Professional Documents
Culture Documents
quality
of
machine
generated
summaries.
to
smaller
channels
like
Zoombucks,
Probux,
Getpaid,
days
even
if
you
have
thousands
of
them.
Another nice thing about CrowdFlower that AMT does not have is a
higher degree of quality control on the results. CrowdFlower has
hidden questions called Gold Standard (provided by the requester),
which has contributors (workers) perform tasks that have already
been
completed
in
order
to
determine
their
accuracy
that
are
not
serious
on
the
tasks.
majority
voting
for
as
the
final
answer.
So what can you use crowd sourcing for? For a lot of things!
Determining the right category of an item, circling out the
sentiment words in sentences, determining the correct sense of a
word in text, summarizing long documents, finding websites on a
specific topic are just a few out of the many tasks you can have
people complete for you.
About CrowdFlower
CrowdFlower, found online at CrowdFlower.com, is a company which
handles the streamlining and posting of tasks for companies who
are interested in utilizing crowdsourcing to fulfill their needs.
Crowdsourcing is a type of online, independent work which was
established
when
companies
discovered
that
certain
basic
And
CrowdFlower
says
that
they
are
the
leading
may
take
much
time
to
get
your
answer"
That is the most unfair thing that i`ve seen at this site.
You have goals. You reach it. You did not get your award. Instead of
this they inform you, that some day you will receive it. Maybe.
Probably. Till then continue working. Lost any trust for that
company.
Pros
-
Good
talent
is
recognized
Great
and
work-life
rewarded
balance
Gorgeous,
open,
plant-filled
office
to
its
values
Hiring
than
decisions
sometimes
necessary
made
unilaterally
new
platforms
by
themselves
are
incomplete
to
be
commercially viable they need both more training data and better
training data.
With AI, CrowdFlower customers will be able to apply a predictive
model against new data sets. For rows of data that fall below a
customer defined confidence level, units can be routed to human
contributors to complete the enrichment task such as sentiment
analysis or data categorization. By combining machine and human
intelligence in a single platform, CrowdFlower can intelligently
assign data enrichment tasks to either humans or a machine based
on the customer requirements for scope, quality and cost.
The industry has been having the wrong debate about human
versus machine intelligence, said Biewald. Human intelligence and
machine
intelligence
arent
in
competition
theyre
natural
and
judgment,
and
machines
great
strength
is
science experiment to a
-Ribbon, slightly more user friendly: The ribbon was the most
noticeable change between Trados 2011 and 2014, and sparked lots
of discussions online. Its not a fundamental change, though, it
simply gives access to some of the frequently used functions of
Trados in a more visual way. If you are new to SDL software, it will
probably make the learning curve a little smoother.
-Possibility to merge several files in a single working pane: Pretty
cool feature for projects with a great number of small files. No need
to open 200 tabs anymore. It saves time and makes things like
Search & Replace much less tedious.
Strengths
Complete: Trados Studio 2014 is still the most complete CAT tool
when it comes to compatibility with file formats. It also offers an
impressive number of customizable options to make it work ideally
for you. In theory, you should be able to translate the vast majority
of the files youll ever need to.
OpenExchange Apps: I have to admit its the one thing that makes
me stick to Trados for most projects not requiring any specific CAT
tool. On the OpenExchange website, you will find tons of really
useful plugins, often available for free. They make a lot of tasks
easier, especially when it comes to TM management. Some of the
dictionary/glossary tools can also give you a good productivity
boost.
Shortcomings
Buggy crashy laggy: Despite updates being made on a regular
basis, SDL Trados Studio 2014 is still awfully buggy. It will crash
rather often, most of the time without a clear/reproducible reason.
There are also regularly problems with opening/saving files that
Trados should be able to handle (and that other CAT tools handle
very well). Saving issues are particularly annoying when you realize,
after finishing a project, that you cant output your translation in the
original format
For large files, Trados still seems to be overall slower than its
competitors. For files over 10,000 words, switching between
segments takes me so much time that I prefer to split the source file
to save time.
Complex, unintuitive: Trados Studio offers lots of options, which is
great, but they are rather poorly organized. Some very simple
actions will require browsing through several layers of sub-menus.
Option labels are often confusing and you have to try them out to
really understand what they do. Another problem is that a ridiculous
number of shortcuts is set by default mistype something and you
will trigger functions that you didnt even know about.
