT Tools?? | What happened...

John Fossey — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 18:31:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: John Fossey
Post title: What happened...

...to the OP? He hasn't posted back since his first post.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | You don't say what your other career is

Christine Andersen — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 11:35:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Christine Andersen
Post title: You don't say what your other career is

Many of us here pre-date actual training in translation, and many have qualifications in other subjects. You do not actually need an MA in linguistics to be a successful translator. Just ask some of the medical and legal specialists around!

You DO need to know the specialist language of your subject, but I am assuming you know enough about CRM in both languages for that to be in place.

My husband once translated a product list with specifications for his company, knowing that I and most of my colleagues would run away screaming! It was just too specialised, but he knew the technical stuff himself, or else he knew who could explain it for him in either language. (Danish to English.)

It did convince him that he would prefer to keep to his normal job, but it was obvious at the time that he was the best person available to do that translation.

What we did find annoying was that the text was not at all consistently set up, and we were not able to use Trados on it. For various reasons the original text was not revised and updated - the translation became the official version instead.
_______________________________

Another advantage of using a CAT is that if you have to update anything in future, you can go to the relevant places easily. You should still check for consistency... but the CAT will also help with that.

OK, if you are not convinced by now you never will be!

Best of luck with the project anyway!

CAT vs MT Tools?? | The right tool for the right job

Georgie Scott — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 08:13:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Georgie Scott
Post title: The right tool for the right job

I'd say you just got a whole load of good, objective advice from the people that would normally carry out this sort of job.

Seeing as this hasn't turned into an MT-bashing thread, I don't mind giving my 2 cents:

I think MT would slow you down in this instance. Maybe if you had a whole host of training and experience in MT and understood exactly how it works, you could calibrate your MT software for this particular subject.

But it's probably best to learn how conventional translation works first. And with 120,000 glorious words on how to use CRM software, you'll certainly have the chance to do that.

The basic utilities of a CAT tool can be picked up pretty fast. As can the basic concerns of creating an accurate translation if you decide to go with Word. If you go with MT, I'm sure you'll learn about its pitfalls soon enough too, but I suspect you need to be quite an experienced translator to deal with them.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | @Phil

Samuel Murray — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 07:36:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: @Phil

[quote]Phil Hand wrote:
MT ultimately takes more time to get a good result using MT... [/quote]

It depends on the language combination, on the subject matter, on how well the source text was written, on how easy the editor is to use and on whether the text is displayed in a way that is easy for your brain to make sense of. It is perfectly possible to get a good result with MT much faster than with TM alone, if the situation is optimal.

As translators we are able to evaluate (and correct) existing translations (including our own), but so can many other people who are good at language but not necessarily translators. It's possible for people who are good at language to be able to see whether or not a translation is acceptable, even if they are not translators themselves, even if they would struggle to create the translation themselves. For such people, an MT system may actually be faster and better than trying to perform a task (translation) that requires great skill.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | @Neil

Samuel Murray — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 07:14:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: @Neil

[quote]neilmac wrote:
The lack of commitment voiced is denigrating to those of us who are committed to the profession. If you're not really interested in translation as a vocation and already "have a career", why not stick to the day job? [/quote]

Who says it's wrong to make some money from a hobby?

CAT vs MT Tools?? | @Jon

Samuel Murray — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 07:12:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: @Jon

[quote]JonAnderson wrote:
- is SYSTRAN Premium the better MT option available?
- and most importantly, is SYSTRAN MT initial translation high quality? [/quote]

Since you're planning to buy Systran, I think you should send them a sample of about 2500 words to translate, and then compare that sample translation to e.g. Google Translate. Because if their translation isn't much better than Google Translate, then I would suggest getting a cheap, easy-to-use CAT tool (e.g. OmegaT) that allows you to use Google Translate in it. That way, you'd get advantages from both worlds.

If I compare the two by assuming that the paid version of Systran will be the same as or similar to [url= [url removed] ]the free version here[/url], then I'm afraid it's not much better than Google Translate (I did a very quick FR-EN test).

