TRANSLATION QUALITY CONTROL/ASSURANCE

AND

THE CORRESPONDING SOFTWARE

Translation Quality Assurance Process

Automated translation quality control

• The market for electronic translation assistants offers several free and paid tools for automated quality control of translations, which differ in price, functionality and efficiency. While the volume of translations is growing rapidly and the time of their implementation is decreasing, the translation load is growing exponentially.
• The need to maintain the required level of translation quality remains unchanged. In such a situation, automation of quality assurance tasks can become a viable strategy for translation service providers.

Aspects of translation quality

• The task of assuring the quality of translation can be divided into two categories. The most traditional definition of translation quality is that the translated text must be grammatically correct, have the correct spelling, punctuation, and sound as if it had been written by a native speaker.
• All tasks of ensuring the quality of translation can be attributed to the language plane. Obviously, most of these tasks require human intervention, and they are quite difficult to automate.

Translation Formatting

• However, there is another aspect of quality that we will call formatting.
• Ensuring this type of translation quality means not only verifying that the original text formatting was not corrupted, but also identifying unnecessary double spaces, double dots at the end of the sentence, checking that the term was not accidentally translated differently, and that the project is done according to his glossary, and whether all the numerous other tasks that do not require knowledge of the language of translation have been completed.

Translation Formatting 2

• Formatting is a monotonous and tedious task, but fortunately it is easy to formalize, making it an ideal candidate for automation.

​

• Stopping putting this on the sharp eyes of a person - a quality assurance specialist - will significantly increase both the level of error detection and productivity of the translator.

​

TM and Translation Quality

• The use of translation memory leads to the need to ensure that the translator has not used fuzzy matches, made the necessary corrections in fuzzy matches, and to make sure that the matches were perfectly correct and did not get into the translation memory incorrectly.
• Obviously, these tasks require a lot of attention, even care. It is not easy to find a person who can give fast and lasting results 8 hours a day, 5 days a week.

10 steps to ensure the quality of translations

• � Stage 1. In order to ensure quality, all translations are read and checked. The whole translation process from start to finish consists of 10 stages to ensure the quality of translations, which has the ability to make high quality translations, as well as to ensure their accuracy. Stage 1: Evaluation of the text
• Initially, the manager pre-evaluates the scope of work: timing, file types, glossaries (if available) and the final file format. The manager together with the client determines which texts should be left untranslated, which should be translated and which should be deleted.
• At this stage, the manager identifies any errors and inconsistencies in the original text (or other issues that need to be agreed), as well as stipulates them with the client.
• Stage 2: Creating a work model / preparing the text for translation
• During the project evaluation, the need to create a work model is determined. This is necessary for a number of reasons. In some cases, files need to be pre-cleaned or reformatted into an editable form. This step is greatly simplified when using the Trados program.

10 steps to ensure the quality of translations 2

• Stage 3: Creating a glossary
• For large projects, it is recommended that standard glossaries be created so that all translators working on the project can use them. If the glossary is not created in advance, it is formed on the basis of translated materials.
• By creating a glossary, you will receive a list of approved terms, which guarantees the sequence of subsequent transfers, as well as their quality. The translation agency may have a translator department that coordinates the work of translators and develops glossaries for each client. Creating a glossary is a continuous process because it is constantly updated and changed.

Steps to Ensure Translation Quality

• Step 4: Translation
• At this stage, the manager sends the text to the translator in accordance with his experience and qualifications, as well as based on the content of the document and the subject. Freelance translators and translation agencies should work with native speakers. The translator translates the text and sends it to the manager for verification.
• Step 5: Editing� All translations are checked by qualified and professional translators / editors to guarantee their quality. Because translations are performed by living people, we do not fly in the clouds and understand that even professional translators sometimes make mistakes and stylistic inaccuracies. That is why translations should be viewed in any case, focusing on grammar, design, choice of words and so on.

