Forum: XTM Cloud support
Topic: A comprehensive review of XTM by a translator
Poster: SEA-words
I have been using XTM for more than one year now, since one of the agency I work with does most of the projects on XTM, and I would like to provide you (i.e. translators and XTM) with a detailed review.
Advantages for the agency:
1) The remote TM is always updated - no more chasing the translator who forgot to send the TM/won’t send it, no more sending TMs by mail, TM conversion issues, etc.
2) Higher reliability - since the translation is store in the cloud, even if the translator’s computer is burning or if the translator goes missing, the job is not lost.
3) Ability to track the progress of the translator– no more nasty surprise on the day of the delivery!
Advantages for the translator:
1) No more exchanges of big files and TMs with the agency, no conversion issues.
2) No need to backup since the translation is automatically stored in the cloud while you translate.
3) Portability– You just need to have Firefox installed and an Internet connection, and you can work on your translation from anybody’s computer.
So, that’s an even 3 and 3.
I can’t tell the disadvantages for the agency, but I have plenty to tell for the translator’s.
Preface: I don’t know if XTM is a modular program and if I have been working with limited features or the full version. I believe this would be up to the agency, and it is something out of my control.
Working with XTM
1) XTM works with Firefox only. That’s really a major drawback since a cloud CAT should increase the cross-compatibility, instead of limiting it to just one browser. Anyway, no problem in installing Firefox just for working in XTM. (On a side note, there is no Firefox for mobile devices such as iPads, Android tablets, etc.) I am working on a Mac, so I had to change the default keystrokes, but that’s fine.
2) Working with XTM implies you have a solid Internet connection, otherwise you will be thrown out from the server and you will have to login again. Being up and running again usually takes around 10 seconds (log-in + file opening), that’s kind of annoying when this happens every 5 segments or so.
Suggestion for XTM: it would be nice if XTM could keep working and automatically sync the translation once the connection is available again, without interfering with the translator’s job.
3) You can actually work in offline mode, your translation will be saved as a local backup and you can retrieve it by clicking on the clock icon in the right frame. The downside is that once you re-connect to the Internet, you have to manually “restore” the local backup to update the remote translation, line by line.
4) You can Zoom In to enlarge the font, but then you will have issues with drop down menus in XTM. Forget about it and buy powerful glasses.
5) The layout in XTM is very neat, however everything is hidden, but the editor. The TM concordance results are shown in a pop-up window, so you have to keep clicking “concordance search” and closing the concordance search window. This is pretty annoying in large projects.
6) No batch support- XTM provides a word count on a per-file basis only, so if you are working on a project which has 20 files, you cannot get your stats for the whole batch. Nor you can finalize them at once.
TM in XTM
7) You have a remote TM, but you can’t use your own TM. Over the years, translators tend to build their own TM since some sentences tend to recur across jobs, think alone to the list of countries of the world… well, you can’t use your own TM in XTM. Period.
8) You can’t download the TM to update your own offline TM. Basically, you have nothing left of your work. The only workaround would be downloading the bilingual file once you finish translating, then open it in an offline CAT, and update your TM accordingly. Is it worth the hassle? No.
9) You can’t edit the remote TM. If you spot an inconsistency or a typo, you will have to live with it. FOREVER. Which is really a pity when the project will have multiple traslators over the time.
10) You can’t set your own fuzzy threshold in XTM.
11) Very often, the automatic TM lookup doesn’t work. I had to work with big projects (5-10k words) with 100% matches in the remote TM that were not prompted when translating. Basically, I had to manually run a concordance search for each segment. Auto-propagating works only the first time it meets a segment, if you edit it, it won't propagate automatically. Instead, either you use find/replace to amend all of the occurence, or you select each segment and wait to be prompted for a different translation in the lookup pane.
12) If you run a concordance search, you have to select the source/target word, right-click on it, select “Concordance search” from the drop-down menu and then another pop-up opens. To be able to type in the target column, you have to close this pop-up. If you need to look at it again, you have to re-do all the steps. Very time consuming.
