Usage of TM: To Be or Not to Be
Translation memory (TM) arrangements, the most widely used toolkits in the localization of digital information at HQ-translate agency, enable the linguistic transition and international accommodation of electronic content (e-content) for local markets. The idea behind TM systems is to store in a computer system the original e-content and the translation that has been produced by human translators; the stored translated version of the source text has been broken down into smaller units, generally one sentence long. Today the most popular CAT tools: TRADOS, Déjà vu, Wordfast. The preferences of using TM systems are fairly obvious: they increase the translator’s productivity and increase translation quality by securing that terminology and statements are used consistently within and across translations. Users in business and cross-border organizations report a 25–60% rise in efficiency. Yet, it must be stated that the use of TM systems may also have negative effects on translation quality. One of the major minuses of TM systems is that they usually perform at sentence level. Thus, there is a severe danger that the translator will focus too much on separated sentences, possibly disregarding the contexts in which the sentences are embedded. Moreover, the matching algorithms of TM systems are based on very ordinary formal criteria, such as the similarity of character strings. That’s why, the human translator’s notion of the grade of similarity between a piece to be translated and a piece retrieved from the storage base may differ considerably from the grade of similarity calculated by the CAT system. This may follow to situations wherein exact matches yield wrong translations, or one translation of a fuzzy match requires little or no adjustment but another fuzzy match with the same similarity degree is not useful at all (for a discussion on the aspects of evaluating the retrieval mechanisms of memory systems, see Expert Advisory Group on Language Engineering Standards (1996), Whyman and Somers (1999), and Reinke (2000a, 2004). Despite the negative sides, it should be noted that TM systems generally integrate into the translation run comparatively smoothly. These CATs leave human translators in control of the actual translation work, while free them from routine work and keeping translation as a creative job whenever the linguistic resourcefulness of a human nature is required. For more remarks, visit us at: HQ-translate company
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