Steps to Ensure Translation Quality

• Stage 6
• Proofreading of translations by a translator / client
• After editing the translation, it is sent together with the comments to the translator who did the translation.
• The translator makes the proposed corrections to the document at his own discretion.
• If the client makes changes to the translation before its formatting, the translator makes changes to the translation in edit mode.

​

​

Steps to Ensure Translation Quality

​

• Step 7: Formatting
• The team of layout designers will prepare the document in the format in which the customer wants to receive it, taking into account the cultural specifics. Usually the same program is used for document layout as when creating the original file. However, in some cases, the program is used that is best suited for the layout of a document given the specifics of the language and other requirements.
• Step 8: Quality control / adjustment
• After formatting, the document must be adjusted accordingly, namely: place the text in accordance with the original, use the desired font, match the headers and footers in the document, correctly write names and surnames, check the numbering of the original text, check the correctness of corrections, check the correct fields , pictures and text layout.

Steps to Ensure Translation Quality

• Step 9: Final verification of the translation
• One of the full-time translators or the translator who performed the translation will make a final check of the document to ensure that it is formatted correctly.
• The correctness of word transfer and possible inaccuracies made at the text formatting stage are checked. After that, depending on the specifics of the project, the text is ready for printing and / or demonstration on the display screen.

​

​

Steps to Ensure Translation Quality

​

• Step 10: Final inspection / delivery
• The manager collects the entire translation, checking its compliance with the proposed conditions.
• The manager last checks that the layout of the text, page numbering, spelling of names and surnames, and other details match the original.
• Delivery methods depend on the volume of the document and deadlines.

​

Translation quality assurance software

(TQAS)

• Translation quality assurance programs (hereinafter - TQAS) compare the source and target segments of bilingual texts (files in .DOC,. RTF and .TTX format) in order to detect errors in the translated text.
• Such errors include: inconsistency in the translation of terms; terms that have not been translated according to the glossary of the translation project; omissions in translation; target segments identical to the segments of the source text; punctuation, capitalization and formatting errors, and incorrect matches of words that do not have matches.

​

HOW IT WORKS

Software products for translation quality assurance purposes are tools that assist in identifying common mistakes found in translated texts, using formal attributes. They work only with bilingual files that are created in professional translation software.

The quality assurance (QA) software analyzes the source and target text of a specific sentence or paragraph, and records all the suspicious segments in a special report. The user then decides whether those segments contain mistakes or not.

​

�Significant limitations of TQAS

​

• There are a number of limitations to the TQAS, some of which are listed below.
• • The TQAS cannot detect errors related to incorrect (or incomplete) understanding of the source text and poor stylistics or incorrect choice of the target language register.
• • When the NPF checks the terminology, they are limited by the amount of glossary used for the check.
• • TQAS often makes mistakes and gives erroneous marks of translation error because it does not "understand" that the source and target languages ​​may have different language rules (for example, punctuation and capitalization). The only TQAS that has different language settings is QA Distiller.

​

​

Examples of mistakes detected by such systems:

​

- The source and target text have different ending punctuation marks, upper/lower case letters, or formatting tags.

- The target text contains double spaces, spaces before punctuation marks, trailing spaces, etc.

- Incorrect decimal separators, measurement units, etc.

- The source text has abbreviations, while the target text does not (or vice versa).

- The same source segments are translated differently or, vice versa; the same translation is used for different source segments.

- The target text is much shorter or longer than the source text.

- There are untranslated segments or non-segmented text.

- The translated term does not match the one in the glossary.

- There are opening brackets without the corresponding closing brackets, incorrect quotation marks in the target text, etc.

- Spelling mistakes.

Examples of mistakes detected by such systems 2

As we can see, these are mainly the barely noticeable typos. Even professional translators can make such mistakes due to a lack of thorough attention. To look for such mistakes manually is a time-consuming task, whereas the QA software detects them immediately and without a hitch. That’s why, both translator and editor are recommended to run their texts through quality assurance systems: this will reduce the probability of negative feedback from their customers.

