Ergonomic optimization for memoQ windows & more!

Click the graphic to see the mind-blowing details of all you can get on two silly little screens. Imagine two big ones!

How many functional windows do you see for working in the memoQ project of the screenshot here? Do you need more? It's possible. Are you familiar with all the functions shown in this two-screen view of my laptop and a repurposed television screen on my working holiday?

Of course one need not be restricted to just the many undockable, resizable and relocatable windows of memoQ; other, third-party like the SDL MultiTerm Widget (for searching SDL term bases in memoQ or other applications) or IntelliWebSearch, which offers many customized, configurable multi-tab web searches with the browser engine of your choice, or others can be added as needed.

"But wait!", you say. "You can't undock memoQ windows except for the preview, and it's impossible to get enough space to see all the information in the Translation Results pane or see the comparison of large matches well!" Well, here you can. The Translation Results hit list can take the whole height of your screen if you want it to. And you can even see more than one translation and editing grid for files if you need to.

Just because memoQ Support or some expert in the company says stuff like that is not possible doesn't make it so. For something like a decade now I have heard users ask for a lot of layout customization features to improve working ergonomics in memoQ. Heck, I've heard myself beg for that for ages. But typically, one is told how difficult and expensive such efforts are, how there are other priorities, yada yada yada. What, apparently, nobody realized was that while all these discussions were going on, someone actually implemented the requested features, deliberately or otherwise. In any case, somehow that secret never got out. Until I stumbled over it last week while trying to enjoy a few days at the beach.

"How do I get there?" you and David Byrne may ask. Join us for the Best Practices in Translation Technology course from 15 to 20 July (next month) in Lisbon and find out! Or wait until I get around to opening my upcoming online courses, Working Ergonomics in memoQ and New Beginnings with memoQ 9.0, coming soon. Or look in all those memoQ basics tutorials from memoQ Translation Technologies Ltd. on YouTube - something as basic as ergonomics for using the software must be in there somewhere. Or maybe not. Yet.

Or... explore and discover the tricks yourself. And while you're at it, you might find some of the other hidden surprises cleverly concealed in the world's greatest translation environment toolkit.

A ferramenta de pesquisa, Memória de Tradução, do memoQ

Esta funcionalidade permite usar as TM do memoQ para procurar texto numa outra janela, por exemplo, num documento do Microsoft Word ou de uma outra ferramenta de Tradução. Também é possível utilizar esta funcionalidade em ambientes de tradução que não tenham memórias de tradução, ou cujo acesso a estas esteja restrito.

À medida que copia o texto da sua janela de trabalho, o conteúdo que está na sua área de transferência é automaticamente transferido para a janela de pesquisa e as combinações aparecem.

Ctrl+Shift+Q	Inicia a ferramenta de pesquisa da memoria de tradução do memoQ, que vai, imediatamente, procurar por qualquer texto na área de transferência do Windows.
Ctrl+C	Copia o novo texto para a janela de pesquisa da memória de tradução, e executa uma procura.
Ctrl+Alt+C	Copia, o texto de destino de uma correspondência selecionada, para a área de transferência.
Ctrl+Shift+C	Copia, o texto de origem de uma correspondência selecionada, para a área de transferência.
Ctrl+V	Cola o texto da área de transferência noutra aplicação.

Na ferramenta de pesquisa da TM pode selecionar qualquer uma das suas memórias de tradução para usar noutras aplicações. No menu Configurações de Pesquisa, desta janela, também é possível definir outros parâmetros, tais como, a percentagem mínima para que existam correspondências, as penalidades para com os alinhamentos ou o rigor a ter para com as tags existentes.

Uma memória de tradução selecionada na ferramenta de pesquisa da TM não pode ser usada nem aberta no memoQ, enquanto a ferramenta de pesquisa estiver ativa, nem a ferramenta de pesquisa consegue aceder à TM que está associada a um projecto em aberto no memoQ. Um raio laranja é exibido na lista das memórias de tradução para indicar esta condição. Depois da ferramenta de pesquisa estar fechada, a memória de tradução ficará disponível novamente para ser usada no memoQ. E, quando fechar o projeto, a ou as TM correspondentes ficarão outra vez acessíveis para a ferramenta de pesquisa.

