Manuals and instructions for use
Installation, operation, maintenance and safety text. The order of the steps, the warnings and the names of the parts are carried across exactly, because somebody will have the page open while they work.
Independent technical translation
Documents that still do their job in the other language
Ana Barata translates technical material between Portuguese and English: manuals, specifications, procedures and reports. The terms are settled in writing and used the same way on every page, so the translated document can be worked from rather than only read.
The work
Four kinds of document make up most of it. What they have in common is that somebody has to act on them afterwards.
Specifications, data sheets and drawing text
Tables of values, tolerances, materials and the short labels that sit on technical drawings. Units and figures are left as they are written in the source unless you ask for them to be converted, and then the conversion is listed.
Procedures, quality documents and reports
Written methods, audit and inspection reports, non-conformity records and the documents that go with a certification. These are read by people who will be held to them, so nothing is smoothed over to make it read better.
Checking a translation you already have
An existing translation read against the source, sentence by sentence, with the changes marked so you can see what was altered and why. Where the existing text is sound it is left alone and that is said in the note.
Terminology is most of the job
A technical text is rarely difficult sentence by sentence. It is difficult because the same thing has to be called the same name on page 3 and on page 180, and because your own documents already decided some of those names before this one arrived.
- A term list built from your own earlier documents
- Your in-house names kept, even when a more common word exists
- Queries sent while the work is running, not after delivery
- The list returned with the job, so the next one starts from it
- Part numbers, codes and model names left untouched
- One name per thing, checked across the whole document
How a job runs
Three stages. Nothing is translated before the second one has been accepted by you in writing.
-
Files and a count
You send the files in the format you have them. They are read through and counted, and anything that cannot be edited, such as text locked inside an image, is listed back to you before a price is given.
-
A written quote
Price, delivery date, the files it covers and what is excluded, all in writing. There is no charge for the quote and no obligation attached to it.
-
Translation and delivery
The work is done, queries are sent as they come up rather than saved for the end, and the files are returned in the format they arrived in, with the term list beside them.
Agreed before anything is translated
The practical points, written here so they do not have to be asked each time.
- Languages
- Portuguese and English, in both directions. Material in another language is declined rather than passed on to somebody else.
- Who does the work
- One person, from the quote to the delivery. The reply you get is from the person who will translate the file.
- File formats
- Returned in the format they arrived in, with the layout kept as close to the source as the format allows. Scanned pages are quoted separately.
- Deadlines
- Given as a date, not as a range. If something would make that date slip, you are told while there is still time to decide.
- Corrections
- One round of changes after delivery is part of the price. A change to the source text after delivery is new work and is quoted again.
- Confidentiality
- Files are used only for the job they came for, are not shown to anyone else and are not fed into a public tool.
- Payment
- Nothing is sold or paid for on this website. Invoicing is arranged directly once a quote has been accepted.
Asked before the first quote
If what you need to know is not here, put it on the request page.
How small can a job be?
A single page is a job. A short text with awkward terminology often takes longer than a long one that repeats itself, so the quote is made on the file rather than on a minimum.
Can you keep the names we already use?
Yes, and that is the preference. Send whatever you have, even an old spreadsheet of terms, and those names are used in place of the more common ones.
What happens when the source text is wrong?
It is translated as written and the problem is listed for you separately. A source error silently corrected in translation is how two versions of a document stop matching each other.
How long does a reply take?
Enquiries are read and answered in writing by the same person who would do the work, one at a time. Nothing here replies automatically.
Have a document waiting?
Send the file, the direction you need it in and the date it is wanted by. A written quote comes back, and nothing starts until you accept it.