By entrusting these technical matters to the software, translators, and/or editors, are able to focus on more creative tasks, i.e. translation accuracy and the text quality.

​

TQAS Logic

• The TQAS assumes that the source text is always correct, but this is not always the case. If the translator corrects an error in the original sentence (for example, incorrect spelling of a word with a capital letter or incorrect punctuation), it can lead to erroneous detection of the error where it does not exist.
• There is a logic in the TQAS that all inconsistencies are equally bad. However, only special terminology should be translated sequentially, while general phrases that are identical in the source text may be translated differently in the target text in order to improve readability and translation style. Identical phrases may even require different translations depending on the context.

​

​

Translation quality assurance model

​

• The International Association for Localization Standards (translation, cultural and linguistic adaptation) - LISA (Localization Industry Standard Association) has developed a quality assurance model for localization and translation projects.
• This model takes into account the quality parameters used in practice by recognized leaders in the field of information technology: Microsoft, Digital Equipment, Rank Xerox, IDOC Europe, DLS and IBM.
• According to this model, the quality of translations can be ensured by two independent processes: selective verification of materials or continuous full control.

​

​

Translation quality assessment parameters

​

• Parameters for assessing the quality of translations are divided into 7 categories: translation adequacy, translation accuracy, translation compliance, accepted language quality, style, compliance with norms and standards of the country for which the translation is made, uniformity of terms, concepts and definitions.
• Within these categories, errors are classified as significant, serious and insignificant. In practice, quality control procedures are also often carried out according to world standards: DIN 2345, ISO 9002, UNI 10574 and SAE J2450. However, these approaches and standards can only complement the quality requirements set by each individual customer of translation services.

​

Translation Reviewing and Editing

• In human translation, there is a stage of the translation process called translation editing, when the translator checks the quality and completeness of his translation.
• During editing, the author of the translation or another person - the editor - compares the translation with the original in order to identify language errors, errors in punctuation, formatting and inaccuracies and in the translation of terms and the sequence of their use.
• In order to automate this process in some way, special translation quality assurance programs are developed that compare the source and target text.

​

​

Translation quality control (assurance) programs

​

• Many programs check the quality of translation in relation to: the sequence of translation of words (segment by segment); glossary matching; spelling; passes; untranslated fragments; inconsistency of figures; double spaces; tag inconsistencies; repetitions of words; parity of brackets and legs; spacing in combination with punctuation marks and other symbols.

​

The First TQAS

• The first program to check formatting, terminology, and spelling was Star Transit, released in 1998, 13 years after the first e-memory program for originals and translations.
• Currently, many such popular programs (Trados, DejaVu, WordFast, etc.) contain a translation quality assurance module. There are also separate translation quality control programs, such as ApSIC's XBench, Yamagata's QA Distiller, and DOG's ErrorSpy.

​

​

​

​

Advantages and disadvantages of TQAS

​

• The most commonly used translation quality assurance programs are those built into e-memory systems for originals and their translations Trados, Star Transit, WordFast and DejaVu.
• Among the positive aspects of translation quality assurance programs are the following: they allow not to do monotonous work on translation verification, increase the level of detection of translation errors and speed up the speed and efficiency of translators and allow easy training to work with them.
• The disadvantages of such programs are usually called functional limitations (checking the correctness of translations of only 10 types), insufficient thoroughness of checking the quality of translation compared to a human translator and the issuance of erroneous error messages. Of the free translation quality control programs, individual Wordfast and XBench programs perform best.

​

​

�Classification criteria for translation quality assurance programs 1

​

•   The first and most obvious criterion - according to the architecture, these programs are divided into standalone programs and plugins.
• Plug-ins are usually designed to ensure the quality of translations performed in the appropriate electronic memory environment to the originals and are generally not suitable for working with files of other formats, because it requires file conversion, which often leads to damage to internal tags and specific characteristics of electronic memory.

