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The Rol e of Translation Tools in the Information Age

The Rol e of Translation Tools in the Information Age. Feng Zhiwei Institute of Applied Linguistics, MOE, China zwfengde@hotmail.com First Sino-German Symposium on Knowledge Handling, 2007, Beijing. Abstract.

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The Rol e of Translation Tools in the Information Age

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  1. The Role of Translation Tools in the Information Age Feng Zhiwei Institute of Applied Linguistics, MOE, China zwfengde@hotmail.com First Sino-German Symposium on Knowledge Handling, 2007, Beijing

  2. Abstract • We are in the information age. The snowballing acceleration of available information resulted in drastic changes in the way of translators work. The paper introduces the translation tools in information age: machine translation system, translation resources on Internet and on CD-ROM, computer-assisted terminology management system, parallel corpora, translation memories and localization tools, computer-aided machine translation system. If translators use these translation tools properly, they shall improve the efficiency and quality of translation.

  3. Keywords: • multilingualism, machine translation system, Internet, CD-ROM, translation resources, computer-assisted terminology management system, parallel corpora, translation memories, localization tools, computer-aided machine translation system.

  4. English – lingua franca? • 80 percent of all business transactions in Denmark are carried out in English. • Many large corporations have adopted English as their official language. • 85 percent of international organizations use English as their working language. • In Europe, 99 percent of all international organizations have English as one of their official languages.

  5. English – lingua franca? • 98 percent of all German physicists and 83 percent of all German chemists publish their findings in English. • 90 percent of all scientific publications are written in English. • The majority of Nobel Prizes go to laureates who are citizens of countries where English is the official language. • English is the default language for international scientific conferences. No matter where they take place or what their specific topics are. • english-reader.JPG

  6. Linguistic uniformity or multilingualism ? • In the world, there are 6000 different languages with different cultural backgrounds. • in Welsh of United Kingdom, the people speak welsh language. • In USA, some people speak Spanish. • The multilingualism is very popular and necessary.

  7. Multilingualism in European Union • IN EU institutions, its original 15 member states have the privilege of using their state languages to conduct their official business. • This multilingualism is made possible by the work of about 4000 in-house translators, interpreters and terminologists and many more freelancers. • With 11 official languages (for 15 states) and 110 possible language-pair combinations, in 1997, 2 billion euros were spent on translation. • This does not include the more than 200,000 pages translated by EC-SYSTRAN MT system each year.

  8. Multilingualism in European Union -- cont • Each additional official language increases the demands by 250 to 300 linguists. • With the expansion of the EU by as many as 12 new members and the integration of 10 new languages, the number of combinations would increase exponentially, resulting in 420 combinations of 21 languages.

  9. Localization in business • The clients will only buy in their own language. • The sellers need to speak the language of the customer and to adopt their conduct and products to the specific characteristics of the local market . • Localization is not only for products, but also for the methods of designing, producing, marketing and distribution.

  10. Internet and translation • Internet becomes a multilingualism network. • 2000-2005, internet growth of English is only 126.9%, while internet growth of Russian is 664.5%, Portuguese 327.3%, Chinese 309.6%, French 235.9%. • Growth rate in number of Internet users in non-English speaking countries are much higher than in English speaking countries. • Dominant position of English was broken. • Translation becomes more and more important. • internet-langue.doc

  11. Information explosion • In information age, the snowballing acceleration of available information resulted the information explosion. • The amount of knowledge to be processed within the next decade is larger than the amount of knowledge accumulated during the past 2500 years. • 165,000 scientific journals are currently being published. • 20,000 new scientific papers are produced every day.

  12. Information explosion • The amount of data that is circulating on the Internet on any given day is larger than all the information available throughout the 19 century (Der Spiegel, 1996) • The combined vocabulary of technical and scientific disciplines amounted to 30 million words in 1991 (Siemens, 1991)

  13. Translation market • According to the study by Allied Business Intelligence, the global translation market is 10.4 billion in 1999 and 17.2 billion in 2003 respectively. • In 1997, the EU-funded ASSIM study estimated the total turnover of the translation markets of 18 member states of the EU and EEA (European Economic Area ) to be 3.75 billion euros with software, audio-visual and multimedia translation constituting 20 percent of the total turnover.

  14. Translation market • According to ASSIM study, the total number of in-house and external translators in EU and EEA exceeds 100,000. • The total turnover of the translation market in China continent exceeded 10 billion Yuan. • Electronic translation tools will be helpful in translation

  15. Using electronic translation tools • According to ASSIM study, more than 50 percent of translators interviewed for the 1997 ASSIM report were using electronic dictionaries, and about one-third of the translators were using translation memory systems. • A lot of translators in China continent and Hong Kong were using electronic tools in their translation.