A ferramenta de pesquisa também pode ser útil como uma segunda concordância no memoQ, para procurar um conjunto em particular de memórias de tradução, que não estejam associadas ao projeto em aberto.

*****

Excerpt from memoQ em Pequenos Passos, the Portuguese version of the second edition of my memoQ tips book. Translated by Cátea Caleço Murta.

Multiple, separate concordances with memoQ

In the comments of my recent post on the memoQ TM search tool, I mentioned a possibility for using that feature to "de-junk" and simplify concordance searches.

In the example above, for example, I am searching the 2 million translation unit EU DGT TM using text selected in a memoQ 6.2 project. Working this way offers me the following advantages:

• I can separate the concordances for my project from a big reference dataset I only need for certain lookups.
• A simple copy command (Ctrl+C) automatically looks up text in either language in the TM search tool.
• If I want to avoid any possibility of unintended "leakage" of data from certain TMs in the project, selecting them for use in the memoQ TM search tool ensures that their content will never be "accidentally" inserted as an ordinary TM match as I work.

Note also that I am using a feature of memoQ 2013 R2 (6.8) to do searches while working in an older version of memoQ. I could do the same if I were working in a web translation interface for memoQ (which does not allow me to attach my own TMs) or any other translation environment.

I remember an argument with a translation agency owner about a year and  half ago. The man told me quite insistently about his intent to force even translators with memoQ to use the web translation interface so that he could restrict them to the use of the client-specific TMs he maintained. With the use of the TM search tool, a reasonable compromise is achieved for TM data at least. (LiveDocs and termbase access remains a bit more cumbersome, however, though by setting up a dummy project with termbases, corpora and particular TMs attached, one could actually use three separate concordance sets. That could be interesting.)

In any case, the possibility of a separate concordance for handling large data volumes separately from one's main TMs and the possibility of doing this even while using older versions of memoQ may be a reason why those who do not yet want to do their routine work in the latest version or cannot do so can still benefit from upgrading now and installing the latest version alongside the old version(s).

The memoQ TM search tool

Release 2 of memoQ 2013 included a new utility which allows memoQ translation memories to be used for lookups, the TM search tool:

When working in other translation environment tools such as SDL Trados Studio or Wordfast, translating text in a word processor or reading PDF files and web pages, selected text can be looked up directly in chosen translation memories and text from the source or target of a translation match can be put in the Clipboard for pasting into the other application. Relevant keyboard shortcuts are:

Ctrl+Shift+Q	Starts the memoQ TM search tool, immediately searches for any text on the Windows Clipboard.
Ctrl+C	Copies new text to the TM search window and executes a search.
Ctrl+Alt+C	Copies the target text of a selected match to the Clipboard.
Ctrl+Shift+C	Copies the source text of a selected match to the Clipboard.
Ctrl+V	Pastes the Clipboard text into another application.

A translation memory selected in the TM search tool cannot be opened or used in memoQ while the search tool is active. An orange lightning bolt is displayed in the TM list of the Search settings to indicate this status. After the search tool is closed, the TM is available again for use in memoQ.

Although the initial version of this tool is quite useful, many users have realized that further refinements of its features would make its application more flexible and effective. Some suggestions so far include

• selecting/deselecting all TMs
• filtering TMs by metadata
• saving and loading profiles (collections of particular TMs and settings)
• indicating match sources (i.e. TM, preferably with metadata)

A number of other quirks, like the ability to launch multiple instances of the tool, also still need to be sorted out as of Build 52.

I hope that Kilgray will take the further development of this tool seriously and consider how to improve and expand it, perhaps to include remote translation memories as well. The current version of the TM search tool requires a memoQ license on the computer where it is used, but separate licensing could also be quite interesting. This could be useful, for example, in collaborative projects with partners who use different tools and working methods or for those who want to use memoQ translation memories as bilingual concordances. I see the potential for a value-added service here if I can provide such a concordance (for a fee) to an end client, perhaps with some sort of protective encapsulation for the memories provided. Inclusion of termbases and LiveDocs corpora in future versions of the tool could also prove interesting. memoQ could become a reference information packaging platform to create additional communication services for our clients. There are interesting possibilities for mobile applications here as well. But in the meantime I'll settle for the modest improvements in the bullet points above.

Further information on the memoQ search tool can be found in the Kilgray knowledgebase.