What is the most cost-effective professional CAT tool? Thread poster: Davidj (X)
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Davidj (X) 
Local time: 07:44
English to Irish
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Hello all,
I was looking at the long list of translator software packages and was wondering which one is the most cost-effective?
kind regards,
David
| | | | Tony M
France
Local time: 13:44
Member
French to English
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SITE LOCALIZER | What kind of software do you mean? | Sep 28, 2012 |
Hi David!
Well, that's a pretty wide open field!
Just what sort of software are you talking about? Do you mean specifically CAT tools? Or are you perhaps asking "Which applications are the most useful for a translator to have in their office?"
I feel sure if you could pin down your request a little more, people would be better able to give you meaningful answers.
| | | | Davidj (X)
Local time: 07:44
English to Irish
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TOPIC STARTER | Sorry about that! Let me rephrase. | Sep 28, 2012 |
Sorry about that! It's very late here and I should be in bed, lol. Let me rephrase :} What is the best and cheapest CAT software?
kind regards,
David
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Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 13:44
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
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| Re the 6-year price analysis | Sep 28, 2012 |
Well, in terms of ProZ.com's post-platinum terminology, that member isn't a member, if I understand correctly. :–)
Due to his handwriting I originally thought that he calculated MemoQ as the cheapest tool at EUR 561, but if you watch the video and not just skip to the last frame, you'll find that the 5 is a 9, and Wordfast ends up as the cheapest tool, even if you buy both WFC and WFP.
Davidj wrote:
Let me rephrase :} What is the best and cheapest CAT software?
A short answer to the original question would perhaps be:
* Best: Memoq or DVX
* Cheapest: OmegaT
* Best and cheapest: Wordfast Anywhere
Perhaps a better question would be (in a separate thread) which CAT tool can handle Irish Gaelic word inflections best, because that will affect your productivity a lot, I think. For example, I mentioned OmegaT above, but OmegaT doesn't have a tokeniser for Gaelic (and since it is a volunteer project, they'll probably ask if you're interested in writing one, for free). That said, I'm not sure if any of the available CAT tools have specific attributive support for Gaelic.
If we evaluate "best" not by number of features but by degree of work speed enhancement, then the best CAT tools would be those that offer some kind of autocomplete, can insert glossary terms and fuzzy matches into your translation either automatically or with a very simple movement, and allows the translator much freedom in organising his translation memories and glossaries.
What exactly are your needs, David?
| | | | Heinrich Pesch
Finland
Local time: 14:44
Member (2003)
Finnish to German
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| Free tools of course | Sep 28, 2012 |
If the software costs you 0, then the cost effectiveness is infinite. You can't beat that.
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I think that depends a lot on the type of texts you get and your customers. I have worked happily with Wordfast Classic for over 10 years - translating fairly standard Word files & the odd PPT or Excel. No problems working with Trados customers. However, recently customers have been asking for Trados Studio directly, so I purchased that. Another long-time customer recently decided to work with MemoQ, so I downloaded that, too. I still plan to keep working with WF Classic and recommend it as an i... See more I think that depends a lot on the type of texts you get and your customers. I have worked happily with Wordfast Classic for over 10 years - translating fairly standard Word files & the odd PPT or Excel. No problems working with Trados customers. However, recently customers have been asking for Trados Studio directly, so I purchased that. Another long-time customer recently decided to work with MemoQ, so I downloaded that, too. I still plan to keep working with WF Classic and recommend it as an inexpensive tool that is easy to learn to use (importing term lists and adding terms is very easy, the main features are pretty simple, etc.) for fairly basic files, i.e., not DTP stuff. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Oliver Walter
United Kingdom
Local time: 12:44
German to English
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| Also depends on its features | Sep 28, 2012 |
For me, using WordFast Classic (WFC), there is a feature that I consider very important, that is absent in some TM/CAT tools (TM = translation memory): true manual segmentation.
With WFC I can let it decide on segmentation (i.e. what it considers to be a sentence for translation) or I can manually select any piece of text (except one containing a paragraph mark) and tell it (by pressing Shift-Alt-Down) "that's the next segment". Examples that WFC handles easily: 1. Sometimes I want a segme... See more For me, using WordFast Classic (WFC), there is a feature that I consider very important, that is absent in some TM/CAT tools (TM = translation memory): true manual segmentation.
With WFC I can let it decide on segmentation (i.e. what it considers to be a sentence for translation) or I can manually select any piece of text (except one containing a paragraph mark) and tell it (by pressing Shift-Alt-Down) "that's the next segment". Examples that WFC handles easily: 1. Sometimes I want a segment to be a piece of text ending with a colon (":"), and sometimes I want it to end instead at the next full stop after a colon. 2. Some documents that I translate contain red strikethrough text that must be left alone, without processing by the TM program - that's easy with WFC but not (I understand) with OmegaT, which insists on doing the segmenting itself and cannot include font attributes in the segmentation rules.
Oliver
[Edited at 2012-09-28 22:52 GMT] ▲ Collapse
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Davidj (X)
Local time: 07:44
English to Irish
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TOPIC STARTER | Thanks Everyone :} | Sep 29, 2012 |
Thank for all of your advice! I have a program called "anois", from www.Gaelspell.com, but that is just a grammar and spell checker. Would it be best if I used a CAT program where I put in custom sentences to be used? or are CAT programs more sophisticated then that?
David
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 13:44
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| Isn't Anois just the word for "now"? | Sep 29, 2012 |
Well, that spell/grammar checker works only in Microsoft Word, so that would normally mean that if you want to use them while you're using the CAT tool, you need to get a CAT tool that is MS Word based. Your options are:
* Wordfast Classic
EUR 350 for a 3-year license
Time-unlimited demo version is fine for small to medium jobs
Constantly being developed and improved
* Metatexis
EUR 99 for a perpetual license
Demo version can only be used 60 times
Not as actively developed as the other CAT tool, could become obsolete if Microsoft releases (and/or you purchase) an incompatible version of Microsoft Word
Many CAT tools can handle MS Word files, but that's no good because the CAT tool does not work inside Microsoft Word, so if you do choose to use those tools, you'd have to make sure they can export the MS Word files and import them again after you've spell-checked it. There's a video comparing the feature in 3 or 4 tools, but 10 minutes of googling now can't find it for me.
[Edited at 2012-09-29 06:40 GMT]
| | | | Drew MacFadyen
United States
Local time: 07:44
Spanish to English
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| Try virtually all before you buy | Dec 24, 2012 |
Almost all CAT Tools have some form of free trial or demo - why not try before you buy.
You can read reviews, feedback, compare products, and find free trials/demo links for many at ProZ.com's Software comparison tool
Regards,
Drew
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