Manual Translation -Reply

[NANCY KAMINSKI <NKAMINS1 -at- FAIRVIEW -dot- ORG>]

>>> Eric Silver <eric -dot- silver -at- EAGLEPOINT -dot- COM> 06/17/97 07:24am >>>
We just finished having one of our dealers in France translate a manual
using Word 7. This was a nightmare. They emailed the files back to us
and the total size of the files was 91 MB. <snip>

How is everyone else doing this? Can we have them use a localized
version of FrameMaker and ship us the files or are we going to have to
bit the bullet and hire a translation company?

Eric--

I do outside contract work for a translation service, laying out the
manuals they translate into PageMaker or Word. What they do might help
you.

Basically, the translator gives mea text file, with the translation of every
page clearly identified. The pages are matched one-for-one. I take the text
and format it exactly like the English version. I don't know Dutch, or
French, or Portuguese, or whatever, but the task isn't that difficult. I take
the existing style sheet, or duplicate it, and apply it to the text. I relabel the
graphics as needed. Voila! Foreign language manual! The translator has to
go over it and correct hyphenation, but other that that, it's done.

So you might want your foreign people to do the text translation and you
do the layout at your office, using Framemaker or whatever.

Hope this helps,

Nancy Kaminski
Fairview Hospital and Healthcare Services
nkamins1 -at- fairview -dot- org

 TECHWR-L (Technical Communication) List Information: To send a message
to 2500+ readers, e-mail to TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU -dot-  Send commands
   to LISTSERV -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU (e.g. HELP or SIGNOFF TECHWR-L).
  Search the archives at http://www.documentation.com/  or search and
browse the archives at http://listserv.okstate.edu/archives/techwr-l.html