Terminology
13) XTM has the glossary function, the words recognized from the terminology list are shown in bold blue in the source. If you hover on them with your mouse, you can see the translation. However, you have to manually type them in the target column, unless you have the option “copy source to target” my default, in this case you can simply click on the blue words in the target column to insert their translation, but you will have to type over the rest of the sentence in English before and after the blue words. So, what use is such glossary to a translator?
14) The glossary function is not customizable. You cannot add terms, and it is not flexible enough to spot capitalization/number differences. So if your terminology has all words starting with a capital initial (e.g. Flower = Fiore), be ready to manually change the F to f each time. If your source reads flowers (plural), then you will have to a) change F to f, b) change the last letter to form the plural (fiori). Two edits in a 5-letter words. Too much work!
Typing in XTM
15) You can select words, provided you are very accurate in your pointer movement. I have been struggling to select the whole word, the right word, the entire sentence, part of it… It drove me crazy! Once you stray from the little space of the line, the selection gets lost. You have to retry again and again… once you get it right. Then, you can drag the selection to move the words within the segment, or use CTRL+X and CTRL+L to cut and paste it elsewhere. You cannot drag words across different segments.
16) You cannot change the capitalization using SHIFT+F3 like in any other Windows program. You have to retype the whole words/sentences with “ALL CAPS” on.
17) The only way to insert an accented capital letter is to use the Char map. If you use a Mac, holding SHIFT+letter won’t prompt you the list of accented variant of that capitalized letter. What a shame!
18) There are TAGS in XTM, just like in any other CAT. But they are very unpleasant to work with since if you double click on a word that sits next to a TAG, the selection will include the TAG as well. How so? I haven’t yet found a keystroke to insert TAGS while I type in the target column. I have to copy (CTRL+C) them from the source and paste them in the target column (CTRL+V).
19) Find/replace – it often freezes, especially if you try to run one search after another without closing the Find/Replace pop-up window. Plus, it works within the same file only. If you type in the editor, the search starts from Segment 1 all over, even if you are halfway the document. And you cannot use wildcards for your search.
Finalizing your job
XTM poses as a CAT tool, but lacks of most of their essential features. One of them is an effective QA. But let’s take one step at time.
20) Spellcheck– XTM comes with a built in spellcheck with a vocabulary wider than Word’s, but you cannot add words to it. So if in your translation there is a recurring term that is not within XTM vocabulary, it will be marked again and again as a mistake. Besides being annoying, this is also fairly dangerous, because in case of brand names, they will be always marked as mistakes, both if they are correct or not. Recently I translated a text where a brand name contained World, a word that doesn’t exist in Italian, and I almost didn’t notice it when it was misspelled (Wordl), since I skipped anything with a capital W and highlighted by the spellcheck.
21) QA– One of the features I appreciate the most in CATs, is the QA functionality. Basically, it’s a feature that automatically checks for some things in the target. XTM’s QA is non existent: it won’t check if you followed the terminology, it won’t tell you if there is no period at the end of the sentence, it won’t tell you if the number in the target doesn’t match the ones in the source, etc.
XTM's QA, which simply detects multiple blank spaces and spaces before punctuation. And it check the TAGS. That’s all.
Conclusions
I don’t know if XTM is still working on their CAT, as I haven’t see many improvements in the last year – I’d say none at all. However, it is still a big mystery to me why a translation agency would pick XTM and call it a CAT. In my experience, it is more the hassle than the help I get with XTM, and I have been working with it only because “forced” to do so by an agency.
I hope you people at XTM won’t take this bad. I spent 1-2 hours to write this comprehensive review which is - let’s say it – all to your benefit.
XTM can be a nice tool to teach translators the basic of a CAT tool, but cannot be considered a serious working tool.
