Tool category: memoQ Translators' Essentials

What is Machine Translation in General?

Machine Translation (MT) or automated translation is a process when a computer software translates text from one language to another without human involvement.

How does Machine Translation Work?

MT works with large amounts of source and target languages that are compared and matched against each other by a machine translation engine. We differentiate three types of machine translation methods:

Rules-based machine translation uses grammar and language rules, developed by language experts, and dictionaries which can be customized to a specific topic or industry.

Statistical machine translation does not rely on linguistic rules and words; it learns how to translate by analyzing large amount of existing human translations.

Neural machine translation teaches itself on how to translate by using a large neural network. This method is becoming more and more popular as it provides better results with language pairs.

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memoQ has integrations with the most popular machine translation engines. These engines provide suggestions during translation that translators may use if they find them appropriate. This way, translators can make sure that the localized version has the same style as the original.

What are the benefits of Machine Translation?

Saves time: Machine language translation can save significant time as it is capable of translating entire text documents in seconds. However, please bear in mind that human translators should always post-edit translations done by MTs.

Reduces costs: Machine Translation can substantially lower your costs, as it requires less human involvement.

Memorizes terms: Another benefit of machine language translation is its ability to memorize key terms and reuse them wherever they might fit.

Next: Translating PDF documents

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A poor translation can have an immediate and disastrous impact on the acceptance of your product, and furthermore, it can easily become an embarrassment to your brand.

Translation Quality Assurance is a comprehensive tool that checks for machine-detectable errors while you translate in a translation management software.

Translation Quality Assurance is a key component of every project to deliver flawless translations; it usually comes as an integrated module with every translation tool or translation management system.

In memoQ, Translation Quality Assurance consists of two levels of quality review. While the Automatic Quality Control checks the text for possible mistakes during translation, the Linguistic Quality Assurance categorizes mistakes and create error statistics to provide structured feedback to translators.

How does Translation Quality Assurance Work in memoQ?

Automatic Quality Assurance

1- Warnings

A warning message can be a difference in punctuation between the source and the target segment, a missing number, a missing or misplaced inline tag, or a missing translation of a term that memoQ recognizes in the source segment. It could also be missing capitalization or extra space at the end of your segment. Warnings can also state if a translation is inconsistent or too long.

2- Errors

Error messages are usually related to tag inconsistency between the source and target segments, but can also show up for other reasons. You can fully control the behavior of automatic quality assurance, and you can even ask memoQ to treat some problems as errors rather than warnings.

Linguistic Quality Assurance (LQA)

memoQ can easily detect errors in documents, however, reviewers can also use Linguistic Quality Assurance models to give much more meaningful feedback about a translation. memoQ allows you to set up your own LQA model, which is usually a form that a reviewer fills in when reporting on an error. memoQ can handle popular standard models such as LISA.  
Linguistic Quality Assurance models provide the following options for reviewing a translation:

Define what happens when there is an error: Use penalty points, ​specify severity (minor, major, critical), or ​require comments on errors​.

Categorize and customize your feedback: You can define your own error categories for reviewing, or use the categories provided by existing models. Categories usually include translation accuracy, terminology, language, and consistency.

Define criteria to accept or reject translations (pass/fail).

Next: What is Translation Memory?

Want to See How Translation Quality Assurance Works in memoQ?

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What is a CAT Tool or Computer-Assisted Translation Software?

The term CAT stands for Computer-Assisted Translation Tool. CAT tools have significantly changed the way how translators work and manage translation projects today.

CAT tools split large multilingual documents into segments (phrases & paragraphs) which are stored in a database. This is called translation memory which means that previously translated material can be reused at any time.

Nowadays, it is more common for enterprises and translators to use CAT tools to speed up their work and increase their productivity globally.

Why do You Need a CAT Tool?

Translate faster

Translators to meet increasing customer demands have to face shorter deadlines. Implementing a CAT tool, such as memoQ translator pro, into your daily translation processes can significantly accelerate your performance.

Handle language repetition throughout your projects by leveraging existing translations from the translation memories. The more you translate, the bigger and smarter your translation memories will be.

Translate accurately

Regardless of the industry you work in, consistency and accuracy in terminology are the most critical aspects to deliver flawless translations.

Beside translation memories, CAT tools have integrated term bases (for single words and expressions) that help project managers and translators to use consistent terminology across all projects.

What does it Look Like?

Let us show you the interface of memoQ translator pro, which consists of four different areas:

The ribbon

Commands in the top ribbon were placed according to the typical workflow of a translator.

The translation grid

Commands in the top ribbon were placed according to the typical workflow of a translator.

The translation results table

In the translation results table, memoQ offers you translation suggestions from the translation memories, term bases and live corpora.

The HTML preview pane at the bottom provides preview to see how your current translation would look once exported.

Next: What is Translation memory?

Why Use CAT Tools?

This eBook explains the purpose and benefits of Computer-Assisted Translation, and more.

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memoQ translator pro is a computer-assisted translation tool with various features to meet the needs of translators, enterprises, and language service providers. Download the free 30-day trial version now!

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