[quote]- what are the major trade offs in using MT instead of CAT? [/quote]

* An MT system (by itself) will always re-translate a sentence, even if that sentence is very, very similar to a sentence that you translated previously, whereas the CAT tool will suggest matches from sentences that you had translated and verified previously. This is why you're right to select an MT system with a TM component.
* If the MT system is rule- and dictionary-based, it may translate terms consistently, but if it uses a statistical component, it may translate terms inconsistently, whereas the glossary and concordance features of a CAT tool will help you to be consistent with terminology.

[quote]I fully realize that I will need to edit the initial translation and that having a TM tool inside the MT software is essential. This lead me to considering buying the SYSTRAN Premium (hybrid MT). [/quote]

I assume you mean this one:
[url removed]

Are you sure it has TM capability, and that the TM offers fuzzy matching? I don't see that in the list of features. I see that you can create a TM from existing translations (by alignment) and that you can have a "TM" in your project, but it doesn't say what role the TM plays in translation.

[Edited at 2015-04-14 07:13 GMT]

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Lacklustre attitude, non-sparkling outcomes

neilmac — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 06:58:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: neilmac
Post title: Lacklustre attitude, non-sparkling outcomes

I agree with Phil, the lack of commitment voiced is denigrating to those of us who are committed to the profession. If you're not really interested in translation as a vocation and already "have a career", why not stick to the day job? There are enough market busters out there already these days without half-hearted intruders to exacerbate the situation.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Emperor's new hobby?

Andy Watkinson — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 01:02:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Andy Watkinson
Post title: Emperor's new hobby?

[quote]Phil Hand wrote:

I'm not sure if everyone else was being super-friendly, or polite, or what, but I'll say directly what JL01 was alluding to above. What on earth dIo you think you're playing at? This is a major, agency-sized job, or a job for an experienced translator. It's lovely that you have friends who are willing to waste their employer's money, but you ought to be aware that translation is a proper job, not a game. And it's somewhat insulting to turn up on a professional translators' forum advertising your lack of interest in the profession...
[/quote]

But Phil, you must admit we're all a very civilised bunch of people. Try telling a group of Chartered Accountants you're going to prepare a set of accounts, financial statements and whatnot without being one or ever intending to become one.

NB. Accountants can be vicious.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Nice to have friends

Phil Hand — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 00:36:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Phil Hand
Post title: Nice to have friends

[quote]JonAnderson wrote:

A friend of mine is an executive of a multinational company and is helping me out financially by offering me some translation work...I am not planning to be a full-time translator...
[/quote]
I'm not sure if everyone else was being super-friendly, or polite, or what, but I'll say directly what JL01 was alluding to above. What on earth do you think you're playing at? This is a major, agency-sized job, or a job for an experienced translator. It's lovely that you have friends who are willing to waste their employer's money, but you ought to be aware that translation is a proper job, not a game. And it's somewhat insulting to turn up on a professional translators' forum advertising your lack of interest in the profession...

And then there's this daft MT idea...

Harrumph.

Having said that, here's practical advice:

1) Forget MT. I'm one of those people who are anti-MT, and I'll explain why: it ultimately takes more time to get a good result using MT, and a good result is what you want here. MT can be useful for gisting, or when no-one is actually going to read the output (surprisingly common situation). But a software help file? Think about your own experience. Have you ever screamed at a badly translated user's manual? Badly written software help is a nightmare, and your customer will not be happy with awkward, hard-to-follow text. CRM software needs to be so intuitive that even salespeople can use it, remember. For a help file you need good flow, and the only way to get it is by translating the text yourself. Editing a badly MTed sentence literally takes longer - try it and see.

2) Pick a CAT tool and learn it. I know SDL looks intimidating, but there are simpler tools out there, including several free tools. For a help file, CAT is perfect: it gives you consistency throughout the file.

But be clear, you will have to do this translation yourself. Your client has given you a translation job. Not an editing job. Not a software text processing job. If you don't actually want to translate, then for goodness' sake, give the job to someone who does.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Big job

John Fossey — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 00:32:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: John Fossey
Post title: Big job

I agree with the comments above. 120,000 words is indeed a large job. Machine Translation of something technical like a help file for CRM software is likely to make a complete mess of it. MT has its place, but accurate translation isn't one of them.

