RE: Top 10 mistakes unstructured FrameMaker Users make in content before translation

["Maxwell Hoffmann" <mhoffmann -at- globalizationpartners -dot- com>]

Keith,

I agree with you completely. It is nearly always ignorance, or lack of
access to the proper information. Many USA companies who do localize have
content creators and tech writers in a different department or under a
different budget than the group that handles language translation.

Also, many companies start out with English-only content for 3-5 years
before deciding to reach global markets in target languages. By that time
there can be thousands of pages of legacy documentation that was not created
in an optimal manner. I will be writing more blogs on simple things that
writers can do during authoring to economize in translation, with structured
and unstructured data.

_________________________ 

Maxwell  Hoffmann
Director, Document Globalization Practice
Globalization Partners International (GPI)    -- direct: 503.336-5952 
skype: maxwell.hoffmann
Follow GPI on Twitter: http://twitter.com/GPITranslates
Follow me on TWITTER: http://twitter.com/maxwellhoffmann

-----Original Message-----
From: Keith Hood [mailto:klhra -at- yahoo -dot- com] 
Sent: Friday, March 26, 2010 2:04 PM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com; mhoffmann -at- globalizationpartners -dot- com
Subject: RE: Top 10 mistakes unstructured FrameMaker Users make in content
before translation

I think this comment by you - "Most publishing habits evolve in an
English-only (or source language-only) environment, and concerns about
translation and text expansion are often an afterthought."

is probably true for everybody. I would not be at all surprised to find that
people who use FM in a different language have much the same problems in not
knowing how to optimize docs for translation.


From what I read, I think most of those things are probably the result more
of ignorance and inexperience on the writer's part than of making an
incorrect decision on what to do. I'm pretty sure most of those things were
the result of the writer not knowing there was a choice to make.
 [snip]



      

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