DITA for Localization

Better Translation Technology

Andrzej Zydron, CTO XTM International


DITA Localization


In the beginning

Technical documentation was without form, and darkness was upon the face of

the page:

– Manual typesetting

– RTF

– WordPerfect

– MS Word

– FrameMaker

– Ventura Publisher

– Pagemaker

– SGML

3Better Translation Technology

In the beginning

Lack of standards

•Proprietary solutions

•Problems with character encoding

•Expensive to design

•Expensive to build

•Expensive to maintain

•Expensive to localize


Along came XML

Let there be light:

– XML born in 1997 from SGML/HTML

– Review of lessons learned from SGML

– Easier to implement

– Removed unnecessary complexity

– Declared standard encoding - Unicode


DITAStandards, Standards, Standards

DITA:

Advent of standards to

technical documentation


DITA is not perfect!


DITA - the good

Extremely well thought out XML document architecture:

– modularity

– fine level of granularity

– reuse

– bookmap

– standardized elements

– Write once, translate once, reuse many times

– Multiple output formats, multiple places, multiple docs:

• PDF, HTML, mobile, web, paper etc.


DITA Localization

Practical considerations:

– Controlled Authoring:

• Consistency

• Terminology

– Delivery for localization:

• All at once in one big heap

• JIT - individual topics when ready

– Translation Consistency:

• Translation Memory

• Terminology


DITA Localization - the good

Modularity:

– Translate a topic once

– Reuse many times!

• No need to retranslate

– Just in time translation

• Translate as soon as source is ready

• Dramatic improvement in time to market

• All documentation in all languages is ready concurrently


DITA Localization - the good

• Decide how you want to translate:

– Whole document as one using bookmap

– Individual topics navigated according to bookmap

– Individual topics as and when ready

• Handling last minute engineering changes

– JIT translation

– Many TMS systems not good at handling this

– Automatically Update already translated segments


DITA Localization - the <bad/><ugly/>

The bad and downright ugly (the three vil lains!):

– Word Substitution

• CONREF

• KEYREF

• DITAVAL

– Specialization

– Conditional processing


DITA: square peg, round hole

• Do not try and force DITA to do what it is not designed for!

• DITA = Modular technical documentation

• Small, discrete topics

• No more than one page of text per topic

• Use the Open Toolkit

• Do not get overambitious with substitutions

– What works for English and Mandarin will not work for other languages


DITA: Object Oriented Documentation

• DITA is an attempt to use OO design for XML documentation

• Very tempting for computer scientists

• We did it for computer programming

• Why not documentation?

• Problems arise with the nature of documentation

• Problems arise with the nature of human language


Language – why humans mess things up!

What language is this?

What is he saying?


Understanding the nature of English

• Why is English different from most other languages?

• English is a fusion language: a creole

– 60% Old Chaucerian English + 40% French

• Other Creoles with a high number of speakers:

– French (Vulgar Latin + Frankish)

– Swahili (Bantu + Arabic)

– Urdu (Hindi + Arabic)

– Mandarin

• (Many Sino-Tibetan languages)


Understanding the nature of English

• Primitive morphology

– Nouns:

• Singular, plural, possessive

– ship, ships, ship’s, ships’

– No Gender

• a ship, the ship, the ships

– No adjectival agreement

• green ship, green ships

• We can substitute nouns and noun phrases without causing grammatical errors

• This is not true of most other languages

• English does not work l ike most other languages

• Your documentat ion WILL be translated sooner or later


DITA Localization

Avoid word substitution (CONREF, KEYREF, DITAVAL):

– Linguistic issues

– Adjectival agreement

– Grammatical case

• Presenting the new Ford <keyword keyref=”model”> for 2014.

– very bad idea!

• Focus, Fiesta, Mondeo

• Nowy Focus, Nowa Fiesta, Nowe Mondeo

• Akin to saying ‘Presenting the Ford new Focus’

• Nowym Focus’em, Nową Fiestą, Nowym Mondeo

– May work for alphanumeric words


DITA Localization

Only use substitution for l inguistically complete sentences

– Warnings

– Cautions

– Notes

Avoid substitution for individual words or noun phrases


Specialization

• Specialize at your peril!

– A double edged sword

• Increases exponentially difficulty:

– Authoring

– Publishing

– Localization

• New elements/attributes

– How are they to be treated

– For localization: completely new document type


DITA and OAXAL

• OAXAL - Open Architecture for XML Authoring and Localization

• DITA Authoring and Localization in a Standards context:

– DITA is an Open Standard

– Why use proprietary software for Authoring and Localization of DITA?


OAXAL

http://wiki.oasis-open.org/oaxal/FrontPage


OAXAL Stack


OAXAL Interaction


OAXAL Source Lifecycle


OAXAL Translation Lifecycle


DITA Localization - considerations

• Choosing the right TMS/CAT System

– Can it handle XML properly:

• Entity references e.g. ‘&’

• Encoding

• Validation

– Does it understand DITA

– Does it understand ditamap/bookmap

– Can you navigate using the bookmap

– Can it handle specialization

– Does it handle JIT

– Can it handle last minute changes


How to reduce you translation costs

• Write less!

– Ford of Europe reduced translation costs by 50% in 2005

– It costs as much to translate into one language as it does to write the

original

• Use more graphics

– Integrate with CAD/CAM systems

– But beware text in graphics – use callouts

• People may actually start using your documentation

• KISS

• Manage your own translation assets: e.g. invest in your own TMS

– Save an additional 20% on average on cost and 50% on turnaround


Less is More


Contact Details

• Postal address:

– PO Box 2167

– Gerrards Cross

– Bucks SL9 8XF

– United Kingdom

• Phone: +44 1753 480 467

• Fax: +44 1753 480 465

• Andrzej Zydroń – [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

DITA for Localization

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