For a software project I oversee, I’m currently in charge of localising a sizable amount of technical documentation. I’m searching for suggestions and best practices to streamline our workflow.
Our documentation is extensive and includes numerous technical manuals, API references, and thorough instructions. Our group of editors and translators has encountered certain difficulties, though:
Terminology consistency refers to making sure that particular technical terminology are translated uniformly throughout all papers.
Preserving Accuracy: Ensuring that the translations are both clear to users who might not be conversant in the original language and technically accurate.
Version control is the process of monitoring updates and modifications made to the original files and making sure these are promptly reflected in the localised versions.
Cooperation and Communication: Encouraging our writers, developers, and localization staff to communicate effectively in order to resolve any questions or concerns that may come up.
Even though Transifex has been a huge help in managing our translations, we’re constantly searching for methods to improve our workflow. I’d be interested to know how various teams are addressing comparable difficulties.
In particular, I’m curious about:
You find that some Transifex capabilities or tools are especially helpful for organising technical documentation.
Techniques for preserving terminology uniformity between various publications and languages.
Best practices for working with technical professionals and making sure translations are accurate.
Any advice on effectively handling version control, particularly in light of frequent updates?
I am Antonis from the Transifex Customer Success team. I hope you’re well!
I’ll share some information that will hopefully help answer your questions.
Terminology consistency: The best way to ensure that your terminology remains consistent across the board is to make use of glossaries. Glossaries especially when combined with Translation Checks can offer a highly visible way for translators to identify technical terms and how to translate them.
Preserving Accuracy: This aspect would also be helped from maintaining consistency of terminology using glossaries. One more steps that you could take is to make a readability pass during your review or proofread step to ensure clarity and accuracy.
Version control: Transifex supports branches which can be utilized for updating your translations without affecting your live content. We also have integrations with the most popular version control tools (GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, Azure Repos) which you can use if you want to follow a more thorough process.
Cooperation and Communication: Transifex has various ways of communication such as string level comments/issues, project/organization announcements and private messages. Additionally we have a Slack integration so if you are already using that you combine the two for improved collaboration.
We have many users that utilize Transifex to localize their technical documentation and in most instances they have set up a GitHub-centric workflow. GitHub makes sure everything remains organized and easily accessible and Transifex is responsible for providing translation or even minor source edits which are then pushed back to GitHub according to your settings in a very seamless and scalable two-way sync.
Please let me know if this information is helpful. As always you can find more specific details in our Help Center but if you want to discuss anything specific I will be happy to help!
,
https://document360.com/blog/document-localization-for-minitab-global-audience/
in advance.