Spring cleaning is one of the strangest traditions of all. Not just people but most mammals and birds in the colder parts of the world seem to see this as a time to clean the house, build a nest, get ready for the summer and in the case of Hedgehogs wake up from a nice snooze. In many ways the idea of spring cleaning is ridiculous.
The weather gets better, the sun is shining, flowers start to bloom and we are expected to stay indoors painting the spare room. This may the reason why people have added another tradition to spring cleaning, the excuse. Getting things sorted may be exactly what is required but there was a reason why we were given long fingers and it is to put things on them.
As you are reading this you probably work in translation. It may even be safe to assume that somewhere in a computer in your office is a wonderful collection of translation memories (TM). You only use the best translators so you can assume that this is a very valuable, high quality resource. However, you are also know that you could be getting far greater value from these TMs. Every so often some enthusiastic, and probably new, member of staff points out the saving which could be made if only you managed your TMs better. Then the excuses would be brought out: too much work, not enough time; no tools to manage them; We don’t even know what’s there. If the excuses fail there is always the long finger, ‘good idea, let’s do that when we get a chance.’
Use these excuses carefully this week as this is your last chance. Kilgray have just released TM Repository and this tool will allow you to manage your TMs regardless of the tool that created them. TM Repository is a database where TMs are stored in the TMX format. This is not just a new tool from Kilgray, it is a completely new tool to the market. The only tools which can be compared to this are systems such as the European Unions’ ERAMIS system and TAUS’ TDA repository. You may have heard people from Kilgray talking about the imminent release of TM Repository for the past two years. During this time we had an extended beta testing period involving LSPs and enterprise customers. As we were releasing a completely new tool we wanted to ensure that the tool would be very mature on the first day of release. The other reason behind the extended beta period is that Kilgray has got a larger customer base and a good reputation. We wanted to ensure that we had launched a tool which did what we said it would it do, allow you to effectively manage your TMs.
Many enterprise customers and LSPs have a number of different tools they have used in the past or use regularly now. TM Repository allows you to import TMs from these tools into the database. When you are doing this you can also add meta data. The better the meta data, the more effectively you will be able to search and manage the TMs. A company that has spent many years collecting TMs only to take up space on a hard drive can now have an effective way to manage them. A single TM can be created from TM Repository based on all your TMs for a particular customer or for a particular market segment. If you have TMs for English to German and English to Japanese, you can use TM Repository to create a German to Japanese TM. The tool comes with a very full API which allows for integration with other tools which you may use.
While Kilgray is adding version control in memoQ 5.0, most of our competitors do not have this. With TM Repository you can have version control at the segment level for all your TMs. TM Repository allows for effective quality control of TMs in a way that previously would have been very labour intensive. The reporting module of the tool will allow you to see what it really happening with some of your most valuable translation assets.
We at Kilgray believe we have released an important tool and would welcome your opinion. Please go to the TM repository page on our website if you want further information: http://kilgray.com/products/tm-repository