  16. Electronic Translation Tools • Machine Translation System • Translation Resources on Internet • Translation Resources on CD-ROM • Computer-Assisted Terminology Management • Parallel Corpus as Translation Tools • Translation Memory • Localization Tools • Computer-Assisted Translation System

  17. Machine Translation System • The first attempts to mechanize translation were made as early as the 1930s. • Weaver memorandum (1949) • “I have a text in front of me which is written in Russian but I am going to pretend that is really written in English and that is has been coded in some strange symbols. All I need to do is strip off the code in order to retrieve the information contained in the text.” • MT is a decoding system.

  18. Warren Weaver (1947) ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf kowazoanv ...

  19. Warren Weaver (1947) e e e e ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv e e e hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf e kowazoanv ...

  20. Warren Weaver (1947) e e e the ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv e e e hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf e kowazoanv ...

  21. Warren Weaver (1947) e he e the ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv e e e t hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf e kowazoanv ...

  22. Warren Weaver (1947) e he e of the ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv e e e t hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf e kowazoanv ...

  23. Warren Weaver (1947) e he e of the fof ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv e f o e o oe t hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf ef kowazoanv ...

  24. Warren Weaver (1947) e he e of the ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv e e e t hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf e kowazoanv ...

  25. Warren Weaver (1947) e he e is the sis ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv e s i e i ie t hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf es kowazoanv ...

  26. Warren Weaver (1947) decipherment is the analysis ingcmpnqsnwf cv fpn owoktvcv of documents written in ancient hu ihgzsnwfv rqcffnw cw owgcnwf languages ... kowazoanv ...

  27. Warren Weaver (1947) When I look at an article in Russian, I say to myself: This is really written in English, but it has been coded in some strange symbols. I will now proceed to decode.

  28. FAHQT can not be achieved • But Full Automatic High-Quality Translation (FAHQT) can not be achieved using today’s technology. • Bar-Hillel’s example (1959), • John was looking for his toy box. Finally he found it. The box was in the pen. John was very happy. • How we can decide the sense of “pen” is a play-pen, and is not the writing tool. It is very difficult using today’s technology !

  29. MT in SAP company. • SAP uses the mainframe-based Metal MT system for translations from German to English. • SAP see MT as enhancing productivity and of growing importance in the company’s translation methodology. • SAP has found that using MT, under the best circumstances, can be two or four times faster than traditional translation methods.

  30. Multilingual MT system -- Systran • The Systran translation from English to Chinese is readable. • Web of Systran：http://www.systransoft.com • systran.JPG

  31. Multilingual Intelligent hand-phone • ‘Beijing city guide’ is a multilingual translation hand-phone (Beijing Information development Company, 2006-08) • hand-phone.jpg • Foreign visitor type in “I want to Beijing Hotel”, hand-phone can translate it as “我想去北京饭店”. • Taxi driver type in “欢迎你来北京”, hand-phone can translate it as “You are welcome to Beijing”

  32. Translation Resources on Internet • Internet is the language resource for translation. • Finding data on the Internet is no problem at all. • But finding reliable information is a rather difficult task. • Finding the information you really need can be very time-consuming and often frustrating.

  33. Three strategies for Internet search • Institutional search through URL（Uniform Resource Locator）. • Thematic search via subject trees. • Keyword search via search engine. Search engine basically consist two components: • A large index of words contained in web documents. • Retrieval software that lets you search for words in the index and then display the matching documents on the screen.

  34. Libraries online and virtual bookstores • In order to understand the source text, it may be as necessary to access libraries and browse virtual bookstore. • Via OPAC（http://catalog.loc.gov）,you can search main libraries. catalog.jpg • Via Amazon（http://www.amazon.com）, you can browse the virtual bookstores on web. amazon.JPG

  35. General encyclopedias • Via Britannica online, you can search Encyclopaedia Britannica on line. • http://www.britannica.com • britannica.JPG

  36. Specialized encyclopedias • PC Webopedia is to the world of specialized online encyclopedias. • It is a English reference work for information and communication technology (ICT). It contains a multitude of ICT terms, including elaborate and easy-to-understand definitions. • Via PC Webopedia（http://www.pcwebopedia.com）,you can search ICT encyclopedias on line. • webopedia.JPG

  37. General monolingual dictionaries • Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary is available online. • Via Merriam-Webster（http://www.m-w.com）, you can search either the dictionary or the thesaurus. • Simply enter your search terms, and click the search button. • M-W.JPG

  38. General multilingual dictionaries • One-Look Dictionary is a search platform allowing you to search simultaneously about 600 word lists, glossaries, dictionaries and databases. • Via OneLook（http://www.onelook.com）, you can search the online multilingual dictionaries. one-look.JPG • Via “金山词霸”（http://cb.kingsoft.com）, you can search Chinese-English or English-Chinese dictionaries online. kingsoft.JPG