In general, every process seems to have more steps than it should.
Even creating a simple project with a source file and TM takes you
through a long series of screens
Unresponsive and condescending support: Responsiveness of the
support team seems pretty random. If you want a quick response,
the fastest way seems to be shouting it out on social networks
and/or translation forums. But then still, you are likely to get only
partial help: either you get workarounds that take a ridiculous
amount of time to execute (arent CAT tools supposed to save time?)
or they put the blame on you/your client/some third party. To sum it
up, I will quote the SDL support itself, which responded to a feature
request this way: Yes there is always hope, but this is pretty
unlikely to be something coming from SDL.
Conclusion
If you are new to CAT tools, I would recommend starting with a more
simple tool, like Wordfast, which doesnt have all of Trados features
but is much more user-friendly and stable. Once you are
experienced and that you start looking for advanced productivity
tips, Trados Studio 2014 and Open Exchange Apps may provide a
real boost. Even if you purchase Trados, I would recommend
translators to keep a lighter and more reliable tool for when
Trados decides it just doesnt want to translate your file. Remember
that you can always import/export your TMs and bilingual files
between software.
Trados can save you big time once you understand how to use it and
that it doesnt crash or decide it doesnt want to handle your files.
With a better interface and less bugs, it would clearly be the best
tool of the market. As such, it should be approached with care and
patience for projects that seem suited to it.
By the way, its pretty expensive. The good news is that, most of
time, group buys (Proz) and seasonal promotional offers are
available (generally 20-30% off discounts). Even if none is available
at the time you check promotions out, one will probably pop out
soon enough, so make sure you wait to get it at a more reasonable
price.
New Features
Studio 2014 uses the same concepts and workflows as the previous
versions of SDL Studio, so there are no fundamentally different changes
to get used to in terms of creating project or handling files. However,
SDL Studio 2014 does introduce some new features and functionality
that I will describe in short in this section.
The Ribbon
Studio 2014 has dropped the use of traditional toolbars in favor of the
Ribbon interface, now used by both Microsoft Office and Windows as
the main User Interface. By doing so, SDL Studio is the first TEnT to
switch to the Ribbon interface which is a topic ofgreat controversy, and
probably will reaming so. Ive participated in the Ribbon-for-or-against
debate since it was first introduced in Office 2007 and there is no other
way to sum it up except for a matter of personal preference. Each side
has very valid arguments and points, and it should be acknowledged
that a major UI change is something that may hurt experienced users
more than novice ones, but ultimately I think that in case of the Ribbon
the UI change is not as fundamental as it may look at first glance
because it still uses the same navigation and presentation principles as a
traditional toolbar, from which it differs mostly in the visual style.
Personally I find the Ribbon to be an improvement over the traditional
toolbars for the following reasons:
Studio uses Projects over working with individual files. Projects offer
many advantages, but they are also a source of confusion for new users
who are used to working with individual files . Im happy to note that as
part of the Welcome view overhaul the quite confusing Open
Document command was renamed Translate a Single Document,
which is a much more appropriate name for it.
SDL Studio 2014 new Welcome view. Note the links to the SDL
OpenExchange and the installed OpenExchange apps on the left
pane
user had to manually switch to the source language under the Files view
to add new files to an existing project and prepare them for translation.
Studio 2014 makes the whole process a little easier by automatically
switching to the source language when files are added via the Ribbon
command or by drag and drop.
These are by no stretch of the imagination a game changing features,
but they do make for an improved and less frustrating user experience,
which I appreciate.
Quick Merge
The previous versions of SDL Studio suffered from a major inefficiently
when working with several files in a single project. The inability to
merge files ad-hoc or to add/remove files from already merged files was
sorely missing. The merge itself was physical (they were merged into
one big SDLXLIFF file) and took some preparation and doing, and
overall it resulted in quite a cumbersome experience. Many users just
opt to (or were forced to) work individually with the project files which
became an issue with large number of files and also meant going back to
correct a segment in one file and batch search and replace operation a
problem.
The QuickMerge feature in Studio 2014 solves all the issues associated
with working with individual files in a project. The QuickMerge allows
the user to select some or all the files in a project and open them
together for Translation, Review, or Sign-off. Unlike in previous
versions, the files are not physically merged; they are just displayed in
the Editor window as one consolidated unit. A nice touch is the fact that
the orange tabs that indicate the beginning and end of a file are still
there to indicate where one file end and the next begins.
