Layout

Choice of software

There are several programs available for the production of documentation. There are however programs which are less useful for the translation and editing of texts. MS Word^® e.g. is widely used, but offers only limited features for the combination of text and illustrations and is not very stable for extensive documentation. Within special graphics programs the text editing is often quite complicated and such files sometimes cannot be translated directly with a Translation Memory System (TMS).

Approved programs like FrameMaker^® have some disadvantages as well, they do not support bidirectional languages for example. For an Arabic version a different program must be used. Therefore, it is recommended to think twice before purchasing software and to make sure the most important features are included. With regard to translation costs the program should particularly be compatible with Translation Memory Systems.

Text expansion

Different languages have different word or sentence lengths, i.e. the German translation of an English text is usually about 30% longer than the original text. The text expansion factor is even higher for other languages, e.g. Portugese. This factor is very high when translating single words, the text expansion of the translation from "View" to "Ansicht" is almost 100%.

Text expansion can lead to layout problems, e.g. not enough space provided for the translated text. It is crucial to consider these problems when creating the source text, i.e. enough space for the translations should be provided, particularly in tables, illustrations, headers and footers.