SDL Trados Studio by default adds the name of the day to autolocalized dates. If you want to change this setting, do one of the following:
For an existing project*, go to Project Settings - Language Pairs - Your Specific Language Pair - Translation Memory and Automated Translation - Auto-substitution - Dates and Times and select your preferred date format from the Long date options.
For the change to be implemented in future projects, created after the setting is changed*, go to Options - Language Pairs - Your Specific Language Pair - Translation Memory and Automated Translation - Auto-substitution - Dates and Times and select your preferred date format from the Long date options.
*Keep in mind that changes made in Options will only be applied to future files and projects created by you. For any existing projects or future projects received from someone else, for example, a package, the change needs to be made in Project Settings.
To increase or decrease the font size in the Editor, do one of the following:
In the View tab, go to the far right and use the Font Adaptation icons to increase or decrease the font size dynamically with every click. The Adapt Font Sizes button has to be enabled as shown below for this to work.
Alternatively, go to Options - Editor - Font Adaptation and enter your preferred font sizes there.
If you keep seeing the following when opening a new document for translation and your target language is not German, you may want to change this setting.
To change the default language in SDL Trados Studio 2019, go to File - Options - Editor - Languages, and select your preferred default language.
If, like me, you find it annoying to have the Outlook window popping up whenever you create a package after opening SDL Trados Studio, then you may find this useful.
This workaround uses an AutoHotkey script, so if you are not currently an AutoHotkey user, read the section at the end of this article for detailed instructions on how to use the script.
In this case, the script I'm using to get rid of the Outlook window (closing it automatically as soon as it pops up) looks like this:
#IfWinActive ahk_exe SDLTradosStudio.exe Loop { WinWait,Welcome to Microsoft Outlook 2016 WinClose,Welcome to Microsoft Outlook 2016 Send, y }
How does it work? The script simply runs in a loop, waiting for a window called "Welcome to Microsoft Outlook 2016" to appear, and when it does, it closes it.
Hint: If your window has a different title, substitute it in the script. The window title has to match exactly for this to work.
But that's not the end of the story, because you know that after you try to close the window, you will see a message like this:
So that last line of the script sends the keystroke "y" to activate the "Yes" button in this window. Again, if your window says something different, substitute the appropriate keystroke in the script.
Here's a video showing Trados Studio's default behavior:
And here's what happens when the script is running:
Creating the AutoHotkey script and running it
First, download AutoHotkey here and install it. Don't expect to see anything different in your computer after installing the program. AutoHotkey runs in the background and allows you to run custom-made scripts to automate tasks.
To use this script, first you will need to create and AutoHotkey file.
1. In Windows Explorer, select a folder where you'd like to keep your script and right-click in any white space within the folder. From the menu, select New and then AutoHotkey Script.
2. Name your file.
The file, which will have an ahk extension, can be opened in a plain text editor, such as Notepad (I personally prefer Notepad++). Double-clicking the file won't open it, but instead it will load the script, making it active. To edit the file, you will need to either open it directly from within your text editor or right click on the file name and select Open with.
3. Open the file in Notepad (or your preferred plain text editor), and paste the script below the text already contained in the file.
4. Save and close the file.
5. Double-click the file to activate the script. After you do this, there will be a green square with a white "H" in it in your system tray.
And that's it! With the script running, that annoying Outlook window will be closed automatically as soon as it pops up.
SDL Trados Studio is most useful during the translation process when we have added as many resources and assets to it as possible. One of these resources are AutoText entries, which, when present, can save us typing time as they are offered in the list of AutoSuggest hits.
AutoText entries can be added on the fly to the active target language list by selecting the appropriate word or phrase and pressing Alt+F7, but if we already have a long list of entries, it is more efficient to import the entire list at once, as explained below.
First, we need to get to the right place where our entries will be imported. If we have SDL Trados Studio 2019, then that's as easy as typing "autotext" in the Tell Me box, which will take us to the appropriate setting. In versions older than 2019, we will need to navigate to the right place (shown below).
The window that opens next displays any existing AutoText entries for the selected target language. As you can see in the example below, my ES-ES list on this computer is pretty empty. Luckily, I keep a backup in Dropbox of my main computer's AutoText entries (which can also be exported from this same screen), so it's just a matter of importing it if I need to.
To import the list, click the Import button...
and find the file that contains the appropriate AutoText entries.*
*This is a plain text file, and we can easily open it in any text editor and make changes to its contents. TIP: This being a very simple text file, we can also use the file for one language variant as the basis for a file in a different language variant, simply by changing the language codes inside the file.
After importing, we will see something like this, with the entries now being available to us as we type.
Typing the first four letters of an AutoText entry will bring it up in the AutoSuggest list while working in Studio.
Points to remember:
1. AutoText entries are monolingual (target language only)
2. The minimum threshold to display an AutoText entry in the AutoSuggest hit list is 4 characters typed.
And that's all we need to do to take advantage of this very simple way to save us some typing while working in SDL Trados Studio.
My favorite feature in SDL Trados Studio 2019 is Tell Me, which SDL has described as Instant Access to Everything.
I have recently learned that Trados has over 700 commands and 1300 settings. No wonder it feels so complex at times!
The good news is that most of those settings don't need to be changed all the time, but when they do, it definitely helps to know where to find them. In pre-2019 versions of Studio, that meant clicking through menus and various screens to get to the right place. In SDL Trados Studio 2019, it's as simple as starting to write a command's name, then clicking on one of the offered options, and you're there!
To access Tell Me, click on the new blue rectangle you'll find on the top right of the Studio screen, or use its shortcut. The default shortcut is Alt+Q, which I've changed to F1, as I rarely use Help and Tell Me includes links to Studio's Help anyway.
Let's look at a couple of examples.