The four files of the example project merged together using the
QuickMerge feature in the Editor window. Note the orange tabs that
indicate the end of one file and the beginning of the next.
This feature is nicely complemented by the file list on the left Editor
pane from which the user can quickly and easily switch to a specific file
in the project without needing to scroll through the editor window.
A closer look on the File List in the left Editor pane that allows the
user to quickly navigate to a certain project file from within the
Editor window
Alignment
Alignment is the process of creating a Translation Memory from past
translation that are available as separate source and target documents.
Previous versions of SDL Studio and Trados featured the WinAlign tool
that I personally never really liked. It worked generally well but was far
from intuitive for new users,, from my experience had a tendency to
crush, and in recent years started to feel outdated a in terms of handling
some file formats.
The icon of the new Alignment Tool in the Ribbon of Studio 2014
Studio 2014 features a new alignment tool that seems to be easier to use
and also creates by default a Translation Memory that can be added to
Studio with no extra importing or processing needed, which is nice.
However, while WinAlign was a complete Alignment tool, the
new alignment tool in Studio 2014 lacks one critical feature
an alignment editor that allow the user to correct
misalignments before creating the final Translation Memory
that might render it ineffective for many alignment projects.
With the default settings Studio 2014s alignment tool works
very well with simple and closely formatted source and target
of them are even installed with Studio 2011 and 2014, but they never
really got much attention, and I dont think that Im wrong in assuming
that they are still largely a relatively little known secret. The
OpenExchange platform is based on the same principle as browser
extensions or Smartphone apps that allow the user to install additional
pieces of software to extend or augment the functionality of the main
program. Through a series of APIs (Application Programming Interface)
that define how software components interact with each other,
developers can harness the powerful capabilities of Studio to develop
some useful value-added apps for some specific workflow requirements
and needs.
OpenExchange is a potentially powerful concept, but much like every
other market or store that are based on the same concept, its long-term
success will be largely determined by the variety and quality of apps
available in SDL OpenExchange. In Studio 2014 a greater focus is given
to OpenExchange as they are better integrated and more easily
discoverable and accessible from within the environment itself. I think
that this is the right move for raising awareness and making
OpenExchage integral part of SDL Studio experience. More awareness is
usually leads to more attention and larger user base which is an
important precursor for turning such a platform from a gimmick into a
Performance
One of the first things that Ive noticed after working with Studio 2014
for a couple of days is a performance gain. I must admit that I wasnt
expecting much, but I was pleasantly surprised. Indeed, without
benchmarks performance is somewhat subjective, but in general I dont
care much for software/hardware performance benchmarks that to me
are far from a reliable method because they are very sensitive to many
factors that significantly influence the results and could mean that the
findings are not transferable in the same way to other system, and
instead prefer to measure things in terms of overall experience. The
most noticeable performance gain that I have noticed is with processing
common file types. Preparing, finalizing or saving files in a project seem
to be very smooth and quick. Exporting and Importing of Translation
Memories, which was the other area I tested with various TM sizes,
seem to remain on a similar performance level as Studio 2011.
For my needs file processing is probably the most important area in
terms of performance, so in that context Im very happy with Studio
2014.
Java: Studio 2014 still uses Java. In light of the security and
performance issues of Java, I would love to see it go and
Takeaway
In my opinion, with the launch of Studio 2014 SDL Studio has finally
became a truly matured and well-rounded translation environment. It
adds major functionality improvements that tackle some of the
annoyances and inefficiencies of previous Studio versions, with the
entire Ribbon interface issue, whether one is for or against it, being
quite negligible by comparison, I think. The better integration of the
OpenExchage apps is good, and it would be interesting to follow the
direction and development of this platform the upcoming years.
SDL Trados and Studio were the subject of some onslaught in the past,
some of it justifiable and some not. I have my own love and hate
relationships with Studio (and previously Trados) throughout the years,
and although there still things to improve and features to add, there
always are, with the release of Studio 2014 I feel that in this point in
Studio 2014, and with the opinions of other users in online forums,
groups and on Twitter (#studio2014) I hope that you will be able to
reach an even more educated decision.