We already wrote about the intriguing history of machine translation but today, we want to dive deeper into the way you can benefit from hiring an LSP that relies on AI and machine translation.

As technology advances, so do our translation practices

Standing still won’t stop the world from spinning around you. You just might get dizzy in the process. The same goes for important advancements in technology. Early adopters always have a competitive edge, so it’s up to you to choose whether you’ll adapt or deny the reality.

We at Ciklopea always choose the first option because we believe that technology, people, and processes are at the core of our services. When it comes to applying AI in translation, it probably sounds a lot more complicated than it really is. If you have the right tech, skills, and experience, you can incorporate machine translation into the translation process fairly easily.

The truth is, machine translation can save up to 60% of translators’ time. This means two things for you as a client: 1) you will get translated content faster and 2) you will optimize your costs.

However, it’s important to be crystal clear here: when we say “machine translation”, we don’t mean pasting your content into Google Translate and sending it back to you. Why would anybody pay for that?

We’re talking about using special technology that does the “heavy lifting” for our translators so that they can do human post-editing afterward and ensure that the content is properly localized. In return, you can launch your product on the international market faster.

When using AI translations and human post-editing is a good idea

In situations where you want to suddenly scale a project (i.e. pivoting from expanding to two markets to expanding to four markets), then it makes sense to include machine translation combined with human post-editing because this gives you the upper hand when it comes to speed. You certainly don’t want to lose any revenue by being late to market.

Another scenario in which it makes sense to rely on AI includes translation projects that include repetitive content. These can be anything from manuals and user guides to privacy policies and other uniform legal documentation (e.g. GDPR and Cookie Policies for EU citizens). So if you need these kinds of materials reproduced quickly in multiple languages, using machine translation significantly cuts down the time needed to translate these kinds of documents.

Plus, with AI in the form of a translation memory, any risk of inconsistency is reduced by automatically filling in the translated content where the repetition occurs. This allows translators to focus on maximizing translation quality.

When you should skip AI translation

In our experience, machine translation cannot be fully utilized when translating marketing content, branded materials, or long-form SEO articles. For example, SEO content requires knowledge of on-page optimization and at least basic keyword analysis skills.

Marketing and branded materials might even require transcreation because it’s important to adapt to different locales while still preserving the look and feel of the brand. This is something in which machines tend to fall short and where human creativity is still necessary.

Balance costs by working with the right LSP that knows AI translations

The main benefit of being open to machine translation post-editing (MTPE) is balancing costs and creating a win-win situation for yourself.

By allowing your chosen team of translators to work with machine translation and AI, you can cut costs where human post-editing is sufficient. Then simply allocate your remaining resources to projects that are more complex. These might include tricky legal and financial translations, software, or other tech product localizations that are too complex or sensitive to be entrusted to machines.

At Ciklopea, we are big believers in the combined strength of people and AI tech, and every project can benefit from it. The only question is – to what extent?

For a nice overview of the AI translations and MTPE services we offer, we invite you to visit this page.

If you’d like to discuss your project or ask any questions about the way we work with our customers, feel free to schedule a discovery call. We’re always happy to hear from you!

The post How AI Can Ensure Faster and More Affordable Translations appeared first on Ciklopea.

Before we delve deeper into the procedures, it should be noted that the choice of accurate and appropriate terminology in the life sciences sector will depend upon the target audiences and purpose of the materials.

If the content is targeted at the patients/end users who are not necessarily familiar with the expert terminology, we may want to use the terms that such audiences will understand.

These are the so-called patient-facing materials and may include a wide range of content from informed consent forms and various patient surveys to marketing materials and user interfaces of medical devices.

Another group of content is targeted at the industry professionals and/or regulators and the language of these materials needs to feature the industry-accepted terms, consistent with the scientific and legal conventions of the target market. These materials also include a wide range of materials, from clinical trial protocols to SmPCs.

The Heritage, the Modern Times and the Speed

The largest part of the medical/pharmaceutical vocabulary in the European languages originates from Latin, Greek and Arabic, making it an international, almost universal lexical stock, and while traditionally it took little more than adapting a Latin/Greek/Arabic phrase in accordance with the target language orthography to render a usable translation, with English having become the lingua franca and the language of much of the contemporary technological and scientific development, this situation looks somewhat different.

Most of the terms describing modern medical procedures, diagnostics, equipment and devices are coined in English every day, combining the traditional terminology with new technologies, at a much faster pace than these terms are adopted in other, comparatively smaller languages.

This situation is frequently resolved by the healthcare professionals simply using the English terms with little to no adaptation out of necessity and this is one of those case when terminology management, as one of the standard procedures in the language industry, truly acts as an auxiliary discipline to the life sciences.

What is terminology management?

Terminology management is a multistage process of identifying, translating, storing and maintaining searchable multilingual terminology bases for use on translation/localization projects.

For best possible results, terminology bases should be developed in collaboration with the client/client’s subject matter experts as the best practices show that client’s input regarding the explanation of new technologies and the desired solutions before/at the early stages of the project can speed up the process dramatically and generate results of higher quality.