Just yesterday, I was talking to a colleague about Match Repair, so I thought that would be a good example to try.
This is what I get if I type "match repair":
From here, I can go either to Options or Project Settings. I want to check my match repair settings for the current project, so I'll select the one for Project Settings, and by clicking on it, I get to this screen:
Bonus info: SDL Trados Studio 2019 offers the option to turn off termbases as a source of match repairs, as seen above.
So that took 2 clicks. Pre-2019, that would have taken a few more clicks, plus, I would need to know where to find the setting.
Let's try another example. This time, I type the word "Open", which displays 16 different commands. From here, I can perform a wide array of actions, such as opening a package, opening my file for review or opening a translation memory.
Note how there's always a "Search for x in Help" option at the bottom of the screen, so at any time, I can go from the Tell Me screen to Help. This comes in handy when you're trying to find something that isn't included in Tell Me. For example, I want to get to the date auto-substitution settings, but Tell Me doesn't show me that when I type in "date":
If I click on the offer to search for "date" in Help, I get this screen, where the second entry is what I'm looking for:
So that's the idea. Now, even before we type anything in, Tell Me offers five options:
These are all helpful, and in my case "translation memory" will be frequently used, as it provides access to a good number of commands and settings that I use all the time. I would like to see "terminology" or "termbases" included in this list as well (both are available if typed in), and hopefully SDL will further refine the default and search options in Tell Me as SDL Trados Studio 2019 matures.
I'll finish by saying that when I first heard about the concept for Tell Me, I wasn't necessarily excited about it. After all, I use Trados Studio everyday and I know how to get to the settings I need, but after I tried it for the first time, I was hooked! Now it takes no time to change Autocorrect settings (you'll see me typing "quotes" and "initial" often to change quotation mark format or first-letter capitalization settings).
Like I've said before, among all the SDL Trados Studio 2019 new features and enhancements, Tell Me is my absolute favorite, and one that I think fulfills SDL's goal of improving the user experience.
SDL Trados Studio 2019 is finally here! Over the next few days and weeks, we will be hearing about the new features and how the SDL team has worked to make the user experience better.
One set of new features that has immediately improved my own user experience is the one around project and file management. In this post, I'll explain three tasks that have been made simpler and faster in SDL Trados Studio 2019: Creating a new project, Adding a file to an existing project and Updating an existing file in a project.
1. Creating a New Project
The New Project Wizard has been redesigned. Below is a comparison of what we see after clicking Create New Project in Studio 2017 vs. Studio 2019:
It's immediately evident that the new wizard offers a lot more information and options. The initial screen gives us options to select the project languages, base our project on existing templates or previous project settings, name our project, select its location, and add files or folders, effectively allowing us to create a new project in one step.
Across the top of the new wizard we see 9 metro stations, each representing a different step in project creation. Should the one-step option not be enough, we can further customize our project settings by either clicking Next and running through each of the stations or by clicking on the appropriate station.
For example, here's what I see after I click on station 4:
After clicking Finish, which can be done at any point in the process, the project is created and we're presented with the following screen:
Now, you may notice those two buttons above the batch task list and wonder what they're for. In fact, the buttons are there in SDL Trados Studio 2017 as well, but they're less prominent, so this is not a new feature, just new placement of those buttons. Restart Preparation will only become active if something fails during the project creation process and the files need to be prepared again. Results will become active when you select one of the completed batch tasks, as shown below.
2. Adding a new file to an existing project
There's an enhancement in SDL Trados Studio 2019 around adding a new file to an existing project that may not seem like a big deal, but has already proven to be a time-saver for me.
In past versions of SDL Trados Studio, adding a new file involves 1) adding the file, 2) manually preparing the file for translation by selecting the appropriate batch tasks, 3) switching to the target language once the file had been prepared. This last step causes a lot of confusion among new users, who are often puzzled about why they can't open the file for translation after preparing it (answer: they're still in the source language view), and usually resort to measures such as closing and restarting Studio.
With the new Quick Add Files option, one simply selects the file and SDL Trados Studio 2019 handles steps 2 and 3 above. The process is so quick that it's often a "blink and you'll miss it" sort of situation, where it seems like I've just added the file and it's already showing in my target language, prepared and ready for translation.
The Quick Add Files option can be accessed via the context menu (right click) in the Files view or via the Add Files button in the ribbon, where Quick Add Files is now the default.
See it in action here:
Note: For the Quick Add Files feature to work, files have to be added using either of the two options mentioned above. Files that are added via drag and drop will not be automatically prepared by Studio.
3. Updating an existing file in a project
This is another enhancement that I really like. I sometimes have clients send me an updated version of a file I'm already working on. In past Trados Studio versions, replacing the old file with the new one required several steps: 1) going to the source language, 2) deleting the old file, 3) adding the new file, 4) preparing the file, 5) switching to the target language.
With the new Update File feature in SDL Trados Studio 2019, this is all done in a couple of clicks. To access the feature, we need to select the file that will be updated, right-click and select Update File, then select the new file. After that, Studio 2019 handles the entire process for us.
Here's an example. I have the following in my original file:
When I receive an updated file from my client, I follow the Update File process, as shown here:
After this, when I open the file, I have the following, which includes the new text added by the client:
A word of caution about updating files and file names: Keep in mind that Studio will update the contents of the file, but will keep the same file name. In my example, my original file was called "This is a file for translation", while the new file was called "This is a file for translation_rev". After updating the file, the new text is there, but the file in Studio is still called "This is a file for translation". I think we can all imagine potential scenarios where this could be a problem, so one should be aware of this.
There are several other exciting new features in SDL Trados Studio 2019, which I hope to explore in future posts, but for now, I hope you'll find the project and file management features as useful as I have.
