One of the most popular tools is those that allow you to do PEMT (post-edited machine translation). If you receive a long document and are on a short deadline, then one of the best things to do is to run it through machine translation first and then work on it from there. The most recognized and possibly used machine translation program is SDL Trados. One reason is that SDL Trados has a vast amount of features and functions.

With all the features and functions that SDL Trados comes with, naturally it is much more complex and difficult to learn to use than other, simpler machine translation programs such as Memsource, Wordfast, or Google Translator’s Toolkit. There are also programs such as MemoQ who have been gaining their own following of people who would prefer them to SDL Trados due to certain features or ease of use. However, if you have the time to learn SDL Trados and become able to use it effectively, then it can open a lot of doors for you to do many things.

Aside from machine translation, translators of websites can also rest assured that there are easy ways for them to translate webpages for clients. For instance, if a website is WordPress based, you can ask the client to install a plugin such as WPML. With WPML, all they will have to do is export the target page or post that they want to have translated as an xliff and send it to you, the translator. Once you receive it, you can open it in one of the machine translation programs that were discussed above and insert your translations as if it was a bi-column word file. Then after you are done, you can just send the client back the xliff file and they can import it back into their websites and the translations will be there as if by magic. The great thing about most of these kinds of plugins is that they are simple to learn and once you do learn them, they will save you a lot of time. If the website is not WordPress, there are other programs that you can explore and some webhosts even come with their own built-in language support.

There are many different types of specialized tools that will best fit the kind of translation job that you are working. Therefore, it is important for us as translators to stay updated and in the loop of technology that is being updated or developed regarding what we can take advantage of as translators. This way we can rest assured to do better work and help more people in need of translation.

However, by industry standards, they also have their own distinct professional traits. What do interpreters do that translators don’t? What does a translator need that an interpreter can do without? How different are they really on the job? Here are just a few of the things that set translators and interpreters apart from each other.

1. Work Mode
Professional translators and interpreters sometimes forget that many people outside of the industry often don’t even realize that these are two different professions. To put it as simply as possible, translators write while interpreters speak. A translator takes a text in one language and rewrites it in another language. Interpreters, on the other hand, listen to what someone says in one language and then convey it by speaking in another language.

The fundamental difference in their respective lines of work is this: a translator usually does not speak at a job, but must have excellent writing skills, with all the things this implies: perfect punctuation, spelling, grammar. A successful interpreter needs all the skills required of a good public speaker, delivering messages clearly by speaking.

Translators in general enjoy the luxury of having more time, but that also means they have to be skilled at personal time management and able to focus deeply on one thing for an extended period, whereas interpreters must be quicker on their feet, able to tune out distractions, and have strong multi-tasking skills.

2. Working Environment
Translators and interpreters have different tools in their arsenals, and work in different environments.

A modern translator is computer savvy and skilled with the leading translation software (MemoQ, Trados, Wordfast, Déjà Vu, etc). Translators often have more freedom in terms of where they can do their work, and since translation requires a great deal of focus and time, this means a comfortable space free from distraction, whether it be a home office or a space at the agency or company a translator works for.

Interpreters, by contrast, have much less personalized work areas, since they generally work in spaces that are not their own, although there are interpreters who work over the phone or through video calls from home. Interpreters in many cases also don’t own the equipment they work with: simultaneous interpretation requires microphones, audio transmission equipment, receivers, and headphones, but these are generally provided by the translation company or the client. Interpreters working in the consecutive mode have a more modest toolbox which usually includes just a pen and a notebook. Recently, tablets and digital pens with special features have been making their way into consecutive interpreters’ kits, but are not yet widespread.

3. Dealing With Pressure
Interpreters work under great pressure because what’s being said needs to be interpreted immediately, which doesn’t leave much time to think. For interpreters, time is very precious. If they spend too much time on a certain sentence or word, they run the risk of missing important information that follows.

By comparison, translators are not under immediate pressure but incremental pressure. They spend a long time refining their work and even invite others to edit and proofread it in order to ensure that the final product is as flawless as possible.

1. Read extensively

If you are a book lover, then you are half way there to being a good translator. Reading extensively is useful in that it helps to hone your writing skills and make you more sensitive to the subtle differences between similar words. As a translator in a specialized field (e.g. law, finance, medicine, etc.), reading parallel texts is even more crucial. Parallel texts make you familiarized with terms in a particular field and allow you to familiarize yourself with the field. As a result, your translation won’t look like it’s written by an outsider with no knowledge of the subject. For example, let’s say you’re translating a warranty from Chinese into English. If you find an English-language warranty and compare it with the original text, you’ll see how a warranty is formulated in English and you can use that reference as a guide for your own translation.