​

• A standalone program, on the other hand, often supports different input file formats and does not directly make changes to bilingual texts, but usually allows you to open them in your native electronic memory and make all the necessary changes there.

​

Classification criteria for translation quality assurance programs 2

• Another criterion for classification may be the approach to expanding, deepening and adjusting inspections.
• While some tools, such as Déjà Vu or Trados QA Checker, require some development knowledge to extend functionality, others, such as XBench, allow less technically savvy users to easily create their own validation rules.
• According to this criterion, one program (Star Transit) stands alone. Having a rather limited number of predefined validation parameters, it does not allow to expand the established set of validation rules and allows only minimal configuration to the target language.

​

Classification criteria for translation quality assurance programs 3

• Existing TQAS programs can also be classified according to the nature of the established set of verification rules. Some of these rules can be disabled when the user changes the scan configuration.
• QA Distiller, StarTransit and SDLX QA belong to this group of tools. The default configuration of other programs only allows for a rather limited set of checks, while other checks are also potentially supported through additional more complex configurations and / or regular expressions.
• These programs include Deja Vu, Wordfast and XBench. In this respect, ErrorSpy is a unique program, because although its configuration is quite easy to do, but at first it requires certain actions outside the program interface.

​

Classification criteria for translation quality assurance programs 4

And another criterion for the classification of TQAS is their ability to work with different encodings and scripts. The table below summarizes the existing QA instruments, however, it does not claim to be complete.

​

Now let's take a closer look at some translation quality assurance programs.

​

Linguistic Toolbox

Linguistic ToolBox (v3.64) is a software application that provides automated pre-processing and post-processing work for translated or to be translated documents. It integrates many applications previously used in production as stand-alone tools into one application, allowing you to easily perform QA tasks on your files, as well as to extract valuable linguistic information from them.

Linguistic ToolBox (LTB) is Lionbridge's automated linguistic Quality Assurance tool. With LTB language professionals can perform a wide variety of linguistic checks on either bilingual or monolingual files, including:

check translation consistency at a segment level

check adherence to translation glossaries

check UI/UA consistency

check spelling

check untranslated and empty segments

check adherence to pre-customized linguistic guidelines

These are some of the benefits of using Linguistic ToolBox:

provides a documentary record of the Linguistic ToolBox QA process

helps to perform a stronger QA Check

helps to identify specific training needs

helps to track translation quality

​

�

ApSIC's Xbench program

• Apsic ​​Xbench is a stand-alone (separate) program for automatic quality control of translated text and unification of terms used in translation.
• The program is available for download at: http://www.apsic.com/en/products_xbench.html.
• With Xbench you can analyze more than 20 types of bilingual files, including: text files, export memory export files, bilingual files of most translation platforms.

​

�Xbench by ApSIC 2

​

• By default, the program runs in full screen mode.
• As in any translation environment, it creates a single project, which can include both one and several files of different types related to a single translation project.

�Xbench by ApSIC 3

​

• Follow these steps to create a project.
• 1. In the upper left corner of the program window, in the Project menu, select New.
• 2. In the window, click the Add button and select the desired file type from the list of suggestions, and then click Next.
• 3. In the window, select the desired file and click Next. (This way you can open several files of different types (such as doc and ttx) that belong to the same project).�4. In the next window, select the Ongoing Translation check box, otherwise the program will not evaluate the quality.
• 5. Then click OK.
• 6. In the Project Properties window, check that all project files are present and make sure that they match the selected type.
• 7. Select the Ongoing Translation check box, and then click OK.

�Xbench by ApSIC 4

• After creating the project, you can start checking the text for errors.
• The check is carried out using the Project, Internet, QA, Instructions tabs.
• On the Project tab, you can check the translation of terms throughout the project.
• To do this, the term should be entered in the Source Term line. This can be done in two ways.

�Xbench by ApSIC 5

• 1. Enter the term manually in the Source Term or Target Term field and click the Search button.
• 2. In an open translated document, select the term and use the combination Ctrl + Alt + Ins to search for the term and display occurrences in the source text and Ctrl + Alt + Backspace to search for the term and display occurrences in the translated text.
• After that, the program window will display all segments that contain this term, which will allow them to compare and unify the translation.
• The Internet tab is used to search for a key term on the Internet.
• The QA - Quality Assurance tab allows you to highlight errors that occur in the translation.

�Xbench by ApSIC 6

• The Instructions tab is a tool for commenting errors and making remarks. Several options are available on the QA tab.
• So, you can check the entire text or select only the part that was translated within the project.
• To do this, select the New segments only checkbox in the Options area.
• In the Check group and List of checks areas, you can select the necessary check criteria or perform them all at once (recommended).

�Xbench by ApSIC 7

• Check group includes the following check groups:
• Basic- Untranslated Segments - search for untranslated segments
• ;- Inconsistency in Source - search for segments that have the same translation for different source;
• - Inconsistency in Target - search for segments that have different translations for the same source;
• - Target Same As Source - search for segments whose translation does not differ from the original;

�Xbench by ApSIC 8

• Content
• - Tag Mismatch - checking tags;
• - Numeric Mismatch - checking numerals in the source and translation;
• - Double Blank - searching for double spaces;Linguistic- Key Term Mismatch - checking translation against a list of keywords;
• - Project Checklist - checking against a project checklist;- Personal Checklist - checking against an individual checklist.
• ApSIC's Xbench provides simple and powerful quality assurance and terminology management tools in one package. Simply upload files in supported formats and take your translation quality to the next level.

�Xbench by ApSIC 9

• Xbench comes with some useful features to check translation quality and completeness, consistency of terminology, numbers, tags, key terms, etc. If you need more quality checks, you can create your own checklists to make sure your translations are perfect.
• Checklists are built on the powerful Xbench search engine, which allows you to find almost anything thanks to its PowerSearch mode and the flexibility of regular expressions or Microsoft Word templates.

�Xbench by ApSIC 10

• If you need to edit the translation due to errors found by the program, simply right-click and select the Edit Source option to open the file in the segment containing the error.
• Segment-level positioning is available for most formats, including Trados TagEditor, IBM Translation Manager, SDLX or MemSource.

QA Distiller 1

• Yamagata-Europe QA Distiller is a software application that allows you to automatically detect formal errors in translations and translation memory, and allows you to quickly and easily correct them.
• Such errors include errors of lack of translation, neglect of the translator, inconsistency in the use of terminology and formatting problems.
• QA Distiller is capable of batch file processing and supports language-dependent settings.

QA Distiller 2

• З. QA Distiller can edit files directly by double-clicking on the error message.
• You should go directly to the location of the error in the source file of the bilingual text, where it can be corrected on the spot.
• TMX and XLIFF files open in an internal text editor, where you can easily make the necessary corrections and update translations

​

QA Distiller 3

• QA Distiller can be easily integrated into the traditional localization process, providing a reliable, objective and consistent way to analyze and evaluate translation quality. The implementation of automated control leads to significant cost savings for service providers and end customers.
• Since translations are free from formal errors at the early stages of the process, proofreaders spend less time reviewing translations, editors insert fewer corrections into translated documents, and translation project managers do not waste time on feedback from translation project participants.
• QA Distiller can be called a dream come true for companies that believe in translation quality as a necessary factor to ensure smooth communication in the global market.

�ErrorSpy 1�

•  The German company D.O.G. has developed its first commercial software product for translation quality assurance GmbH ErrorSpy.
• ErrorSpy is used to assist proofreaders in their work. Translations are automatically checked for a number of characteristics. The proofreader is provided with a list of errors that he or she can edit. At the same time, ErrorSpy can be used to evaluate translations.
• Using objective and freely configurable criteria, ErrorSpy automatically generates translation scores and error lists.

�ErrorSpy 2

• How does ErrorSpy work? The procedure is relatively simple: the file to be scanned is read in ErrorSpy. The proofreader determines the tasks to be checked and ErrorSpy marks all places that deviate from this specification. What is being checked? ErrorSpy can check a number of features:
• - Terminology check: using the terminology list, ErrorSpy checks whether the translator used the correct terminology. A legitimate question is how a proofreader can guarantee to keep the translation sequence in the translation terminology, when the file has 1000 terms and 200 pages that need to be viewed. This is not a problem with ErrorSpy.
• Moreover, the program has the ability to create a reservation for several word forms (for example, the set 'S') and several translations of one term. ErrorSpy checks terminology in both directions. It therefore checks whether the term source is for the target term that was found.

​

�ErrorSpy 3

• - Checking for consistency: ErrorSpy marks all sentences or segments that are identical in the source language. If the translations differ for such segments, the proofreader is informed about such differences.
• - Numbers check: errors in the use of numbers are among the most serious. ErrorSpy not only checks whether the digits are identical in the source and target texts, but also checks how the decimal places correspond to the task at hand.
• - Checking translation completeness: you can specify a certain length for a sentence or text. All sentences that are too short are sent to the proofreader for checking. Therefore, it can find missing translations.

�ErrorSpy 4

• - Tag checking: many file formats contain tags. These tags can be accidentally deleted or damaged during the translation process. ErrorSpy informs about all segments containing tag errors.
• In addition, ErrorSpy offers the possibility to exclude certain tags from the check. For example, the proofreader can exclude a tag for conditional word division from the check, because such tags often disappear in translation.
• - Abbreviation checking: another source of errors is misunderstood abbreviations. ErrorSpy offers the ability to detect acronym patterns and check whether they are equivalent in both languages.

�ErrorSpy 5

• - Сorrect typing check: the correctness of punctuation marks is checked depending on the language.
• - Missing translations: this function performs a quick and easy query to find missing translations of words and sentences. The same source and target segments are presented to a human to check the correctness of the translation.
• No human is able to perform such large-scale checks accurately and quickly. With ErrorSpy, everyone can be sure that it will not miss the errors specified in the checking task. This is a huge help, especially when checking the correctness and quality of translation of large volumes of documents.

�ErrorSpy 6

• ErrorSpy reads both raw Trados files and text files that contain the original and the translation, sentence by sentence (sentences of the original and the translation can be separated by any delimiter).
• Similarly, you can check electronic memory programs for translations (Trados text formats or TMX files), Trados TTX files, Transit XV files or files.

�ErrorSpy 7

• Previously, it was difficult to produce error lists and evaluate translations objectively. Due to time constraints, many companies stopped providing feedback to translators on the quality of their translations.
• Using predefined error search criteria, ErrorSpy generates translation scores in seconds and produces an error list that can be sent to the translator. Thus, the scores are fair, objective and understandable.

� TransCheck 1�

•  
• The more time the translator spends on proofreading and polishing the translation, the higher the quality of the final product. On the other hand, the more time is spent on quality control of translation, the higher the cost of translation.
• In an era of increased global competition and expanded translation services, everyone is well aware of this dilemma and is looking forward to some solutions, at least in part.

� TransCheck 2

• RALI has developed a new prototype system that can help reduce quality control costs by partially automating translation analysis. As the name implies, TransCheck is a tool that can help a person (translator or translation editor) in detecting certain types of translation errors.
• The TransCheck program is designed to check the correspondence between the source and target texts and thus ensures that the performed translation corresponds to the generally accepted properties of adequate translation.
• This is what distinguishes bilingual translation quality assurance tools, such as TransCheck, from monolingual tools, such as authoring software or grammar checking, because the latter work with only one text, as the latter is unable to detect translation errors.

� TransCheck 3

• In order to check the translated matches, TransCheck starts by equating the sentences of the original and the translation, and then checks that these pairs of aligned segments do not contain prohibited matches and that certain mandatory matches are met.
• What errors does this translation quality assurance program detect? The translation verification task is usually performed by a senior translator; these are highly paid specialists who have vast experience and special knowledge. such programs cannot be expected to completely replace such specialists, moreover, the detection and correction of all possible translation errors is probably a more difficult task than the machine translation itself.
• On the other hand, a system that can save editors time and effort by freeing them from the mechanical aspects of their work deserves attention.

TransCheck 4

• Let us consider the aspects of translation that are checked by TransCheck.
• The system checks whether the terms are translated by one of the proper translations. The list of words (including terms) can be customized for each application or text.
• To check for incorrect translations, a dictionary of forbidden equivalents is used. TransCheck flags questionable translations such as false translator's friends, calques and unjustified borrowings from the source language.
• It checks for incorrect transcription of numerical expressions, dates or amounts of money, etc.
• Checking a text full of numerical expressions is a particularly tedious task. Each numerical expression in the source sentence must have a corresponding expression in the target sentence.

TransCheck 5

• The program detects gaps in the translation: when the length of the source sentence differs significantly from the length of the target sentence, TransCheck marks it.
• Of course, TransCheck cannot detect subtle errors in meaning, for example, when the target sentence does not accurately convey the meaning of the source sentence, because such errors cannot yet be detected by a purely formal type of check.

Verifika Online, Free and Paid

• Verifika, a quality control tool
• In terms of its functionality, it has already overtaken ApSIC Xbench - so it catches many things better (for example, adherence to terminology) + allows you to correct errors directly in the program without switching to Trados Studio, MemoQ, etc. (You really start to appreciate this when it comes to a few hundred edits to a document).
• The developers have released a fresh free version.�http://e-verifika.com/QAtool/verifika-besplatno/

Verifika 2

• Verifika is a software tool that helps to locate and resolve formal errors in bilingual translation files and translation memories. It detects formatting, consistency, terminology and spelling errors in the target language.
• All detected errors are included in a report which allows to conveniently correct them with no external software tool (such as TagEditor) required. Verifika features an internal editor for reviewing and amending translations.
• For many error types, Verifika also offers an auto-correction feature. Its powerful search feature allows you to perform further corrections if necessary.

Verifika 3

• Verifika checks the following:
• Missing translations
• Untranslatables
• Adherence to language standards
• Text formatting
• Repeated words
• Translation consistency
• Terminology
• Spelling
• Grammar
• Number formatting
• Now, you are able to add your personal user-defined checks

​

Verifika 4

• Common tab allows to select formal errors that you want to detect in the project and set them up in the way you need.
• The error groups are listed on the left. Click each of them to select individual checks of this group.
• The buttons in the upper left allow to save the project, use Search and replace window, check the project, display the Help file and select/deselect all the checkmarks in the right part of the window.
• Omissions�Untranslatables�Forbidden Words�Letter Case�Punctuation and Spacing�Quotes and Apostrophes�Measurement�Tags�Numbers and Ranges�Miscellaneous

​

Verifika 5

​

• There is a tab that allows to select consistency errors which you want to detect in the project and set them up in the way you need.

​

Terminology Check

• This tab allows to choose if you would like to check terminology in your project, set up terminology options and load glossaries

​

Verifika 6

• The protection function allows you to prevent any file or segment type from being edited or checked. As an example, this function can be useful if your client asks you not to review 100% matches, you don’t want to change locked or pretranslated segments, or the whole file was provided by the client and shouldn’t be corrected, but you still want to check consistency.
• To protect the whole file, click the shield icon on the Files tab. The line with the file name will be greyed out, and the shield icon will turn blue V.�

​

ITR BlackJack 1

• ITR BlackJack ­­ is a software application developed by ITR as an integral part of the translation workflow. This provides a reliable procedure for assessing the quality of translations.
• The tool allows you to easily analyze the accuracy of the translation according to 21 standards and detect relevant errors. The reports generated contribute to an objective assessment of the translation, which allows managers to determine the cause of the error and take the necessary steps to correct the situation.

