At 09:37 p.m. 10/11/2014, Alexey Kovyazin wrote: >Hi All, > >As you know, we are going to translate recently completed Firebird >Language Reference in Russian into English. >For this purpose we are working with translation services. >I need input from English speakers (native and not native :) about >quality of the following test translation from one of the services: >https://yadi.sk/i/uh1WeVY9ccChv > >Obviously, this translation needs some additional work, and also we can >supply translator with some kind of guideline how to translate certain >things in better way, but the question is: should we choose them or need >to try another one?
On a quick read, 1. I sense that this translator does not have a good command of the use of articles in English (the, a/an, some. and constructs with no article). At best, it makes the text awkward to read for an English native speaker; at worst, the misuse of articles can make a difference to meaning, which could be a problem when translating the English version to other languages. It is a tedious editing task to go through text and correct these errors. (Believe me, I'm doing that all the time!!) If the person is being paid to translate, we should not be put in the position of needing to do such basic corrections. 2. Vocabulary choice in some cases needs to be reviewed. Referring to statements as "operators" is a bad choice in a language reference. The term "operator" has a distinct meaning in SQL and it is not that one! Similarly, use of the word "events" when talking about operations will cause confusion, even to native English speakers, given that the word "event" has a specific meaning in Firebird's procedural language. I found some other examples where vocab choice was inappropriate. Possibly the translator(s) should be given a set vocab of the terms most used in English for the various concepts. 3. Is the merging of keywords into one invalid "word" intentional? e.g. DROPPROCEDURE and other examples. If so, why? As far as I can tell, this occurs only in the explanatory text, not in the syntax patterns or the examples. I downloaded the sample, in the hope that I will have more time to study it when I get clear of release notes for a while. Helen ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ Firebird-docs mailing list Firebird-docs@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/firebird-docs
