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(January 10)

 

Hey gal, how is mommy life going? I haven't had work for a long time so I've accepted some translation work, which I haven't had to do for several years. Now I am trying out this translation memory software, which I am used to forcing my translators to use, and I must say it is truly amazing. Brought me back to the days we were translating in Lhotka and I filmed us going bonkers. Basically the program remembers how you translate everything, so if anything repeats within a file, or for that matter, repeats over several years of translating, it translates it for you automatically. And if it is almost a full repeat, like a few words have been changed in a sentence, you can see the exact differences and make only minor changes. So by remembering a few shortcut keys you can whip through a document rather quickly. When my agency starts to pick up work again, I want to use this for my translators as much as possible (good for contracts, technical documents, user manuals and stuff like that) so that I can build up translation memory in many languages. That could increase my profits, but I also want to start an interesting project like wikitranslations. Translators from all over the world could send me their previous translations, and after checking to make sure that the quality was good, I'd add it to the system and automate everything on the internet. Customers could log in and get quick "automated" translations for a few pennies a word. The extent and sophistication how I have developed things since he old days of v Chaloupkach would require endless babble to explain. just thought of you while using this software, so I wrote ya an email. have a good oneroo.


got a big translation into English, which I assumed you would not be interested in, but I'm finally using Transit myself and I must say it's pretty nifty and I like it. And it's good to have experience with it from the translator's end, to help me explain to others how to work with it. So when I swing by your hood I'll give you a copy and a training presentation? It does not seem to want to install from copies of it, which is why I did not load a copy of it on the server, but we can try, or just install straight from my disk. Have a J for me, JB


sorry I didn't manage to hook up with you before I split, but I should be back in the Czech Republic early part of the summer if you'd like to hook up. Got desparate and took on some translations, and doing a big one now for a drive through Burger King. But it's a translation from German to English, which Presto is translating through Czech. So it looks like, unfortunately, they won't be opening up a shop in Czech. How are things going with you?


Thank you for the detailed letter. I already have some experience working with TM software, although I normally work with Trados Freelance (which is what seems to have been used to provide the translation from German into Czech in the first place). The .pxf files that you are referring to is not something that I am familiar with. Which program do I use to work with them? Where would I be able to get it from? I'll take a look at the file during the day today and will get back to you with a small sample translation as you request. If my quality is OK, you'll let me know what to do next. I would suggest that having access to the original files in German could help me with the terminology quite a bit, so is there a chance that we could have them to? Are they available? It seems to be a big project and I'm interested to get stuck into it, so I'm willing to go on the price that you can offer. I would say 7.00EUR (about 190.00 CZK according to xe.com) per 1800 keystrokes, but we can try going below that, if you feel that is necessary. As I said, I'll be getting back to you with the sample tonight and then we can discuss further.

Dear Andrey

I think I can offer you more than 190. Let us see how it goes on both our ends and share it somehow. I don't need to be greedy. The email I sent you should have the weblink with instructions where to download the Transit program. I heard it is a similar environment as Trados, and think it would be better if you did that. Otherwise I can also produce a .tmx export for you, but I don't think you would get the dictionaries and stuff like that, and might lead to problems when I import again. Although the formatting for the original files is rather simple, so perhaps we'd avoid complications with conversions between Trados and Transit. But I have been warned against it by my Trados/Transit expert. Just asked the customer for the German originals.


cau dude. In Russia and Czech, and maybe in some other very exotic places in the world, they generally charge by the normostran, which is 1800 characters, including the space, tab or any other character typed between words. In Word you can go to File > Properties, and there see the statistics. Usually you can add the number of characters (counts words only) plus the number of words (as there is always something between each word) and then divide that by 1800. But because I used to do this a billion times a day, I just took the number of characters and divided it by 1500, which should work out the same. So for your document, the number of characters is 96435, which makes about 65 normostran. The average agency in Czech charges around 350 Kc for this type of text. Because your my friend I can give you a discount and charge 300Kc or less per page, but it depends on what quality your friend wants. I might even be able to get it done for 250 Kc a page, but you would have to guarantee I get paid for my translation work, because I always pay my translators and if I don't get paid for such a large job with such a small markup for me, you can imagine that it would really not be worth it.


okay, that looks like almost 2,000 words or 10 pages of text. I assume you want it translated online through your website? This will take the translators longer and they will probably want to charge more. If not online, I would assume a total charge of 0.09 USD/word for each of the languages, and then an additional 0.04 USD/word for the proofread, meaning a total of 0.13 USD/word for each language, or around 700 USD total for all three languages. But depending on how slow it is for the translators and proofreaders to navigate through your website, the cost may increase as much as 0.05 USD/w or more for each of the languages (depends on what the translators will say). If your website is not secret design work, another possibility is that you send me the entire website. I import it into a program so that the translators only translate the text without damaging any of the scripts. Then I would export it again and you would get the scripts back but each with the individual languages. This could be the cheapest option for you, if possible. Please let me know before I start approaching translators, and if my price is acceptable. This of course assumes that the translators of the target languages are all very high native quality speakers and that you are aiming for high quality. I would like assurance that my prices are acceptable to you before I would approach my translators with this.


perhaps an exciting time, as I have a real live project you can practice with, and it should give me some income so I can pay you for some of the work you did so far. I will be sending you another email, which I am sending to all the translators. That will allow you to read everything from the point of view of the translator, so that you can help them, and it will also give you the opportunity to start learning Transit, a very important program. So please go through all the procedures. If you learn it fast enough, you can answer emails to the translators, but the deadline is pretty short and the project is not very large, so I do not know if there will be enough time for that. But we can try. More importantly is that you learn the software. You will be learning it on the translator end, and the freely downloadable version of the software. Eventually I will give you access to the server where you can operate the full paid version of the program, which costs around 2,000$. This version of the program and working with it is much much more complicated than the translator end, but the translator end is a good place to start, in order to understand the entire process. I find it rather interesting.


responding offline to your email I received on my mobile. I'm not blaming you of spying on me, but it seemed you were trying to wean me out of information to help you win this tender, always dangling a carrot that you "might" send me some of the work if this or that, without any intention to do so. I too am in the dumps, have not had much or any work for a long time, and owe more than you do, which is why I am even more sensitive to this than normal. I can use the work and it seemed you were really yanking on my dick. It seemed dishonest, which should not be amongst friends. I was offering you prices that competed against your best, yet it seemed you tried everything possible to resort to someone else, like for a sense of victory that you could accomplish this yourself. You can run your business as you choose by I ask you not try to exploit me like this. It goes against our friendship. Anyway, if you win this tender I will truly be amazed. Especially if you sent them an ill prepared response, followed by a better prepared response. You are only showing your disorganisation that way and definitely lowering your chances. I am bidding on all of Panasonic's work into 25 languages, 800 applicants have applied so far, and I can guarantee you that I spent more than 30 days of full time work answering stupid emails and setting this up, so 3 days is nothing in the world of wining and dining to win a tender. That is the way the business community operates, so welcome tadpole (meant as humour). But generally just shooting for the lowest price seems a bad strategy. I always ask the customer what they want and help them with suggestions. If they want basement prices, I can give them that. But I have yet to find a customer who wants that. It is a balance of quality, price, and a display of organisation on your end. And if they do choose you, I would be sceptical about full or any payment, so you should definitely watch out for and research that. Who is the company who is offering you the work etc. Anyway, good luck, and if you're over your head one day, send me an email and we'll see. But I definitely like honest and friendly business. I have it with all my translators and customers and have shown the door to customers and translators who have reduced the quality of my working day in any way. I'm sittin in my truck and I like being happy. latero

 

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