There is a myth out there, among people who know nothing about the profession of translation, that it's all done by computers now. Machine Translation is good for what is sometimes referred to as "gisting" - getting the gist of a text in a foreign language. It is not useful for accurate translation. In fact, MT tends to often get things completely wrong. A professional translator who can touch-type efficiently can usually translate directly a lot faster than unraveling a machine translation and sorting out its errors, inconsistencies and tortured sentences.

A CAT tool is well worth the investment, IMO. Especially if you use free ones like OmegaT or Wordfast Anywhere. What a CAT tool does is help you to maintain consistency throughout a project, as well as helping with organizing the work and controlling formatting of the document. In a 120,000 word technical job, you will be hard-pressed to maintain consistency through the whole job without a CAT tool. A help file is likely to have numerous repetitions of phrases and terms, and a CAT tool will mean you only need to research a term once, even if the next use of the term is 100,000 words later.

Just by the way, a 120,000 word project would normally be handled by a team of full-time translators or a pair at very least, not one person. Here, even more, a CAT tool with some form of interoperability (remote server or at the very least sharing of TMs as the work goes on) is necessary to maintain consistency between team members.

[Edited at 2015-04-14 00:36 GMT]

CAT vs MT Tools?? | You want to do what?!

Jean Lachaud — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 19:54:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Jean Lachaud
Post title: You want to do what?!

Translating 120,000 words will require several months working full time, regardless of the method and technology used (CAT, TM, plain old typing or long hand, whether together or not).

A project this size would be a major undertaking for a trained and experienced professional translator, which you are NOT, by your own admission. On average, a professional translator can translate 2500 words/day, which includes research (terminology and other), proofreading and editing. 120,000 words would thus require a minimum of 50 WORK days. Using a regular work week, that would be 10 weeks, assuming everything goes well, that the translator has no understanding issue requiring long back-and-forth exchanges with the document authors, that the translator knows perfectly the target language terminology (in the case of an application Help file, the knowledge of the application topic, such as accounting, manufacturing, CAD, deep-sea fishing, flying, whatever is also likely to be required both in the source and the target languages), to name a few factors.

One wonders how that would be compatible with your existing career, even without considering the two facts above.

Just saying.

[quote]JonAnderson wrote:

Hi,

I am completely new to the world of translation. A friend of mine
is an executive of a multinational company and is helping me out
financially by offering me some translation work. The first
project is a large (120,000 word help file for CRM software) which
will be followed by other translation projects.

[/quote]

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Formatting without a CAT tool is a nightmare

Magdalena Kowalska — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 19:39:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Magdalena Kowalska
Post title: Formatting without a CAT tool is a nightmare

There is one more thing in favour of a CAT tool, apart from consistency, terminology etc. It is formatting. I don't even want to think about formatting a complicated Word or ppt file without a CAT tool. Been there, it was a nightmare in comparison.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Just try

Magdalena Kowalska — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 19:35:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Magdalena Kowalska
Post title: Just try

[quote]FarkasAndras wrote:

Download the free trials of two or three main contenders and spend at least a day testing and researching each of them before you buy. [/quote]

MemoQ has a generous trial period of 45 days. I would give it a try, and would take advantage of the whole trial, or at least enough to really test the software.

I find CAT's indispensable for technical translations, just because of the many repetitions in this kind of texts. Termbases are useful in any kind of translation to ensure consistency, something you do want to take seriously.

In short, MTs are usually full of rubbish, but with a CAT you get your own translations as a basis you can build on.

By the way, you can integrate MTs into MemoQ, if you wish, and check for yourself if it is helpful at all.

I started translating without any CAT tool,but now I wouldn't go without, it would be a huge waste of time.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Play nice.

Diana Obermeyer — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 19:34:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Diana Obermeyer
Post title: Play nice.

[quote]Tom in London wrote:

Can everyone please stop talking about me and my presumed notions, and focus on the topic?

TIA [/quote]

Anyway...

