Why Edit in a CAT Tool?
Besides translation work, I sometimes edit lengthy, complex texts with specialized terminology and strict formatting requirements. Since the interval between jobs can be quite long, I frequently find myself revisiting old projects to check how I previously spelled certain terms or applied specific formatting rules. This can be very time-consuming.
Ideally, I would have a streamlined system to store and quickly retrieve texts, terminology, and style rules – similar to the way CAT tools work. Since most translators already use a CAT tool, why not repurpose it for monolingual editing?
Features Required for Monolingual Editing
- Support for configuring a language pair with the same language.
- A built-in Track Changes feature to record edits.
Of the three leading standalone CAT tools – Trados Studio, memoQ, and Wordfast – only memoQ meets both requirements.* Consequently, I will focus on this tool for the remainder of this article.
Configuring a Language Pair in memoQ
As a translation tool, memoQ is designed for bilingual projects with source and target languages. For monolingual editing, however, only one language is used. So, can a CAT tool still be used for this purpose?
While this might initially seem unfeasible, it turns out memoQ allows you to treat language variants as distinct languages. For instance, selecting English (British) as the source language and English (General) as the target language, will create a language pair within the same language, enabling monolingual editing.
The same applies to other languages. Essentially, any language with a locale variant can be used for this workaround.
Step-by-Step Guide for Editing in memoQ
- Open your document in the editor.
- Go to the Edit tab and choose Select/Select All Segments (Ctrl+Shift+A) to select all segments.
- On the Edit tab, choose Clipboard/Copy to Target/Copy Source (Ctrl+Shift+S) to copy the source text into the target column. Ensure the segments remain selected.
- Go to the Translation tab and click Confirm (Ctrl+Enter) to store all segments in the TM.
- From here, you’re ready to edit the text.
Tracking Changes
To ensure edits are recorded and visible, enable memoQ’s Track Changes feature. To do so, go to the Review tab and enable the feature via Tracking/Track Changes. Any changes you make in the target column will now be marked and immediately visible. Once you've edited a segment, save your changes with Ctrl+Enter, ensuring they are written to the TM.
Leveraging Search and Term Base Features
If you need to recall how you previously spelled a term or phrase, use memoQ’s Concordance search via Search/Concordance (Ctrl+K).
Store frequently used tricky terminology in a Term Base. This makes future searches faster and ensures consistency in your edits, just as you would for regular translation projects.
Exporting the Corrected Document
After completing the editing process, export the document as usual via Documents/Documents/Export. The final file will include all tracked edits, which are visible in MS Word.
Conclusion
For monolingual editing, memoQ stands out as one of the few CAT tools that support both same-language configurations and tracking changes. It provides a practical solution for translators or editors who work with complex texts, specialized terminology, or need to efficiently manage client preferences. By leveraging memoQ's Concordance search and Term Base functionality, editors can streamline their workflow and ensure greater accuracy and consistency in their edits.
