Translation-friendly authoring ,
section Proposed improvements to HTML and translation techniques

Proposed improvements to the HTML language

This is a very preliminary "wish list". Most probably some of the problems discussed here should be solved by introducing a more general construct than the one proposed here, or solved outside HTML, e.g. by improving the translation software. Sorry, you probably don't understand very much of this unless you know the HTML language rather well.

• It is very important in translations that the translator knows the context. A human translator or and advanced automatic translator could first process the entire text and deduce what topics it discusses, then use this information to select suitable alternatives among dictionary entries. It might still be useful to assist translators by using markup which specifies the context, for an entire document, or for a part of it, or even for a single word or phrase. Some general classification (e.g. UDK) might be used. When a translator knows that the text discusses mathematics, for example, it (or he) is in a much better position to translate terms like "field" or "product" appropriately. In other languages, these words as mathematical terms may have equivalents quite different from the words that correspond to "field" or "product" in everyday language. On the other hand, a mathematical text might use "field" in its everyday meaning, too!
• Markup for indicating "mode" or "style" such as sarcasm, jocularity, or poetry might be added. On Usenet, people sometimes use pseudo-HTML like "<SARCASM>...</SARCASM>. Perhaps translation programs might one day benefit from such markup. (They might also be used e.g. by speech-based user agents in order to select appropriate tone of voice.)
• Introduce markup for indicating uncertainty of enclosed text. Additional information indicating the numerical degree of uncertainty and an explanation of the reason for uncertainty might be introduced. Translators - both automatic and human - might use such markup for indicating that the translation might be incorrect. The explanation generated might include the corresponding fragment in the original text. (Notice that in our example of Finnish to English translation, the translator uses italics to denote one kind of uncertainty. Naturally, logical markup would be needed instead of physical, but current HTML has no suitable element.) The markup could also be used for other purposes, such as in an HTML document containing the text of an old manuscript where some words are less certain than others, e.g. interpolated.
• In conjunction with uncertainties, markup with variants could be used. That is, at the HTML level one could specify different variants for a piece of text. One of the variants could be marked as the "normal" one to be presented to the user by default, distinguished in a manner similar to links, and letting the user access the other variants and their explanations. Naturally, translators should generate such constructs sparingly.
• Introduce "joiner" markup which means that two or more words are to be treated as a whole. This would be especially useful for languages like English which use phrases consisting of several words rather than compound words. Translation might be greatly assisted by indicating how words belong together. (Notice that the existing SPAN element and the no-break space &nbsp; do not logically mean the same as a "joiner" markup would.)
• Include ORIGINAL into the set of standardized values for the REL attribute. It would indicate a link to the original version from which the current version was translated. Translator programs should leave such links intact instead of converting them to links through a translator (as Babelfish now seems to do to all links). Naturally, a translator program, when asked to translate a document to language X, should check whether the document itself refers to its original which is written in X. This could be important when following links in a manner which goes through translations; it might prevent the situation where the user gets a translation of a document from language Y to X instead of getting an existing original in X!
• Include markup for presenting author's estimate of translatability. This should be in the HTML markup, not in metadata outside it. For example, a prose document might contain a quotation of a poem, and the author might wish to denote that it has low translatability. This might imply, depending on software and user preferences, that parts of a document are not translated, or translations would be indicated as being less reliable than usual. At the HTML level, this might involve the use of a "uncertainty element" mentioned above.

To be continued...

Date of last update: 1998-08-24