[Edited at 2013-09-27 18:28 GMT]
Topic: A comprehensive review of XTM by a translator
Poster: SEA-words
I have been using XTM for more than one year now, since one of the agency I work with does most of the projects on XTM, and I would like to provide you (i.e. translators and XTM) with a detailed review.
Advantages for the agency:
1) The remote TM is always updated - no more chasing the translator who forgot to send the TM/won’t send it, no more sending TMs by mail, TM conversion issues, etc.
2) Higher reliability - since the translation is store in the cloud, even if the translator’s computer is burning or if the translator goes missing, the job is not lost.
3) Ability to track the progress of the translator– no more nasty surprise on the day of the delivery!
Advantages for the translator:
1) No more exchanges of big files and TMs with the agency, no conversion issues.
2) No need to backup since the translation is automatically stored in the cloud while you translate.
3) Portability– You just need to have Firefox installed and an Internet connection, and you can work on your translation from anybody’s computer.
So, that’s an even 3 and 3.
I can’t tell the disadvantages for the agency, but I have plenty to tell for the translator’s.
Preface: I don’t know if XTM is a modular program and if I have been working with limited features or the full version. I believe this would be up to the agency, and it is something out of my control.
Working with XTM
1) XTM works with Firefox only. That’s really a major drawback since a cloud CAT should increase the cross-compatibility, instead of limiting it to just one browser. Anyway, no problem in installing Firefox just for working in XTM. (On a side note, there is no Firefox for mobile devices such as iPads, Android tablets, etc.) I am working on a Mac, so I had to change the default keystrokes, but that’s fine.
2) Working with XTM implies you have a solid Internet connection, otherwise you will be thrown out from the server and you will have to login again. Being up and running again usually takes around 10 seconds (log-in + file opening), that’s kind of annoying when this happens every 5 segments or so.
Suggestion for XTM: it would be nice if XTM could keep working and automatically sync the translation once the connection is available again, without interfering with the translator’s job.
3) You can actually work in offline mode, your translation will be saved as a local backup and you can retrieve it by clicking on the clock icon in the right frame. The downside is that once you re-connect to the Internet, you have to manually “restore” the local backup to update the remote translation, line by line.
4) You can Zoom In to enlarge the font, but then you will have issues with drop down menus in XTM. Forget about it and buy powerful glasses.
5) The layout in XTM is very neat, however everything is hidden, but the editor. The TM concordance results are shown in a pop-up window, so you have to keep clicking “concordance search” and closing the concordance search window. This is pretty annoying in large projects.
6) No batch support- XTM provides a word count on a per-file basis only, so if you are working on a project which has 20 files, you cannot get your stats for the whole batch. Nor you can finalize them at once.
TM in XTM
7) You have a remote TM, but you can’t use your own TM. Over the years, translators tend to build their own TM since some sentences tend to recur across jobs, think alone to the list of countries of the world… well, you can’t use your own TM in XTM. Period.
8) You can’t download the TM to update your own offline TM. Basically, you have nothing left of your work. The only workaround would be downloading the bilingual file once you finish translating, then open it in an offline CAT, and update your TM accordingly. Is it worth the hassle? No.
9) You can’t edit the remote TM. If you spot an inconsistency or a typo, you will have to live with it. FOREVER. Which is really a pity when the project will have multiple traslators over the time.
10) You can’t set your own fuzzy threshold in XTM.
11) Very often, the automatic TM lookup doesn’t work. I had to work with big projects (5-10k words) with 100% matches in the remote TM that were not prompted when translating. Basically, I had to manually run a concordance search for each segment. Auto-propagating works only the first time it meets a segment, if you edit it, it won't propagate automatically. Instead, either you use find/replace to amend all of the occurence, or you select each segment and wait to be prompted for a different translation in the lookup pane.
12) If you run a concordance search, you have to select the source/target word, right-click on it, select “Concordance search” from the drop-down menu and then another pop-up opens. To be able to type in the target column, you have to close this pop-up. If you need to look at it again, you have to re-do all the steps. Very time consuming.