Personally, I haven't had favourable experiences with MT. However, I'm not very good at coping with linguistic torture, and sadly this is a common side effect of such tools. I couldn't comment on time savings, as I enter nervous breakdown mode when I have to read a substantial text of this kind, wherefore a comparison is rather tricky.

Yet, I fully understand that different people have different preferences. We all have different favourite subject areas, and some are more inclined towards editing tasks. The important thing is that you don't rely on the MT output too heavily and are confident that you will know when specific terminology is required. You may find it useful to have the framework in place and edit it yourself. I had a quick look at the product descriptions, and the premium version you mention has some of the functionality we (not speaking for Tom) enjoy with CAT tools - it remembers your terminology choices, you can build glossaries and it creates a TM in tmx format (which is compatible with most CAT tools).

The homepage also features a box where you can enter a random text to see the results. Why not enter a few phrases from your project to determine whether or not you consider the output helpful.

[Edited at 2015-04-13 19:35 GMT]

CAT vs MT Tools?? | me

Tom in London — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 18:47:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Tom in London
Post title: me

Can everyone please stop talking about me and my presumed notions, and focus on the topic?

TIA

CAT vs MT Tools?? | I would go for a CAT from day 1

Christine Andersen — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 18:44:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Christine Andersen
Post title: I would go for a CAT from day 1

Which CAT is a matter of taste.

Whether you like MT or not depends on a lot of factors, one being your language pair. For some the results are helpful. I generally find that it is not. I spend more time removing the inaccurate translations and correcting them than I save with anything helpful.

I have never tried SYSTRAN, but I think others I have worked with have. I have come round to having an open mind about MT, but I am not convinced.

Not all CATs are expensive. Some are free, or you can get free demo versions that work quite well.

I think in terms of productivity and getting paid, the latest Trados Studio pays for itself in spite of being one of the most expensive CATs on the market, but I have used Trados for many years now. I stay with it because I like the glossary, Multiterm, that goes with it, but others find that hard work. OK, it is, but once you get the hang of it, it has useful features that the simpler models don't have.

MemoQ is another popular option, and for a while I liked WordFast Classic, which is free until you build up quite a large TM, and then is reasonable value for money, but I got fed up with the glossary.
___________________________

If I wanted to work on a big project like yours, I would start feeding the glossary at once to keep track of the terminology.
(In Trados you can do it fast by highlighting the source and target term as you translate, and then clicking save, so it only takes a few seconds.)

Although it is true that the longer you use your CAT the more you benefit from it, you do actually benefit from day 1 with larger projects and around job 2 or 3 for the same client if you do smaller ones (under 1000 words each) as I do.

With a help file for CRM software I bet there are dozens of phrases, if not whole sentences, that come up again and again.

Feed them into your glossary, and Multiterm will insert whole strings, correctly spelled, at when you type the first four or five letters.

A few random strings from mine:

Ministerial Order on the Appointment of Academic Staff at Universities

This delightful string comes up now and then:

Bekendtgørelse nr. 806 af 12. juli 2004 om information og samtykke ved inddragelse af forsøgspersoner i biomedicinske forskningsprojekter

-- and Trados immediately finds:
Ministerial Order No 806 of 12 July 2004 On Information and Consent at Inclusion of Trial Subjects in Biomedical Research Projects

-- product names like Halvblonde -> Half Lace (one of Royal Copenhagen's patterns). I canot remember all of them offhand...

and lots more.
___________________________________

The big advantage of the CAT is that it is reasonably reliable. Of course you should never accept anything uncritically - the best translations may get out of date, and you have to be careful about updating the TM with the final version of your text after proofreading, or it will contain the typos and errors you have removed from the text.
However, with a little discipline, that is neither difficult nor time-consuming.

Machine translation is partly based on human translation, but it is still a lottery, even though sometimes the odds are more favourable than unfavourable.

I have exchanged TMs with colleagues or received them from agencies, and I can see who translated each segment and when as it comes up.

I can instantly correct or delete any errors I come across, and it is possible to update TMs more systematically, though it is still quite a job if they are large.