2. Write well

Being an excellent writer is essential to success in translation. Writing well means writing clearly, which is as necessary for communicating the source message in a translation as it is for making sense in any kind of written work. Don’t get confused – translation may be an art in its own right, but here writing well doesn’t refer to being a good creative writer; many translators may write impeccably, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they have the creativity to write the next great novel from scratch. Writing is also a largely mechanical skill that can be learned. It means, in part, being familiar with the conventions and preferences of the often very different writing styles that are used in various fields – something which the previous tip can help you with.

3. Be patient and pay attention to detail

Unlike interpretation which is done within seconds, translation is an extended process and your finished texts will be there for all to see long after your work is done. Of course, there are both pros and cons to this: one good thing is that translators don’t have to work under quite the same pressure as interpreters, and they can afford to spend time choosing the most suitable word for any given context. One of the negative sides is that your work will likely be subject to greater scrutiny than many interpretations, since, especially in the digital age, a document can essentially exist indefinitely, whereas the average interpretation is gone forever after it’s been completed. In general, translation demands patience and extreme attention to detail. Translators need to be very careful in editing and proofreading their work in order to avoid mistakes before it is published or presented to others.

4. Learn how to do research

As a translator, you’re bound at some point to encounter a word or phrase you don’t know. Be it an idiom, the name of an organization, someone’s title, or even their name, translators need to have the ability to do extensive research using whatever tools are at their disposal. A translator’s research isn’t limited to looking for difficult to render words, either: they should know how and where to look for reference material – those parallel texts that were mentioned before, and other materials that will make translation much easier. Thanks to modern technology, translators today have incredible access to potential sources of research, starting with everyone’s favorite, Google, which can let you quickly check whether or not your translation is idiomatic in the target language. Frequently translators have to go much deeper than just a Google search, though, accessing various corpora, specialized dictionaries, trade publications, and so on. The internet even makes it possible to reach out to the author of a text to ask for clarification or explanation when a translator encounters difficulty understanding the source. As wonderful as the internet is, a translator shouldn’t rely on it to the total exclusion of good old-fashioned books and other printed material. You never know when you’ll be without internet access, and the sheer volume of information on the Web can make it difficult to know what’s correct, whereas a specialized Spanish-English medical dictionary has been compiled by an expert.

5. Use CAT tools

Recent years have witnessed the nearly universal application and rapid development of computer assisted translation tools, such as Trados, MemoQ, Wordfast, etc. These CAT tools have effectively become the industry standard and can help improve translation efficiency and save time and energy. CAT tools can cut down your time spent and simplify any number of situations, for example handling a large translation project that involves multiple languages. While some of these tools are both powerful and fairly user-friendly, it can be difficult to intuitively navigate and manage some CAT programs with all their features and options. Fortunately, there is no shortage of online tutorials and other CAT tool guides available, but whether you decide to make use of them or explore your CAT tool of choice independently, one thing is for sure: the sooner you learn how to use CAT tools effectively, the better.

These are just a few tips to help you become a better translator. There is one other thing which shouldn’t be overlooked: be passionate about translation! Great translators are “doing their job” all the time, always translating (at least mentally) whatever they see and hear around themselves, be it a sign at the park or an advertising slogan on TV. Enjoying what you do and making it into an everyday, fun activity may be the most important key to becoming a better translator.

Monterey Language Services is committed to bridging the world’s languages by providing quality, professional and efficient translation & interpretation services in over 175 languages.

“Machine-assisted human translation vs. human-assisted machine translation” was the topic that won the Monterey Language Services Tech Contest, which took place on Monterey Language Services’ Facebook page and ended today at noon.

Participants were mainly from the Chinese program of the Translation and Interpretation School of the Monterey Institute of International Studies, which is the largest program in the school. Congratulations to Qianxi, the winner, and all who participated! (See his victory speech here.) We felt your energy and it was breathtaking. We hope to see you next time.

The 36 comments touch upon the future for translators, development of language technology and machine translation, CAT tools such as Trados, MemoQ, Wordfast, power of machine translation, human translators versus machine translators, translation software, how machines can improve efficiency and productivity for translators, a real life story with Google Translate, training machines to translate, coding and decoding, translation segmentation, machine language, repetitions in text, subject knowledge and specialization, theory versus reality, and more.

Monterey Language Services strives to provide the highest quality of translation and interpretation services. Please feel free to contact us for a quote.