Terminology
13) XTM has the glossary function, the words recognized from the terminology list are shown in bold blue in the source. If you hover on them with your mouse, you can see the translation. However, you have to manually type them in the target column, unless you have the option “copy source to target” my default, in this case you can simply click on the blue words in the target column to insert their translation, but you will have to type over the rest of the sentence in English before and after the blue words. So, what use is such glossary to a translator?
14) The glossary function is not customizable. You cannot add terms, and it is not flexible enough to spot capitalization/number differences. So if your terminology has all words starting with a capital initial (e.g. Flower = Fiore), be ready to manually change the F to f each time. If your source reads flowers (plural), then you will have to a) change F to f, b) change the last letter to form the plural (fiori). Two edits in a 5-letter words. Too much work!
Typing in XTM
15) You can select words, provided you are very accurate in your pointer movement. I have been struggling to select the whole word, the right word, the entire sentence, part of it… It drove me crazy! Once you stray from the little space of the line, the selection gets lost. You have to retry again and again… once you get it right. Then, you can drag the selection to move the words within the segment, or use CTRL+X and CTRL+L to cut and paste it elsewhere. You cannot drag words across different segments.
16) You cannot change the capitalization using SHIFT+F3 like in any other Windows program. You have to retype the whole words/sentences with “ALL CAPS” on.
17) The only way to insert an accented capital letter is to use the Char map. If you use a Mac, holding SHIFT+letter won’t prompt you the list of accented variant of that capitalized letter. What a shame!
18) There are TAGS in XTM, just like in any other CAT. But they are very unpleasant to work with since if you double click on a word that sits next to a TAG, the selection will include the TAG as well. How so? I haven’t yet found a keystroke to insert TAGS while I type in the target column. I have to copy (CTRL+C) them from the source and paste them in the target column (CTRL+V).
19) Find/replace – it often freezes, especially if you try to run one search after another without closing the Find/Replace pop-up window. Plus, it works within the same file only. If you type in the editor, the search starts from Segment 1 all over, even if you are halfway the document. And you cannot use wildcards for your search.
Finalizing your job
XTM poses as a CAT tool, but lacks of most of their essential features. One of them is an effective QA. But let’s take one step at time.
20) Spellcheck– XTM comes with a built in spellcheck with a vocabulary wider than Word’s, but you cannot add words to it. So if in your translation there is a recurring term that is not within XTM vocabulary, it will be marked again and again as a mistake. Besides being annoying, this is also fairly dangerous, because in case of brand names, they will be always marked as mistakes, both if they are correct or not. Recently I translated a text where a brand name contained World, a word that doesn’t exist in Italian, and I almost didn’t notice it when it was misspelled (Wordl), since I skipped anything with a capital W and highlighted by the spellcheck.
21) QA– One of the features I appreciate the most in CATs, is the QA functionality. Basically, it’s a feature that automatically checks for some things in the target. XTM’s QA is non existent: it won’t check if you followed the terminology, it won’t tell you if there is no period at the end of the sentence, it won’t tell you if the number in the target doesn’t match the ones in the source, etc.
XTM's QA, which simply detects multiple blank spaces and spaces before punctuation. And it check the TAGS. That’s all.
Conclusions
I don’t know if XTM is still working on their CAT, as I haven’t see many improvements in the last year – I’d say none at all. However, it is still a big mystery to me why a translation agency would pick XTM and call it a CAT. In my experience, it is more the hassle than the help I get with XTM, and I have been working with it only because “forced” to do so by an agency.
I hope you people at XTM won’t take this bad. I spent 1-2 hours to write this comprehensive review which is - let’s say it – all to your benefit.
XTM can be a nice tool to teach translators the basic of a CAT tool, but cannot be considered a serious working tool.
[Edited at 2013-09-27 18:28 GMT]