Anyway, when all is said and done, I find a CAT is well worth the money and time spent learning to use it properly.

Even our friend Tom who hates CATS has a system of macros ...

There is quite a good discussion of different CATs here:

[url removed]

_____________________________

Whatever you decide, good luck with your project!

CAT vs MT Tools?? | I'd use a CAT tool and not MT

CasaPhil — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 18:22:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: CasaPhil
Post title: I'd use a CAT tool and not MT

[quote]JonAnderson wrote:
The first project is a large (120,000 word help file for CRM software) which
will be followed by other translation projects. [/quote]
While I understand that newcomers may find that translation takes too long to do from scratch and would rather have a pre-chewed MT version to work on, I am not sure that a raw MT program will save you much time, especially in its out-of-the-box form. Now if the translation user just needs a quick, dirty reference in-house, then MT may suffice.

As help files are usually quite repetitive, I'd choose a proper CAT tool and insert terms in a glossary as I go along. Depending on the amount of repetitions/similarities, I may be able to finish in 1.5 months working full-time on it (5 days/week). Or not.
For what it's worth, if the user interface (the actual program captions on the screen, such as Open File, Show Report, error messages, etc.) is meant to be translated, it should be done before (or in parallel with) the help files, as the latter constantly refer to the UI. You will also need to know the UI terms for the OS used with the CRM program.
Software projects can quickly get very messy if not properly managed.
[quote]JonAnderson wrote:
- what are the major trade offs in using MT instead of CAT?[/quote]
It's like comparing the strengths/weaknesses of a saw vs. a hammer. Although they can both be used in carpentry, they don't serve the same purpose.
[quote]JonAnderson wrote:
- and most importantly, is SYSTRAN MT initial translation high quality?[/quote]
From what I have seen, MT can save time (meaning: a "fit-for-purpose" outcome. Flow and language quality is another matter) when it is fed beforehand with human translations - usually from a CAT translation memory - and/or specific glossaries. If your MT program is not customised to your specific project, I don't think it will do any better than the free online tool Google Translate.

If similar projects come up afterwards, if your customer's quality requirements are "post-edited MT" and not "human-like quality", and if you have time to customise an MT program, maybe it could make sense to "teach" it the TM from the CAT tool and pre-translate subsequent batches with MT.

Philippe

CAT vs MT Tools?? | I would...

FarkasAndras — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 18:13:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: FarkasAndras
Post title: I would...

Forget about MT and go with a plain CAT tool. MT is likely to introduce a level of unwanted complication. Building up a good TM may take time, but that's not the right way of looking at it. If a specific sentence is repeated 5 times in your text, you will only have to translate it once. The other 4 times you will just have to confirm the automatically retrieved translation ([i]your[/i] translation, so you don't have to go through it with a fine-toothed comb again). Also, you can import termbases (term lists) and translation memories (previous translations) to jump start the database creation process. If the company had similar documents translated in the past, you should try and align them (=generate translation memories out of them).

Download the free trials of two or three main contenders and spend at least a day testing and researching each of them before you buy.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | CAT tool (with good terminology module), definitely.

Michael Beijer — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 18:06:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Michael Beijer
Post title: CAT tool (with good terminology module), definitely.

You'd have to be insane (or have a photographic memory) to translate a "120,000 word help file for CRM software" without a CAT tool. It'll probably contain nine gazillion repeated fragments, which I assume you will want to keep consistent somehow.

If you want to use MT, just use a CAT tool with an MT plugin (pretty much all of them nowadays).

[Edited at 2015-04-13 18:10 GMT]

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Termbases, definitely

Dan Lucas — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 17:36:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Dan Lucas
Post title: Termbases, definitely

[quote]interpretwhisky wrote:
***That comment isn't directed at you by the way, Tom. [/quote]
Well, just so that our new friend doesn't get the wrong idea, I think it is only fair to point out that while Tom is of course a wonderful chap, he is also a fervent anti-CAT person and in this he does not represent the mainstream. Full disclosure and all that.

Like interpretwhisky, I think the OP would get a fair bit of mileage from a good CAT tool with a 120k file that probably has a lot of repetition. And I find termbases far more useful than the TM.

