How to setup a translation process for a CMS website? Thread poster: Noe Tessmann
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Dear colleagues,
I was asked to take care of the translation process of a new website. It will be built using CMS. One possibility would be to work online and to just overwrite the existing text. But I'd prefer to work offline with my own CAT tool, MemoQ in my case.
I'd have some stupid questions:
Can any CMS export text in translatable formats which can be reimported afterwards or does the webdesigner have to use a special CMS?
What do I have to ask ... See more Dear colleagues,
I was asked to take care of the translation process of a new website. It will be built using CMS. One possibility would be to work online and to just overwrite the existing text. But I'd prefer to work offline with my own CAT tool, MemoQ in my case.
I'd have some stupid questions:
Can any CMS export text in translatable formats which can be reimported afterwards or does the webdesigner have to use a special CMS?
What do I have to ask the webdesigner for to implement the translation process properly?
Are there different CMS which are more or less easy to translate?
Thanks in advance for any hint, HTML websites have be a lot easier
Noe ▲ Collapse
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Noe Tessmann wrote:
I was asked to take care of the translation process of a new website. It will be built using CMS. One possibility would be to work online and to just overwrite the existing text. But I'd prefer to work offline with my own CAT tool, MemoQ in my case.
I'd have some stupid questions:
Can any CMS export text in translatable formats which can be reimported afterwards or does the webdesigner have to use a special CMS?
What do I have to ask the webdesigner for to implement the translation process properly?
There ain't stupid questions.
Ask the webdesigner to export the text to be translated into an Excel file (xls our xlsx) (without sorting it in an alphabetical order!!).
And ask him if he knows how to re-import the translated column. If not, ask him to learn to do this.
Are there different CMS which are more or less easy to translate?
I don't know. I always get an Excel, csv, txt or Word file now.
Thanks in advance for any hint, Use a form of terminology autopropagation. This will make your life much easier.
HTML websites have be a lot easier
Certainly not. Updates of html webpages are much more complicated: you need to process the whole file. If a CMS is used, the webmaster just has to give you the new strings (those which have been inserted or modified after a given date).
Good luck.
[Edited at 2011-08-21 20:06 GMT]
| | | | Samuel Murray 
Netherlands
Local time: 17:08
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
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| CMS... great in theory... | Aug 21, 2011 |
Noe Tessmann wrote:
Can any CMS export text in translatable formats which can be reimported afterwards or does the webdesigner have to use a special CMS?
No, not all CMS developers realise that some people would actually like to edit the web site using non-GUI non-browser systems.
I know very little about CMS systems but aren't they all database based, and if so, why won't one be able to export to CSV and then re-import from it? Something to ask your CMS system's web designer. I also suspect that many CMS systems do have the ability to export and import text in a CAT friendly format, but that the web designers using the system (or the user who buys the services of the web designers) simply don't know how to do it, or believe that dealing with it should be charged by the hour and would therefore be too expensive.
I had to handle the translation of a web site build on a CMS system, and although I was initially very excited about the prospect, neither the client (a translation firm) nor the web developer (who may or may not have been the developer of the CMS system) understood my needs, and eventually I had to download all pages manually, convert them to MS Word, translate them, and then ask the CMS admin to paste the content one page at a time into the CMS's little GUI box in the browser window, and mark up the fonts manually.
Thanks in advance for any hint, HTML websites have be a lot easier.
Some CMS systems' editing GUI have an option to view the HTML source code of the editable portion of a text, and then you can copy that and translate it in your CAT tool and paste it back (and hopefully it'll work).
The CMS that I had to translate had that function, but I could not make use of it, because the style sheets didn't specify fonts for HTML elements, but gave every font change a dynamic span with a numbered ID, which meant that I could not figure out (in the HTML code) what any of the style markups were for. Ask if your CMS system uses (or can use) a simple style sheet that requires minimal markup in the HTML source code.
| | | | Noe Tessmann
Local time: 17:08
English to German
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TOPIC STARTER | excel export | Aug 22, 2011 |
[quote]kalap wrote:
ask the webdesigner to export the text to be translated into an Excel file (xls our xlsx) (without sorting it in an alphabetical order!!).
And ask him if he knows how to re-import the translated column. If not, ask him to learn to do this.
Are there different CMS which are more or less easy to translate?
Dear calap,
thanks for your answer, there must be at least an export feature to ask for. I think xml should also be an appropriate format.
Strange that there's not much information on the web about the translation process of a CMS web site.
