Re: Controlled English

[Sarah Carroll <sarahc -at- INDIGO -dot- IE>]

There are quite a few Controlled English
applications out there. Two have been
mentioned on list already, there's also one
from the Smart corporation in New York,
although I'm not sure that it's a commercially
available system, I get the impression that
it's an entire process backed up with
customised software.

My understanding of Controlled English
software is that it's a lot more complex
than the kind of effect one could achieve
by creating a custom dictionary in the way
that Stuart has suggested. Certainly, as far
as creating material that is to be localised
using a Machine Translation or Translation
Memory system is concerned, such a method
would add little to the process. Except in as
much as the custom dictionary could be used
to create a glossary of terminology.

The sort of system that is of use needs a lot
of input from the writer/editor in the beginning.
The system needs to learn your house style
and what phraseology is acceptable to you.
Do you always instruct your users to "Click OK"
or "Click the OK button"? What is important
when translating using a computer aided
translation system is that term is used
consistently throughout the document rather
than the absolute correctness of the original
expression.

Best
Sarah
sarahc -at- indigo -dot- ie

Larissa Neumann wrote:
>Is software available that can check your work for compliance with
>Controlled English?

and Stuart Burnfield answered:
>Most word-processors support custom dictionaries. Could you create your
>own dictionary of OK words, and run the spelling-checker over your
>document using that dictionary only?