May we share with you the procedure we have been following lately to prepare translations.
It is based in two ideas I received from two good friends.
I use
as my English to Spanish and Spanish to English dictionary.
It is also good for translations between many other languages.
It works well and it is fast.
It is free.
The only limitation is it doesn't accept long texts.
Long texts have to be divided in portions of not more than about two paragraphs or, you have to pay.
I frequently use it to look up just one word.
Changing between translations from Spanish or into Spanish is very fast and easy.
I became aware of this tool through Dr. Luis Osín of Israel.
For some time we both were students at Montevideo's Engineering School.
I also use the online dictionary from the Spanish Royal Academy, the safe keepers of the Spanish language:
http://buscon.rae.es/draeI/html/cabecera.htm
If you have not taken some time to use and explore this dictionary, may we suggest you do.
The Academy has abandoned its traditional inflexibility as far as accepting new words and modernizing the language.
The online dictionary includes words that only recently became commonly used.
Example: it shows both "computadora" and "ordenador".
Both words show "computer" as one of their multiple meanings.
Attention Spanish teachers, the dictionary says: "La palabra compu no está en el Diccionario." (The word compu is not in the Dictionary).
Maybe someone wishes to propose it is added as a word in common use in Uruguay.
Interesting, there are several words used in some countries only.
Example: it shows three words with the same meaning, each used only in some countries, "pibe", "gurí" y "botija", all meaning "niño" or boy.
Another intersting situation shown: One word with several different meanings depending on the country.
Example: "guagua".
Someone told us with surprise about a newspaper article describing how a "guagua" had a collision with a cyclist who ended up fighting for his life in a hospital.
To her, "guagua" meant a baby.
To the reporter who wrote the article it meant a bus.
I also constantly use an online English - English dictionary.
The one I prefer is:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/
There are many others, as well as similar dictionaries for other languages.
I use Firefox, the free browser that works very well with all traditional computers.
I learned about Firefox through my former classmate, Pedro Vilanova, an electro-mechanical engineer.
The multiple tabs feature he pointed out at that time was a novelty, now is also availabe in Chrome and probably other browsers.
The multiple tabs allow to keep several websites open at the same time and to jump among them very easily.
I usually keep three tabs with three open sites:
- Tradukka to go from English to Spanish and viceversa.
- Spanish Dictionary.
- English Dictionary.
Sometimes in a fourth tab I keep the Google Doc I am translating.
While I don't need them, I minimize the window to have a cleaner screen to work with Etoys or with an off-line word processor.
With Etoys, I follow the guidelines of its own translation procedure.
We plan to cover this subject in a future message.
With word processors I follow a procedure similar to that of Etoys:
I make a copy of the original file and rename it with the name I want for the finished translation.
Then I work with the new document, adding short portions of translated text and deleting the corresponding portions of the original text.
I imagine this system might be useful to people with all levels of command of the foreign language.
I believe it can be used by the desperate person who has received a message that seems to be important but is written in a foreign language which he doesn't know at all.
I believe it could help professional translators who, for legal reasons, have to come up with a perfect translation.
Or to the professional translator of literary works who may achieve results with very different quality levels depending on how much effort they put in selecting each word for the translated text.
And of course, It helps all those like us, with varied levels of knowledge of the foreign language, who translate because of the need or just the satisfaction of communicating with foreigners.
Carlos Rabassa Voluntario Red de Apoyo al Plan Ceibal Montevideo, Uruguay