Kind regards
Noe
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Noe Tessmann
Local time: 17:08
English to German
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TOPIC STARTER | Horror scenario ;-) | Aug 22, 2011 |
No, not all CMS developers realise that some people would actually like to edit the web site using non-GUI non-browser systems.
I know very little about CMS systems but aren't they all database based, and if so, why won't one be able to export to CSV and then re-import from it? Something to ask your CMS system's web designer. I also suspect that many CMS systems do have the ability to export and import text in a CAT friendly format, but that the web designers using the system (or the user who buys the services of the web designers) simply don't know how to do it, or believe that dealing with it should be charged by the hour and would therefore be too expensive.
You're right, the web designers still think that it must be OK to translate the text on the spot and to put it in their little boxes.
I had to handle the translation of a web site build on a CMS system, and although I was initially very excited about the prospect, neither the client (a translation firm) nor the web developer (who may or may not have been the developer of the CMS system) understood my needs, and eventually I had to download all pages manually, convert them to MS Word, translate them, and then ask the CMS admin to paste the content one page at a time into the CMS's little GUI box in the browser window, and mark up the fonts manually.
This I really want to avoid, that'd be the horror scenario. ;-(
Some CMS systems' editing GUI have an option to view the HTML source code of the editable portion of a text, and then you can copy that and translate it in your CAT tool and paste it back (and hopefully it'll work).
I'll try to have a look into this option, at least the format tags should be OK like this. Any CAT tool can handle HTML tags.
Kind regards
Noe
I'll keep you posted about what the web designer said.
[Edited at 2011-08-23 07:15 GMT]
| | | | | I don't think this is useful | Aug 24, 2011 |
Noe Tessmann wrote:
I'll try to have a look into this option, at least the format tags should be OK like this. Any CAT tool can handle HTML tags.
The aim of a CMS is that layout and contents are separated. The translator only translates the contents, and has nothing to do with the layout. If well organized, you'll receive only translatable strings without tags, or only some rare internal tags such as bold or italics. You can proceed this with any CAT. Do not insist on html, xml or another static format. This is not how a dynamic system works.
For the horror scenario (lots and lots of small textboxes), you are right, this has to be avoided. In some rare cases you can copy long articles, translate them with your CAT and then copy them back. Invoice your client accordingly (markup for file handling).
| | | | oerjan
Local time: 17:08
German to Swedish
| How did it go? | Sep 2, 2011 |
Hi,
Sorry to bump into this a bit late. But I would very much like to know how it did go, what workflow was finally established?
I have a similar scenario where the content of the webpage to be translated is stored in a database. The site is rather big. I´m trying to convince the customer to let me have those database files directly.
Does anyone have experience with such configuration. What file format should I ask for?
Best regards,
... See more Hi,
Sorry to bump into this a bit late. But I would very much like to know how it did go, what workflow was finally established?
I have a similar scenario where the content of the webpage to be translated is stored in a database. The site is rather big. I´m trying to convince the customer to let me have those database files directly.
Does anyone have experience with such configuration. What file format should I ask for?
Best regards,
Örjan
PS. Forgive me if I violate any netiquette out of ignorance. This is my first posting here. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Noe Tessmann
Local time: 17:08
English to German
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TOPIC STARTER
oerjan wrote:
Sorry to bump into this a bit late. But I would very much like to know how it did go, what workflow was finally established?
Hi Orjan,
the project didn't start yet. The web designer is still on vacation. I'll keep you posted.
Best regards
Noe
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Sumin
China
Local time: 23:08
English to Chinese
| It depends the CMS used and who assign you the job | Dec 14, 2011 |
There are a lot of CMS products in market, such as CMS400 and Sitecore, and some open sourse CMS such as WordPress, Joomla, and Druple. Some can export structured xml for translation and import the translated xml back. Others did not provide export/import buttons, but you can always export the text from database. So the process depends on which CMS being used and who give you the job (if there is engineer support you). Some translation agency even developed connector or plug-ins for main CMS pro... See more There are a lot of CMS products in market, such as CMS400 and Sitecore, and some open sourse CMS such as WordPress, Joomla, and Druple. Some can export structured xml for translation and import the translated xml back. Others did not provide export/import buttons, but you can always export the text from database. So the process depends on which CMS being used and who give you the job (if there is engineer support you). Some translation agency even developed connector or plug-ins for main CMS products.
If your client asked you work with their website authors or CMS administrator to translate the content online, you may not count on more engineering support. The process will be: copy the content out, translate them via CAT and paste them back. Maybe you need to explain why use CAT to them and then invoice your copy and paste work. In addition, you need to do the website testing once website published by CMS. ▲ Collapse
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