Dan

CAT vs MT Tools?? | I think it is a mistake

brg (X) — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 17:32:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: brg (X)
Post title: I think it is a mistake

[quote]JonAnderson wrote:
- is it a mistake, considering my situation, to shy away from CAT software?
[/quote]

In fact, you have two options:
- use a CAT, and probably a part of its segments are reusable (to be analyzed before: 30%? 50%? 70%?)
- use MT (Systran or another) and you will have 120,000 words to revise entirely, maybe even retranslate, and to check consistency all over the files.

Good luck

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Depends on the type of document

Lori Cirefice — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 17:12:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Lori Cirefice
Post title: Depends on the type of document

[quote]JonAnderson wrote:

- is it a mistake, considering my situation, to shy away from CAT software?

[/quote]

I'm not familiar with MT software at all, have only read a few things here and there. I do know that you can use MT within some CAT tools, kind of like a plug-in, but I have never tried these.

Have you tried analyzing your 120,000 word project (with the Wordfast demo version for example) to see if it has any repetitions? If there are repetitions, you should consider using some form of CAT.

You would probably benefit from the glossary function of a CAT regardless of whether there are repetitions, especially for such a large project with more to come from the same company.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | An old common saying: You can get it fast, cheap or good – pick any two.

Rolf Keller — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 17:08:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Rolf Keller
Post title: An old common saying: You can get it fast, cheap or good – pick any two.

[quote]JonAnderson wrote:
120,000 word help file for CRM software [/quote]

Such a file consists of thousands of short text snippets. In order to translate them into a well understandable and really helpful result the translator has to know and to take into account many references to the CRM software's details, dialog windows etc. But an MT software will not know anything about that CRM software; actually it will not even be able to discern which words are "special terms" (proper names, nouns that are converted into verbs, .... let alone sloppy language, shop language and wrong capitalization).

A simple example: "Put the customer into the number box" has to be translated like "Enter the customer's ID number into the Cust. No. box". How will MT software cope with that?

Depending on the conditions (your abilities as well as quality & style of the source text) the post-editing might take more time than a translation from scratch. My personal opinion: Post-editing is more difficult than translating.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | In defence of CAT tools (sort of)

Keith Boak — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 16:54:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Keith Boak
Post title: In defence of CAT tools (sort of)

Whilst I agree with some of the drawbacks and shortcomings highlighted here and in the associated thread, their usefulness really depends on the nature of translation work you get involved with.

For example, if you work for the same client for several years, and if there are routine reports that come up at least once a year, with only say less than 50% of the text changed from the previous year, then the client has an incentive to remain loyal, because by means of your TM, you will be quicker and cheaper than your competitors.

Also there are many clients out there that even if they know you use a CAT tool, don't insist on discounts, or that you hand over the TM or a bilingual version of the document.

CAT vs MT Tools?? | Omega T

Marco Florio — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 16:46:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Marco Florio
Post title: Omega T

And what's about OmegaT?

CAT vs MT Tools?? | A note on MT

Georgie Scott — Mon, 13 Apr 2015 16:39:00 +0000

Forum: CAT Tools Technical Help
Topic: CAT vs MT Tools??
Poster: Georgie Scott
Post title: A note on MT

There are a couple of members on this site that are extremely against MT. Personally I find some of the animosity towards it is a little unjustified and would recommend taking it with a pinch of salt.

I can't give you any advice on that software though, I tend not to get involved with MT at the moment - because I have other things going on, rather than because I'm scared of the machines taking over.

Your comments about CAT tools are fairly justified, but if you are working on a 120,000 word project, once you are just a third of the way through, you'll probably already have quite an interesting TM already. It would also give you the option of creating a term base as you go along, so that the terminology you've decided on is suggested to you automatically - a bit like T9 on a phone.

In any case, it's up to you, but watch out for the trolls. And if you haven't already, look into term bases.

***That comment isn't directed at you by the way, Tom. I wouldn't be surprised if SYSTRAN is rubbish.

[Edited at 2015-04-13 16:43 GMT]