Technical Translation of IT Documents
Just about everyone who has ever sent documents or files via email, knows what a file compression tool is - usually the first one that comes to mind is Zip, or WinRar. 7zip is probably the best free file compression utility available, and easy to use. Translating a technical history about 7zip, however, is another story. We recently provided highly technical translation service for a client who needed a complete, detailed history of the 7zip compression utility, including all bug fixes, updates, and other documented changes to 7zip over the years. Greek to English translation was requested for this document, and it was about 10 pages long.
This is the kind of professional Greek translation that requires careful selection of a translation "team" - team meaning project manager, translator(s) and proofreader(s). Sometimes when a translation company such as ours advertises low cost translation rates to our clients and customers, it is assumed that we just assign a qualified translator with the lowest rate offer - but our project selection and assignment process is actually much more involved and meticulous. We evaluate translators on criteria covering a wide array of skills, experience, past project history, feedback, and so forth - rate offers are a fraction of the overall system we use to evaluate and select translators. The evaluation and selection of translators becomes even more demanding when there is highly technical information and translation skills required to complete a translation.
How We Select Translators for Professional Translation Services
For the 7zip technical Greek translation, we released project details to all Greek translators who have IT and technical translation experience. We then narrow down the selection process to a small group of professional Greek translators based upon detailed criteria. Then we often contact the translator directly, to review the project, while the project manager oversees that the document translation stays on task and on time. This is essentially the simplified version of how we select and assign translators. The heavy risks that arise by simply awarding the translator with the lowest rate offer for all professional translation projects are far from worth the trade-off. Translation agencies that do practice this selection method usually have a lot of complaints about inaccuracies, mistakes, sloppy translations and awkward wording - if not worse.