Title:
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Expanding the possibilities of translation memory systems : from the translators wishlist to the developers design
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Translation Memory systems have become established as a key technology to address the
challenges faced by the language services industry today. Despite flourishing research on
how TM technology could reach the next level of technical sophistication, there has been a
lack of systematic research on the usability aspects of TM systems, leaving many questions
unanswered as to how translators' actual needs could be met more effectively by future TM
solutions. The goal of this thesis has been to bridge the gap between current R&D efforts
and translators' work reality by identifying and investigating the needs of modern
translation professionals with reference to TM technology.
A survey was used to elicit information from TM users, with 874 translation professionals
giving their views on what they liked, disliked and wished for in TM systems. The
information was analysed using a system of coding and analytical elements of the grounded
theory approach, as well as user profiling, in order to reveal the needs of various distinct
groups of translation professionals, in relation also to particular TM use situations.
The identified needs relate to the functionality of TM systems, specifically to the TM
translation editor, its facilities for resource building and management, project management
and quality control, its search and translation assembly capabilities and its collaboration enabling
features. In addition, several other needs concern non-functional aspects of TM
systems, namely the systems' usability. The thesis also explores those needs that cannot be
derived immediately from articulated user requests or problems, but can be anticipated
from a number of significant implicit clues. A number of such clues reveal a growing need
for technologies that can access vast lexical and factual resources, or integrate such
resources in a TM-enabled workflow. Such a subtle need is believed to hold the key to
innovative TM systems.
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