One of the most important aspects of technical translation is standardising the technical terms used, and the Translation Terms Database is at the heart of the translation process.
Purpose of the translation database
The objectives of collecting translation terms:
- Retain and standardise vocabulary on a project (like a term base)
- Provide search vocabulary for other projects
- Provide synonyms and a deeper understanding of terms
- Vocabulary, project tracking, production stats
- Calculate translation volumes per month, customer and type of work
- Store agency contacts, email addresses, logins to agency portals
Design of the translation database
At the outset, I stored my translation terms in Evernote and on Google sheets. But after a while, searching for terms previously encountered was quite time-consuming.
I designed the translation database to store translation terms in source and target languages (French to English). It could be adapted for any language pair.
Terms are attached to a project but as they are in one table, I can easily search for any term from any project.
I realized that the database could also be used to generate statistics about projects and the domains in which I work. This is part of defining my profile as a technical translator.
Translation database table structure
The essential tables are described below in a summary class diagram.
A term can be attached to only one project. A possible adaptation would be to allow terms to be attached to more than one project. Terms may have significantly different meanings depending on the context. A project links back to the agency and all terms within a project.
Translation database functions
The advantage of a bespoke database is to create functions tailor-made to your process. The essential requirement for me was to store terms and then be able to search for them from one location.
Search for terms. While terms are standardised within a project, they are also available for search across all projects. So, I often search for a term to see if I have come across it in previous projects and how I handled it. The following fields are searchable.
Alternative terms
Two important fields: the chosen term in my target language (English) and the alternatives. This helps me reflect on the most appropriate term during translation.
At the end of a project, I may send a list of terms to the customer with the target files to show them the alternatives considered or for customers to choose the appropriate industry-specific term.
I store the abbreviations in French and English. It is often important to spell out an abbreviation to confirm its meaning and to determine, with customers, whether an abbreviation should be translated or left as is.
Deduplication of terms
Terms may come up in more than one context or project. Sometimes the same word may mean different things in different contexts, or be combined with a strict duplicate.
This function is still useful to combine terms encountered on current projects. I take care though only to combine terms if they have the same meaning and are essentially synonyms, in which case the English term of one goes into the ‘alternative field’ of the other.
Standardising translation terms
This is the recording and standardisation of terms in ‘everyday’ translation. Writing down and evaluating the synonyms for terms leads to a better understanding of an industry-standard term A text may use similar terms, or one might translate terms using similar words only to realise that two similar terms are indeed the same (particularly for large projects).
Project vocabulary serves as a reference for the terms used and to standardise them during proofreading. Customers come back if you are familiar with their technical or industry vocabulary. The database allows you to pull up the vocabulary for the customer to work on repeat projects. At the same time, all terms are available for search, no matter what project.
Each project in the translation database has its own specific terms which I record against the project ID, so I can come back and look at the vocabulary for specific projects. I can search through all the vocabulary to find the term I’m looking for. I can attach an existing term to the current project, enter new terms, and thus constitute the terms for a project. This is also an opportunity to improve terms I’ve come across already.
I import term bases into the translation database, technical dictionaries (such as the engineering one) which are available when I’m doing a project.
Measuring key performance data
I capture time spent on projects in the translation database. I work on projects in batches of half an hour, which I record using the timer screen. Purpose: time the work done with the timer screen
The timer screen is where I show the time spent on projects, and applies the Pomodoro method. The timer screen is the heart of the database. Its where I record time spent on projects. As you can see below, I record project time in batches. (I usually work according to the Pomodoro method, so often the batches are 30 minutes.) For each batch I record the number of words done draft or checked and can then calculate the average word rate.
The timer screen becomes the central screen to track my progress against initial estimate to know whether I'm on track for delivery.
It has been important to track words per hour and pleasing to note that wph is increasing. This might be due to increased efficiency. Also, the volume of machine translation is increasing so the number of words processed is on the rise. When will it reach a plateau?
Project progress
I can see my progress on the timer screen, how many days a job has taken me, my average hourly rate and word rate. The objective is to maximise production time at a favourable rate, and review productivity in a weekly GTD Review. But to get the data to do this review you have to measure production.
Translation project management
I import customer source documents, translate with or without machine translation, proofread and export the target document. I use the database to manage translation projects, customer contacts including customer portals, planning, and history of customer actions. I measure translation output, performance, productivity such as words done by day, week and year and been able to improve because of measurement.
Estimation of project delivery dates
I estimate a project for 1500 words at a word rate of 0.05, total price is 75 GBP. It will take me 1.5 hours, thus an hourly rate of 50 GBP. This is achieved two half hour batches of 750 words one translating to draft and a half hour proofing 1500 words.
In this example, I use a new project,
- Number of words: 1500
- Price: 75 EUR
- Time estimate: 1.5 hrs
- Estimated hourly rate: 50 EUR
The video below explains the key measures managed in the translation database and provides a brief explanation of hourly rate.
Measures from the translation database
I produce some or all of these combinations of indicators and review them regularly in my GTD Review to ensure that I'm on track. Whether for individuals projects, or overall productivity.
There are 6 main indicators but the core measures are average price per word and hourly rate.
Average translation rate: I measure the time taken for each project, the total number of words for each project, and the number of words translated per hour.
I want to know how many words I'm averaging overall. A high hourly word rate means that I’m working as fast as possible (maintaining quality). A rising word rate may be a sign of finding better ways of doing things (continuous improvement).
Average order price might highlight more profitable periods with relatively fewer large projects (low number, high price), against others with a high number of orders but at relatively low price.
Volume | Hourly rate | Word rate | Income | |
Period | Word volume and time spent | Hourly rate | Word rate | Average order by period |
Customer | Word volume by customer | |||
Project | Hourly rate by project | |||
Category | ||||
Task | Word rate by task type |
Production overview
The GTD review is an overview of performance, for which I measure some key data. The main thing is that I look at are the hourly rate, the word rate.
Monthly production
Overall, I can see how many words I’m doing per month and whether I’m putting in the hours. Project words is the number of words in the order. But if a project is 5,000 words, I might do 10,000 in all, 5,000 to draft and 5,000 to proofread. All this time and volume must be (and is) counted in the hourly rate.