Courses in Translation Memory Tools

Translation memory courses where students learn to work with these tools, should ideally be held in a room equipped with enough computers – if possible, one for every student. An Internet connection, a translation memory tool and a word processor as well as CD-ROM dictionaries and other background materials should also be available to students. Students should also have solid ICT knowledge. To acquire these skills, the ICT Skills courses can be completed before this course.

The main objectives of these courses are to learn:

• how to use TM tools – using one or several TM tools as examples
• when it makes sense to use TM tools and when not
• the advantages and drawbacks of using TM tools
• translation problems originating from the use of TM tools
• different concepts of TM tools – database vs. corpus
• possible workflows in different professional environments

These courses should be a prerequisite for courses in LSP translation.

• Translation memory courses must be planned for one or two semesters. Courses should be held regularly – e.g. two hours per week. This would depend on the time dedicated to them in the relevant study courses – Bachelors (BA), Masters (MA), etc.
• Depending on course objectives and students' level, teachers can point out which parts of eCoLoTrain courses are relevant for teaching theoretical issues, such as basic concepts and principles of TM tools, creation and maintenance of TMs, functionalities and translation workflow with TM tools.
• Teachers can also use eCoLoTrain online materials to prepare for their face-to-face lectures.
• To practice theoretical principles, teachers can also use or refer to our eCoLoTrain exercises, which contain different activities, such as aligning source and target texts, creating translation memories, performing analysis and pre-translation, importing, maintaining and exporting translation memories.
• If raw materials are not available, the eCoLoRe training kits can be successfully used for this purpose.
• Teachers should bear in mind that besides preparing and organising course content (translation memory databases, aligned files, file structure, etc.), they must also consider technical issues, such as defining user rights and user IDs for the use of databases by students – this is, however, usually done by system administrators or CAT tool specialists.

Since in fact working as professional translator with translation memory tools is possible in several different scenarios, CAT tools teachers can design various types of courses to simulate these scenarios. These can include, for example: freelancers and translation agency. Students can work individually or in groups according to class objectives, number of students and the number of available PCs. For the courses on translation memory tools the main objective of simulating these scenarios is to exemplify the use of TM tools in translation projects, i.e. the main focus is placed on the use of the tools themselves, not on translation.

• Freelancer: In this scenario, students will play the role of freelance translators who have to work with a translation memory tool for translating their source texts. Depending on the course objectives, several real-life scenarios and tasks can be simulated and practised in class, for example:
  • Translation of a new project based on an existing TM
  • Importing a TM provided by a client
  • Alignment of previous translations to create a TM and translating a new text based upon this TM
  • Creation of a new, empty TM for translating a project

• Translation agency: To simulate this particular scenario it is desirable that students have good translating skills and already have a solid knowledge of TM tools. They should also have basic knowledge on the principles of translation project management. The teacher will assign a different translation project to each group of students according to students’ language pairs. This means, students will have to work in teams and each one will have a different task to do according to the role assigned by the teacher (e.g. terminologist, translator, project manager, etc.). Examples of possible tasks in one project are:
  • Preparing the translation project: setting due dates and responsibilities, source file analysis and creating translation memory and terminology databases for the project (project managers). They will also be responsible for creating the translation kit to be sent to the translators containing all the resources necessary, the source texts in the required format – which may include a pretranslation – and a translation brief. For detailed information on translation project management, please refer to the eCoLoTrain Project Management Module.
  • Searching and collecting terminology (terminologists)
  • Maintaining terminology databases (terminologists)
  • Translating text using translation memory tool and terminology database (translators)
  • Storing translations in translation memory (translators)
  • After discussing different translation solutions, making necessary changes in translations and updating translation strings in TMs (translators)
  • Delivering completed translation, termbase, and translation memory together with comments on translation difficulties or technical problems with tools (project managers)
  • Checking TMs for correctness and merging them into a single TM database

• At the end of either of these two scenarios, each group (terminologists, translators, project managers) can deliver short presentations sharing their experiences. Finally, students can be engaged in class discussions about the advantages and disadvantages, challenges and shortcomings of the terminology management tool(s) studied.

• If various tools are to be taught, the functionalities that they offer can be compared.

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