Translation

in

While I wait for the letters to flatten out, I have returned to the process of translating the manuscript.  As noted earlier the conversion from paper to a machine-readable form was less than perfect.  I experimented with a different scanner, that offered a much better scan, yet the conversion from image to machine-readable text appeared no better.  

So, I continue along my original path: [1] compare the german text (after being processed into a machine readable form) with the original in the manuscript, [2] correct spelling and other errors, [3] cut and paste into the translator, [4] review the English result to see if it makes sense; correct the German text as necessary.  I repeat this process for each paragraph.

The resulting translation is somewhat “functional” landing somewhere between a word-for-word conversion and a more meaning-oriented result.  

My original plan had been to correct the entire body of work, that is complete steps 1 & 2 for all 60 pages of the manuscript, and then run the 60 some-odd pages through the translator.  However, I have decided to work on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis so I can be motivated to continue by an unfolding story.  

Snapshot of working text:
I first cut and past a paragraph into a column on the left.  Then I correct the original German by comparing read text with that of the original manuscript.  As can be seen the word processor is able to determine spelling errors, however, I still need to go through word-by-word as sometimes a word mis-read lands on a correctly-spelt term. Following that I translate the paragraph and insert the English in the corresponding right column.

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *