Maybe you found yourself here because you are a fellow translator/interpreter eager to compare some tricks of the trade or you are simply here for other reasons. Whatever the case, I thought it might be interesting to put together a list of 5 simple tricks I use to deal with large amounts of text that has to be completed with a deadline for „yesterday”.
Before we start, however, it should be mentioned that I assume you are not using CAT tools (Computer-Assisted translation software) when working. These may make your life even easier, but for the sake of this list let’s just assume you are not familiar with or willing to pay for Trados or similar programs.
- CONVERT DOCUMENT TO AN EDITABLE FORMAT
Way too often it happens that the client sends you a poor-quality PDF file or a low-resolution smartphone picture of the text, asking you to maintain the original document layout if possible. Instead of meticulously trying to recreate the tables, logos and divisions in your word processor you could try and convert your document to a Word editable file. There are many choices on the market, and I have tried a few of them. I became a fan of Docs.Zone which (for a small annual fee) does a great job of converting many different file formats and images into editable text. It might struggle with extremely poor-quality files, but I cannot count the amount of hours it has saved me of shifting my sight between two screens or documents. It has also allowed me to maintain pretty much identical document layout as the original document which never fails to impress my clients. Try it out!
- GOOGLE TRANSLATE LISTS AND REPEATED WORDS
Say what? A professional interpreter recommending Google Translate? Well, yes, if time is your enemy and you have a long editable document (see point 1 above!) with a list of simple items or often repeated words, I say – go for it! In the past I translated a cooking book and well, with words like „sugar”, „flour” or „egg” not many things can go wrong in machine translation. I also saved some time using this method on translation of a clothing website. I could have typed and translated „socks” or „t-shirt” a few dozen times but preferred to save this time for proof-reading the whole project a couple of times instead. Mind you, I am also the first one to detest using machine translation for literally anything else! Luckily, no automatic translation is still even close to being able to relay subtle nuances of good prose, a poem or a catchy word-play – I won’t be out of business anytime soon.
- CRTL + F & REPLACE REPETITIONS
This one is kind of related to point 2 above. If you have translated one very common word once in the text (Professional title? Price of item? Recipe ingredient?), you can just look up the original word by pressing Crtl + F (or Cmnd +F on a Mac) and then replace it throughout the text with your translation. It can sometimes backfire with inflectional languages such as Polish when many words have different endings depending on the case (Kowalskiego/ Kowalskiemu, grudzień/grudnia, itd.), so I suggest you go slowly here and replace one-by-one instead of covering the whole text with one click. Trust me, it will still save you time.
- HAVE A TEMPLATE FOR MOST COMMON DOCUMENTS
If you have worked on text edition for clients in any capacity, you quickly realise that there are certain document types that are much more popular than others. In my case, I probably do at least 2-3 birth or marriage certificates per week. Many years ago I created templates for these two, including my e-signature, watermark and stamp, so now with every new client I usually just have to change personal details on the template, save it as PDF and… Bob’s your uncle! You don’t necessarily have to tell that to the clients though, and just politely thank them when they admire your „lightning fast efficiency”.
- WORK OUT A NAMING CONVENTION FOR CLIENT FILES AND STORE THEM
This is a big one. You would be surprised how often clients come back to you asking to resend their file because they have lost it or need another copy. Be ready for it and make sure you put the date of translation and client details in the file name – it makes it so much easier to dig up the file even after many years, or when you need the old file to use as a template for a new job. My chosen pattern is as follows: „2020-09-10-Marriage certificate_John Doe”. The American dating system makes it easier to look up and arrange files by date, then comes a short description of file content and name of the client at the end in case they come back to you for future work. Simplicity at its finest 🙂
Have you found any of this useful? Or maybe you have some more clever suggestions I could borrow? Let me know in the comments below.