Subsegment recall in Translation Memory — perceptions, expectations and reality

Some CAT tool vendors describe their software as providing ‘subsegment’ matching, sometimes called ‘advanced leveraging.’ The descriptions can seem quite similar, but different tools in fact provide very different subsegment matching techniques and performance, with no typology available to disting...

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Main Author: Kevin Flanagan
Format: Article
Language:deu
Published: ZHAW 2015-01-01
Series:JoSTrans: The Journal of Specialised Translation
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.jostrans.org/article/view/8056
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author Kevin Flanagan
author_facet Kevin Flanagan
author_sort Kevin Flanagan
collection DOAJ
description Some CAT tool vendors describe their software as providing ‘subsegment’ matching, sometimes called ‘advanced leveraging.’ The descriptions can seem quite similar, but different tools in fact provide very different subsegment matching techniques and performance, with no typology available to distinguish implementations. This article first describes subsegment matching, then proposes just such a typology. The results of the first survey of translators to gauge their interpretations of vendor descriptions and their expectations of the software are presented and analysed in terms of the typology. A matrix of all CAT tools providing subsegment matching and available for trial (or free) use by translators is used to cross-reference their features with the typology. Finally, for the four CAT tools that provide the more advanced functionality, the first detailed analysis of their subsegment matching performance is presented, using an extensive series of tests. The overall findings show that interesting subsegment matching functionality is available, but that performance could be improved to meet translator expectations better. This in turn helps highlight the functionality to translators who may benefit from it, and the differences so as to help them make informed CAT tool purchase decisions.
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spelling doaj-art-3f7f788e746e4b6daeba7b1324e701d42025-08-20T03:16:12ZdeuZHAWJoSTrans: The Journal of Specialised Translation1740-357X2015-01-012310.26034/cm.jostrans.2015.340Subsegment recall in Translation Memory — perceptions, expectations and realityKevin Flanagan Some CAT tool vendors describe their software as providing ‘subsegment’ matching, sometimes called ‘advanced leveraging.’ The descriptions can seem quite similar, but different tools in fact provide very different subsegment matching techniques and performance, with no typology available to distinguish implementations. This article first describes subsegment matching, then proposes just such a typology. The results of the first survey of translators to gauge their interpretations of vendor descriptions and their expectations of the software are presented and analysed in terms of the typology. A matrix of all CAT tools providing subsegment matching and available for trial (or free) use by translators is used to cross-reference their features with the typology. Finally, for the four CAT tools that provide the more advanced functionality, the first detailed analysis of their subsegment matching performance is presented, using an extensive series of tests. The overall findings show that interesting subsegment matching functionality is available, but that performance could be improved to meet translator expectations better. This in turn helps highlight the functionality to translators who may benefit from it, and the differences so as to help them make informed CAT tool purchase decisions. https://www.jostrans.org/article/view/8056TMtranslation memoryCAT toolssubsegment recalladvanced leveraging
spellingShingle Kevin Flanagan
Subsegment recall in Translation Memory — perceptions, expectations and reality
JoSTrans: The Journal of Specialised Translation
TM
translation memory
CAT tools
subsegment recall
advanced leveraging
title Subsegment recall in Translation Memory — perceptions, expectations and reality
title_full Subsegment recall in Translation Memory — perceptions, expectations and reality
title_fullStr Subsegment recall in Translation Memory — perceptions, expectations and reality
title_full_unstemmed Subsegment recall in Translation Memory — perceptions, expectations and reality
title_short Subsegment recall in Translation Memory — perceptions, expectations and reality
title_sort subsegment recall in translation memory perceptions expectations and reality
topic TM
translation memory
CAT tools
subsegment recall
advanced leveraging
url https://www.jostrans.org/article/view/8056
work_keys_str_mv AT kevinflanagan subsegmentrecallintranslationmemoryperceptionsexpectationsandreality