Although they are also developed and used in conjunction with productivity software (CAT tools), unlike translation memories that store translated segments (sentences or paragraphs) in a single language pair, terminology bases store only translations of specific terms and provide a quick and reliable reference to the translators and reviewers working on the project.

Terminology bases can be described as customized advanced dictionaries and some of their benefits include:

• Terminology bases are multilingual (they can contain translations for specific terms in many languages);
• Terminology bases can contain specific notes (clarifying the context, e.g. which translation should be used for the patient-facing materials);
• Terminology bases can contain images/definitions (very useful for providing additional context);
• Prohibited terms / terms that must remain in the source languages (DNT terms) can be defined.
• Terminology bases are stored and can be reused on future projects, ensuring lexical and stylistic consistency.

Benefits of terminology bases

Terminology bases are one of the building blocks of any successful/lean translation process.

A result of joint effort of the linguists, client’s subject matter experts and the experts working on the technical preparation and execution of translation projects, terminology bases with their versatile functions ensure a faster and leaner translation process with less editing in the quality assurance stages.

Side effects

While terminology bases are an excellent tool, they are not a substitute for a magic wand that will make any bad translation go away.

Unclear/missing context of the desired terms may actually generate very bad results (just consider the entirely different meanings of simple words such as thread or probe in different medical and pharmaceutical applications and the issues that might arise from these differences).

Terminology bases usually do not include different grammar case forms, often leading to reporting false errors in the quality assurance phase.

However, when done right and in the hands of an experienced and focused linguist team, terminology bases ensure accuracy, appropriateness and fluency of the translated/localized materials that fulfill their ultimate purpose of bringing the medicinal and pharmaceutical products to the global markets.

The post Word for Word and More: Terminology Management for the Pharmaceutical Industry appeared first on Ciklopea.

I have learned only here what it really means being a true translator, how to be a team member and cooperate with other translators on various translation projects, but how to be independent as well. I have learned to use the CAT tools and translated various types of material, thus gaining the experience that makes me a better translator with every passing day and that will surely help me in my further career.

Given the fact that the university education needs to be advanced with practice and deeper insights into the challenges translator face every day, I believe it is ideal to start work as early as possible, in a stimulating environment, with colleagues who are willing to share their knowledge and experience with others, and who are a pleasure to work with. I have found all of this at Ciklopea.

This priceless experience and the first step to the world of translation will be provided to all who apply for Ciklopea Summer School, taking place in August!

The post Professional Translating from a Student’s Perspective: the Story of Jasna Subašić appeared first on Ciklopea.

Preparation is everything. If you are rolling out a product onto a new market, there are several pieces of information you should share with your translation provider to keep your project on track and make sure no unexpected delays or costs arise.

If you are rolling out a product onto a new market, there are several pieces of information you should share with your translation provider to keep your project on track and make sure no unexpected delays or costs arise.

1. What will be translated?

Devices and appliances usually have a range of buttons, some marked with symbols and some with words, and many of them have user interfaces as well. When introducing a product onto a new market, you will have to decide whether or not these will be translated into the local language. Of course, the best decision is to localize and make the product more accessible to customers in the new market, but sometimes there simply is not enough time or resources, or the market is simply too small to warrant complete localization, so you might decide to leave the interface and buttons in English. Whatever the decision, it is one of the crucial decisions you need to share with your translation team before starting any translation projects, no matter how small the project might be.

Otherwise, you might end up with a customer not being able to match the instructions in the user manual to what they see on their user interface. Or with a real-life user interface with commands, warnings, or prompts translated differently than the user interface printed in your user manual.

2. Is there a product naming policy?

Gone are the times when Shakespeare wondered what was in a name – marketing experts have been aware of the value of product names for a long time now. Even if you have made sure that your product has a name that works in the local language and has no unwanted resemblance to any other words or phrases which might make your product the butt of a joke in the new market (like the notorious “Pee Cola” drink), you still have to consider several other issues – does the local language have inflections and do you want the name of your product to appear with different word endings? Or would you rather add a modifier before the name so you can conform to the rules of the local language and keep your product name intact? If the local language uses a different script, do you want to keep the name in Latin script?

3. Are dialogue boxes expandable and are there any character limits for translation?

Although it is quite a technical issue, a timely response to this question might save you and your technicians a lot of time later on in the project. What is more, it might spare them and your customers from the frustration of seeing only half of the command on a screen or trying to understand what a string of words abbreviated to only a couple of letters really stands for.

4. What date, time, and currency formats are supported, and which measurement system do you use?

Keep in mind that dates and times are written differently in various parts of the world. Some will write the year first, some the month, some the day. Some will use the 12-hour scale, some will use the 24-hour scale. Also, although widely used, the metric system is not the only system of measurement in the world. You might want to add some inches, feet, or elbows to your meters when localizing your product to save the locals the frustration of picking up a calculator. Or you might do away with them to avoid confusion in markets using the metric system.

5. Does your font support various character sets?

The perfect font for your user interface, operating instructions, or user manual might not be the best choice for all local markets. Languages that use Latin script use a range of letters that might not be supported by every font. It is good to check this before you start a translation project so you do not end up spending hours adding lost diacritics to your documents.

The post 5 Things You Need To Share with Your Translation Provider When Localizing a Product appeared first on Ciklopea.