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Poll: What is the main influencing factor when purchasing a CAT tool?
Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
neilmac
neilmac
Spain
Local time: 14:12
Spanish to English
+ ...
Other Aug 24, 2017

Simplicity. If I need to to spend more than a day learning how to use the thing, I'm not interested.

 
Alan Corbo, CT
Alan Corbo, CT  Identity Verified
Uruguay
Local time: 10:12
English to Spanish
+ ...
Agreed Aug 24, 2017

Chris S wrote:

Alan Corbo, CT wrote:
as long as you're using (and feeding) your own TMs (translation memories), I don't think they "kill" your creativity


They certainly stifle it though. They make it harder to be creative. You have to jump through more hoops. You're more likely to take the easy option.

But most translators, of course, don't just use their own memories, which is when these things really do get down to murdering texts.


Which is why it is so important to keep honing your skills.

I've using the same massive TM for years now (maybe 8+ years), and even though it's my TM, exclusively fed with my translations, I NEVER fall into the trap of just blindly accepting 100% or CM matches just because they are mine. I certainly don't mind admitting that I've come accross really, really bad translations in my own TM, back from the times I was starting out, when I knew a lot, a lot less than I know now (and I'm certain I'll keep finding horrendous stuff as time goes by, into eternity, hehe). As a measure of how much you've progressed (from a pure linguistic perspective), I think CAT tools are excellent repositories.

I guess my point is CAT tools are just but one of the several "components" of translation in the XXI century. Wisely used, they can definitelly boost productivity, income and quality.


 
Mónica Algazi
Mónica Algazi  Identity Verified
Uruguay
Local time: 10:12
Member (2005)
English to Spanish
memoQ Aug 24, 2017

While for many years I preferred not to use any CAT tools for fear they would stifle my creativity, I have now learnt to use, and enhance my work with, memoQ, a user-friendly tool with a superb support team who are there to help you at any time of the day without having to pay extra for their assistance.
Tremendous discovery indeed.


 
Jaime Oriard
Jaime Oriard  Identity Verified
Mexico
Local time: 07:12
Member (2005)
English to Spanish
+ ...
Range Aug 24, 2017

of advanced options and customizability.

 
Mario Freitas
Mario Freitas  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 10:12
Member (2014)
English to Portuguese
+ ...
A set of factors Aug 25, 2017

At first I refused to use a CAT.
I tried Trados, because a client required it. I hated it, and I don't intend to use it again. The CAT is supposed to save time, not to make you waste it.
Then I did some research and realized it had to be a CAT with high demand (by the clients/agencies).
A good friend then convinced me to use the second most "popular" one, i.e., MemoQ. I think it's pretty expansive, but I believe very soon all these CATs will exchange files (they already do AMOF
... See more
At first I refused to use a CAT.
I tried Trados, because a client required it. I hated it, and I don't intend to use it again. The CAT is supposed to save time, not to make you waste it.
Then I did some research and realized it had to be a CAT with high demand (by the clients/agencies).
A good friend then convinced me to use the second most "popular" one, i.e., MemoQ. I think it's pretty expansive, but I believe very soon all these CATs will exchange files (they already do AMOF), and the clients will stop requiring a specific CAT. Then I can switch to a not-so-expansive one, and the expansive ones will certainly lower their prices.
Collapse


 
Elina Sellgren
Elina Sellgren  Identity Verified
Finland
Local time: 15:12
Member (2013)
English to Finnish
+ ...
Functionality Aug 25, 2017

I find it very strange that user-friendliness and functionality were not among the options!

 
Leticia Klemetz, CT
Leticia Klemetz, CT  Identity Verified
Sweden
Local time: 14:12
Swedish to Spanish
+ ...
Client's requirement Aug 25, 2017

Most of my clients require that I have a TM tool. Some years ago, most were using Trados and required me to have it, as well. In recent years, some have started demanding MemoQ, but they usually accept my using Trados instead. But if the client demands it in order to give you a job - and it's a good client, well, then you get it. You can always have/use several programs...

 
Kay Denney
Kay Denney  Identity Verified
France
Local time: 14:12
French to English
I have Aug 26, 2017

Alan Corbo, CT wrote:

satish krishna itikela wrote:

In my eighteen years of career i never used any kind of CAT tool. I rejected some hundred of projects which insisted the use of CAT tools. I don't recommend the use of CAT tools, they really kill the talent and creativity of the translators.


... if you've never used one? Maybe you're confusing CAT tools with MT (machine translation), a "forbidden" word for some translators but a certainly useful technology in some circumstances.

I'd say CAT tools are an excellent way of guaranteeing terminological consistency (termbases), of recycling/leveraging your own work (alignment,TMs), and of dealing with layout (since the tool takes care of everthing related to fonts, sizes, indentation, tabs, tables of contents, codes, and many, many more things), so that you can focus 100% on that for which you're paid: translating. And as long as you're using (and feeding) your own TMs (translation memories), I don't think they "kill" your creativity. I believe they help you improve over time. I've been using CAT tools for almost a decade (since Trados 6.0), and presently I just can't live without them. And unlike you, I've turned down hundreds of projects for which CAT tools CAN'T be used, haha. I do understand, however, that for certain kinds of projects CAT tools may be useless.

IMHO, I think everybody should at least have a basic knowledge of CAT tools. It takes time to master them (if "mastering" them is at all possible), but in the long run, they are very useful. And I think that after all these years, they are here to stay. We'd better get used to them.

Alan




I have used CAT tools, for catalogues where there's a certain amount of repetition

An agency I used to work for would only ever send CAT files and it was ridiculous when they were sending tourism blurb and press releases. I would do a draft, ask them to export the file then just rewrite the thing. I hate the way the CAT tool segments everything, I love to chop up long sentences, change the order of ideas for greater clarity and to better appeal to the Brit mindset. It' s not as if anything would ever crop up later as a 100%. I would just make sure that the terminology was about right in my draft, just in case someone did a search in the TM for a particular term.


 
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Poll: What is the main influencing factor when purchasing a CAT tool?






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