  39. Multilingual Terminology databases • Via Termite（http://www.itu.int）, you can search online multilingual terminology database of International Telecommunication Union (ITU). itu.JPG • Via Eurodicautom（http://europa.eu.int/eurodicautom）, you can search the online EU multilingual terminology database. In 1999, it contained 5.5 million entries and 180,000 abbreviations in the EU’s 11 official languages. eurodautom.JPG

  40. Newspaper and magazine archives • Via Spanish newspaper ABC (http://www.abc.es), German newspaper Die Welt (http://www.welt.de), American magazine Newsweek (http://www.newsweek.com), you can search the related background information for your translation. • abc.JPG • welt. JPG • Newsweek. JPG

  41. Translation Resources on CD-ROM • Translation resources on CD-ROMs are offline language resources. CD-ROM can offer information offline. • CD-ROMs are able to store vast amounts of data (in general around 650 Mb), They are highly suitable for storing multimedia information or huge amounts of textual data. The contents of the 32-volume edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica can be stored on a single CD-ROM. • CD-ROMs are fairly cheap to produce. • Multimedia ability: graphics, audio and video sequences are easily integrated. • The use of hyperlinks allows for effective networking of entries (for cross-references, synonyms, etc)

  42. Encyclopedia on CD-ROM • Encyclopedia of China on CD-ROM。 • encyclop.jpg • Britannica Concise Encyclopedia on CD-ROM。 • concise-encyclo.JPG

  43. Specialized encyclopedia on CD-ROM • Construction Installation Encyclopedia。 • constrution.JPG

  44. General dictionaries on CD-ROM • Oxford English Dictionary (OED) on CD-ROM。 OED-3.JPG • Bibliorom Larouse on CD-ROM。larouse.JPG

  45. Electronic dictionaries in palm • Children talking dictionary and spell corrector • Various English dictionaries • Bilingual dictionaries • Franklin. JPG

  46. Computer-assisted terminology management • Professional translation is mostly technical translation. • A technical translator is forced to keep up with the many fast changes that are taking place in the fields of information technology, manufacturing, business, medicine, biotechnology ,etc. • It would be unrealistic to expect a translator to be a nature expert in all these fields. • But the translator must to be an expert in quickly finding the information that he is lacking. • Search for terminology can take up to 75% of a translator’s time). • Terminology management is a general term for the documentation, storage, manipulation and presentation of specialized vocabulary. It can help the translator to resolve the problems of terminology.

  47. Trados’ MultiTerm • Main functions of Trados’ MultiTerm（http://trados.com） • Creating a new terminology database entry. • Importing terminology data. • Importing data from a word processor • Retrieving terminology data • Exporting terminology data • Creating word lists, glossaries or dictionaries. • Distributing terminology data • Exporting data via WinWord • Exchanging data between a word-processor and MultiTerm • trados.JPG • trados-term.JPG

  48. Corpora as translation tools • Corpus constitutes the raw textual material for various forms of linguistic analysis. The parallel corpus can help translator to compare the source language and target language. • Using corpora to check the acceptability of translation text. • Using Internet documents to Create a corpus. • Retrieving data from your corpus with WordSmith（http://www1.oup.com/elt/catalogue/Multimedia/Wordsmith）. • Creating the wordlist. • Concordance shows the occurrence of a given search term in its textual context. • Finding the keywords from a short article. wordsmith.JPG • Using Alta Vista Personal（http://altavista.com）to index and search local documents. altvista.JPG

  49. Bible – bilingual parallel corpus • Following is the segments of bible corpus（http://www.o-bible.com/b5/int.html）: • 1:1[hb5] 起 初 　 神 創 造 天 地 。    [kjv] In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.     [bbe] At the first God made the heaven and the earth. • 1:2[hb5] 地 是 空 虛 混 沌 ． 淵 面 黑 暗 ． 　 神 的 靈 運 行 在 水 面 上 。     [kjv] And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.     [bbe] And the earth was waste and without form; and it was dark on the face of the deep: and the Spirit of God was moving on the face of the waters. • 1:3[hb5] 　 神 說 、 要 有 光 、 就 有 了 光 。     [kjv] And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.     [bbe] And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. • 1:4[hb5] 　 神 看 光 是 好 的 、 就 把 光 暗 分 開 了 。     [kjv] And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.     [bbe] And God, looking on the light, saw that it was good: and God made a division between the light and the dark, • 1:5[hb5] 　 神 稱 光 為 晝 、 稱 暗 為 夜 ． 有 晚 上 、 有 早 晨 、 這 是 頭 一 日 。     [kjv] And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.     [bbe] Naming the light, Day, and the dark, Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

  50. Translation memories & localization tools • Since many products are based on previously existing products, the corresponding documentation is also based on prior documentation. • Research has shown that 50% or more of the elements in a text can be repeated in the same text. • If those elelments have been translated previously, it will be useful for translators to be able to recycle that prior work. • Translation Memories (TMs) recycle existing translations so as to reduce time and costs as well as improve quality and consistency.

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