4.2.4 - eXercise

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Open the sample excel file provided here. The file is a collection of sample translation units (TUs) that were selected from the CzEng parallel corpus. All TUs have one thing in common - they all have their origin in European legislation. Therefore, they might be a good source of relevant EU terms and their direct translation to Czech. To take advantage of this marvelous resource, take the following steps:

Task 1: Building up a termbase

1. First try to extract all units consisting of less than 20 characters (If you are not sure how, just ask for help).

2. Once you have your shortlisted TUs, make sure that you have the same number of entries in English and in the Czech language.

3. Add a heading to both columns ("English", "Czech") and save the file as "SampleTBX"

4. Open SDL MultiTerm Convert and follow the wizard for conversion into a termbase exchange format *.TBX.

5. Open SDL MUltiTerm, create a new termbase and import the TBX file into it.


Task 2: Creating a translation memory

1. Use the remaining TUs from the excel file (20+ characters) and save the file as "SampleTMX.xls"

2. Now cut and paste the first column and save it in a separate text file ("SampleTMX_EN.txt") while using UTF8 encoding.

3. Do the same with the second column, only now use the name "SampleTMX_CZ.txt".

4. Open text2tmx freeware text alignment application and load both files in.

5. Check random units that they are truly matched and then save the output as "SampleTMX_EN-CZ.tmx".

Task 3: Translating with the use of the custom-made resources

1. Open SDL Trados Studio and define a new project. Add the following 2 files for translation and then use both the termbase and the TM you have created in tasks 1 and 2.

2. Before you start translating, skim quickly through the files and note down 5 phrases that are repeated in the text you opened in the main editor view.

3. Add those word combinations to the list of AutoText expressions.

4. Now add a sample AutoSuggest dictionary and finally start translating.

5. Make an extra effort to keep track of what is going on everytime you shift to a new untranslated segment.

6. After you have translated and confirmed at least 20 segments, add the Google Translate automatic translation engine.

7. Carry on translating. Don't forget that automatic translation, though efficient for restricted language, still needs manual post-editing.