​

ITR BlackJack 2

• Verification of translations becomes a simple matter of analyzing textual components based on predefined criteria.
• The software works in conjunction with tagged XML files and MS Word. Files to be evaluated are imported into ITR blackjack.
• ITR blackjack automatically generates an estimate of each error.

ITR BlackJack 3

• The report can be presented on the screen as a text file or MS Word document for analysis by an evaluator or translation manager.
• General types of translation errors
• include incorrect terminology, grammatical errors and omissions in translation. BlackJack ITR evaluates errors on a scoring system according to:
• • the impact of the error on the acceptability of the translation
• • the impact of the error on the legibility of the translation
• • the amount of time required to improve the translation

�Scope of ITR BlackJack application

• ITR BlackJack has been designed for use in any translation project for all industries, including customer relations and marketing literature to high public profile literature. Its main function is translation evaluation.
• This software is only one component of an overall quality assurance strategy, which may include development tools, terminology management, database translation, etc.

The future of QA tools 1

• The future of QA tools looks rather promising. For about 10 years of their existence they have been developing from straightforward checks (as in Star Transit) to a bit more complicated ones represented by regular expressions or rules formulated in some other ways.
• This is just the first wrap of logic which can be compared to global search and replace that translators used when no TM tools existed. Apparently QA tools may at least adopt and implement fuzzy logic used in TM tools as well as employ probability and statistical methods to detect some kind of inconsistencies or even poor style. Such systems may become really trainable in the future and learn to detect errors not by regular expressions but by examples encountered.

The future of QA tools 2

• The nearest future of QA tools, however, will most probably be related to batch processing, improved handling of individual languages (such as right-to-left ones), expanding supported file formats and eliminating some false positives (such as terminological errors in untranslated segments etc.).
• Closer relations with project TMs and wider support for project-specific and client-specific checklists are also easy enough to implement, so users may expect all tools to employ them sooner or later.

​

The future of QA tools 3

• Usability is another good direction for development.
• Due to the amount of checks being performed, user interfaces of almost all programs are currently rather complicated. Implementation of additional checks will make them more difficult to work with, so it is really necessary to think well about end user convenience before extending capabilities of the QA tools.

The future of QA tools 4

• A survey has shown a rather high penetration rate of QA automation tools (they were used by over 81% of those who responded). On the other hand, it proves that the awareness of such tools is still low enough (over 11% of all the respondents confirmed they had never heard of the fact such tools existed).
• The survey has also confirmed that the most popular QA approach to date is to perform any checks that are easily automated and not too time-consuming while neglecting rather important, but more complicated ones due to time constraints.
• This finding together with the benchmark results reveals a definite perspective for the QA tools. The fact that QA tool developers are aware of this situation and have plans to develop them in this direction ensures translators one day will obtain more sophisticated quality assurance tools, and the overall translation quality will be constantly increasing, at least where it is really important.

The future of QA tools 5

• Translation professionals are quite satisfied with the environments they work in, and there is no particular need to extend QA tools to different platforms and to add support for many interface languages. It also confirms that most likely neither TM plug-ins nor standalone applications will be able to force out another architecture. Most probably plug-ins will be used by both freelance and in-house translators while standalone applications will be employed by QA departments of language service provider companies.
• Both the benchmark and the survey demonstrated urgent necessity of extending languages, encodings and file format support by QA tools as well as the tools usability.
• Main factors that keep translation professionals from wider employment of QA tools are lack of support for some particular encodings, languages and file formats as well as lack of time and skills necessary to perform all additional customisation to achieve higher level of error detection.

The future of QA tools 6

• QA tools available on today’s market vary greatly in the matter of usability, learnability, architecture and support for different languages, encodings and formats.
• Although all the tools speed up QA process and increase translation quality to some extent, their error level is still high enough, which means people who perform QA spend most of their time deciding whether an error reported needs to be corrected or not.