• Machine Translation & Post-editing in the Industry

  • THIS RESEARCH IS CURRENTLY CLOSED TO SUBMISSIONS.

     

     

     

    This research is carried out within the framework of [anonymized].

    It aims to identify the skills necessary for professional post-editors of machine translation.

    Your participation in this survey-based empirical research is voluntary and your data will remain confidential and will only be used for research purposes. Please transfer it to the person in your firm who knows the most about the translation workflow.

    Should you have any questions, feel free to contact [anonymized].

    Filling out this questionnaire takes 15-20 minutes, depending on your expertise in machine translation post-editing. Required questions are marked with an asterisk.

    At the end, you will be invited to leave your email address if you wish to receive a report with the results. 

  • Basic Information

  • 1. Gender*
  • 3. What is the highest degree you have completed?*

  • 5. Type of company*

  • 6. Does it have a translation department?*
  • 7. Size of company:*
  • 8. Does it have office(s) in Europe?*

  • MTPE Projects

  • MTPE (machine translation post-editing) is defined as "editing and correcting machine translation output". Machine translation is defined as "automatic translation of text from one natural language to another using a computer application"

    Source: ISO 18587-2017

     
  • 11. Does your company handle translation projects with post-editing of machine translation (MTPE)?*
  • 11_1. For which type of documents do you use MTPE?*

  • Client-TSP Agreement

  • 12. Do you use an agreement between client and translation service provider (TSP)?*
  • 13. Does the client-TSP agreement contain any of the following elements?*

  • Current Trends in MTPE Projects

  • The next three sections will ask the core questions of this survey.

     
    • Your MTPE Background 
    • 14. How long have you been handling MTPE projects?*
    • 15. What is the percentage of your translation production via post-editing (PE) of machine translation (MT)?*

    • 16. Please select the most frequent language pairs in which you translate content via MTPE.

       

    • It seems that your language is not in the list. Please specify it below.

      Language codes may follow ISO 639-2 or ISO 639-3, and ">" shows direction towards. For instance "EN>FR" would be English into French. Feel free to write the name of the languages in full letters if you are not sure about the ISO code. To show bidirectionality you can use "<>", for instance: English<>French.

       
    • 17. In general, who triggers the decision of translating content via MTPE?*

    • 18. Does the client ever send an MT output along with the source text?*
    • 19. Are your MTPE projects generally post-edited with the source text (ST) as reference?*
    • 20. How do you decide if a ST is apt for machine translation and post-editing?*

    • 21. How do you decide if an MT output is of enough quality to be post-edited?*

    • 22. Have you ever used MT output without informing the client of such workflow?*
    • 23. What is the level of post-editing (PE) that is most often required?*
    • 24. To what extent are post-edited texts revised or checked by a second translator/reviser?*
    • 25. Which of the following PE scenarios is most used in your firm or company?*
    • 26. Do you keep track of post-editors productivity rate?*
    • 27. How many words per hour do you expect a post-editor to be able to post-edit on average?*

    • Controlled Language / Authoring

    • 28. Do you use any controlled language (CL) or controlled authoring (CA) tool to write or pre-edit content that you will translate with MT?*
    • 29. Who developed the CL that you use to write or pre-edit content that you will translate using MT?*

    • The Machine Translation Post-Editor Profile 
    • 33. Do your in-house post-editors work 100% of their time on MTPE projects?*
    • Rows
    • Rows
    • 36. How do you usually pay for MTPE projects?*

    • Post-editor Recruitment Criteria

    • 37. Which of the following post-editor profiles would you value more for your MTPE projects?*

    • Please pay special attention to the next two questions. They are essential to guarantee sound results for this research.

    • Rows
    • Rows
    • 40. If you ever receive unsatisfactory deliveries, in what way do they not respect the MTPE assignment?*

    • 41. Do you have a recruitment test for post-editors, different from the one for translators?*
    • The MT Post-Editing Project 

    • Post-Editing Assignment or Brief

    • 42. Do you use a post-editing assignment or brief?*
    • 42_1. Which of the following does the PE assignment/brief include?*

    • Post-Editing Guidelines

    • 43. Which PE guidelines do you send to the post-editor?*

    • Post-Editor Feedback

    • 44. Do you ask your post-editor for feedback concerning MT output in order to improve the MT system?*
    • 44_1. What elements are sent by the post-editor after a MTPE project?*

    • TQA (Translation Quality Assessment)

    • 45. Do you use a Translation Quality Assessment (TQA) system for MTPE projects?*

    • 45_1. Is your TQA model defined according to a risk management strategy?*
    • 45_2. Which of the following TQA systems do you use?*

  • Training in Machine Translation Post-Editing

  • 46. Does your firm/company offer MTPE training?*
  • 48. Does the training change depending on who is attending?*
  • 49. Who is the trainer?*

  • 49_1. Who is the trainer for in-house participants?*

  • 49_2. Who is the trainer for freelance participants?*

  • 50. How is the training organized?*

  • 50_1. How is the training organized for in-house participants?*

  • 50_2. How is the training organized for freelance participants?*

  • 51. Do you know what the training provided by in-house staff includes?*
  • 52. What elements does the training include?*

  • Rows

  • Technology & Tools

  • 53. What MT architecture does your MT system have?*

  • 54. What MT provider(s) do you use most often for your MTPE projects?

  • 55. Do you use existing translation memories and/or glossaries to train, customize or tune an MT engine?*
  • 56. Is your MT system integrated with any translation productivity tools other than a CAT tool?*

  • 57. Are MT output and Translation Memory results combined in the editor?*

  • TM/MT Not integrated

  • 58. In what tool is the MT output post-edited?*

  • Integrated TM/MT

  • 59. In which tool are MT and TM integrated?*

  • 60. What CAT tool(s) do you use most often?

  • 61. Does the post-editor see the origin of the translation result?*
  • 62. Do you offer "repaired" segments? (both TM result and MT output mixed to build the fuzzy to be post-edited)*
  • 63. What tool do you use to track the productivity rate?*

  • 64. Do the post-editors use any of the following tools to perform quality assurance (QA) checks?*

  • 65. What controlled authoring tool do you use most often?*

  • Feelings & Thoughts

  • 66. Do you think that current PE training courses are adequate for a professional post-editor position?*

  • 67. Would you like to have access to an online platform that allows your firm/company to send PE assignments to post-editor trainees?*

  • 68. Are you aware of the publication of or existing work on any of the following standards?*

  • Thank you!

  • Thank you very much indeed for having spent some time filling in this survey.

  • For this research, we are only considering LSPs, firms or corporations that translate content using machine translation and human post-editing.

     

  • For this research, we are only considering LSPs, firms or corporations that have offices in Europe and that have a translation department.

     

  • Public organizations such as NGOs or public bodies are not considered for the moment. However, similar research among these institutions might be carried out in the near future.

    If you wish to participate in it, please leave your personal details below:

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