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Translation Technology – a brief Overview
The following is a very condensed glance at the two most advanced technologies used in making the job of translation both more efficient and more economical. One of the technologies is Machine Translation (MT), the other is Translation Memory (TM). A summary of our services integrating these two technologies ( Machine Translation & Dictionary Building and Translation Memory & Data Alignment) can be found under Technology Integration.
Machine Translation
The drive to make the translation process less complicated, cumbersome and tedious has been around for quite a while. As early 1661, Johannes Becher, a German monk, devised a mathematical meta-language designed to describe the meaning of sentences written in any language.
In 1933, a patent was granted to Georges Artsruni in France for a 'mechanical brain' that could replace words or phrases with equivalents from a target dictionary. At the same time, P.P. Trojanskij, working in Russia , proposed a complete, largely automatic translation process.
But it was not until the latter half of the 20th century that serious thought was given to using the early large computers for translation. And the development leading to today's computer translation tools has been anything but smooth. At one point in 1966, a US government-sponsored committee (ALPAC) issued a now infamous report stating that machine translation was "overall slower, less accurate and more costly than that provided by the human translator" and therefore not worthy of any further research grants.
While this stalled state-funded research on machine translation, the private sector continued to work on improving the software, and today, after an adventurous development of machine translation, we can choose between quite a few highly sophisticated computer aided translation programs.
Of course, MT still is far from perfect. There is currently no program available that will produce publishable translations without input from human translators. It has, however, evolved into a formidable tool for more efficient and faster translations with a definite, bottom-line effect on turn-around times and pricing.
At Digital Language Services, we have always held a keen interest in translation technology and have been at the forefront of applying MT technology to everyday translation work. The company's principals successfully integrated MT into the high-volume production flow for clients from the automotive industry, process control industry and computer hardware industry.
Clients with large volumes of materials of a clearly defined domain (i.e. automotive, aerospace, pharmaceutical, etc.) can gain from Digital Language Services' experience in computer-aided translation.
We are adept at designing specialized MT dictionaries for our clients to improve the translation quality. In addition, many of our translators are skilled post-editors of machine-translated texts.
Clients with an Internet presence can benefit from our expertise in providing MT. If your web site contains a fair amount of dynamic content, you will find that the constant translation needs for your updates may be forbiddingly expensive and time-consuming. On the other hand, you may not wish to leave it to the visitor to procure a translation through a free internet translation service such as Babelfish™ or others. This would mean, for all practical purposes, that you would relinquish control over the presentation of your website contents to an automated service with less-than-desirable results of translation.
Instead, we can provide you with an integrated MT translation service that is custom-tailored to your contents and presentation needs.
Translation Memory – Reuse of existing translated material
Another important development in translation technology has been Translation Memory (TM). This technology emerged in the 1980’s, when computing equipment and resources became more widely available. At that time, large translation companies began using specialized, automated tools to help their translators work more efficiently and consistently. These tools assisted translators by storing previously-translated materials, providing databases of specialized terminology, and allowing translators to access this information for subsequent projects. And, from these tools, translation memory systems emerged.
Using a translation memory system, a translator can translate, save, and reuse translated segments. The translation memory system, which is usually integrated into a word processing program, follows along as a document is translated and saves translated sentences and passages. Thus, when the translator comes across recurring or similar material, the translation memory system allows the translator reuse of the previously-translated material.
This technology, of course, has several advantages:
- Enhanced consistency in terminology and structures.
- Maximized turnaround times by utilizing the translation memory in the software. Therefore, repetitious text is translated only once. Cost efficiencies: Translate once, pay once, – use often.