Creating High Quality Content that Communicates Across Language Barriers: Reducing Localization Costs By Focusing on Information Quality

Slide 1: IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ Creativity or Confusion? The case for word-, phrase-, and sentence-level reuse. Control Information Quality and Consistency to improve readability, and to reduce tran$lation co$t and time-to-market Kent Taylor acrolinx North America, Inc. IMPROVING Y OUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 2: Agenda  Creativity: How many ways can you say …?  Creativity or Confusion: Real-world Information Quality and cost issues  A brief history of the world – how we got here  Managing Information Quality – moving on  Information Quality Management Tools  Q&A © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 3: How many ways can you say the same thing? This parrot is …  Ended his days  Dead  Cashed in his chips  Deceased  Crapped out  Passed away  Kicked off  Passed on  Taken away  Perished  Gave up the ghost  Expired  Shuffled off his mortal coil  Departed  Went the way of all flesh  Finished  Gone to the great beyond  Kaput  Met his maker  Six feet under  Turned to dust  Pushing up the daisies  Kicked the Bucket  Ceased to exist  Out like a light  Is no more  Croaked  Faded away  Dead as a door nail  Withered away  Heard the heavenly trumpet  Gone West  Met St Peter  Breathed his last  Entered the pearly gates  Bit the dust © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 4: How many ways can you say the same thing? On the other hand, he might just be:  Tanked  Drunk  Buzzed  Blitzed  Crocked  Snockered  Lit  Tipsy  Sloshed  Three sheets to the wind  Hammered  Knee-walking  Sotted  Blasted  Pissed (British)  High  Sozzled  Plastered  Stewed  Inebriated  Plowed  Intoxicated  Juiced  Blotto  Blown Away  Trashed  Feeling no pain  Wasted  Passed out  In the Bottle  Dead Drunk © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 5: How many meanings can one word have? DO  I do. (lifetime commitment)  Just do it. (set yourself free, carpe diem)  Three-fingers Louie hired the Joker to do Batman. (kill)  If he gets caught, he will probably do time. (be incarcerated)  The musical scale starts with do, re, mi.  My car will do 165 miles per hour. (is capable of)  We will do all the attractions around Disney World on our vacation. (visit, take advantage of)  When the MD couldn’t help him, he consulted a DO. (osteopath)  If you don’t have Merlot, a good red Zinfandel will do. (be acceptable)  I do my own hair. (comb, brush, cut, style)  And I’m still walking around with my original 50’s do. (hairdo)  She put on an incredible do at her beach house last night. (party, event)  I always wear a do at Kendo class. (body armor)  Do you do drugs?  What’s the big to do about? (fuss)  Do over!  Undo.  Dah do ron ron ron, dah do ron ron … © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 6: How many words do you need? Creativity? or Simplicity? a great deal of much a large number of many a number of several arrive at a conclusion conclude as well as and at the present time currently conduct a demonstration demonstrate conduct a test test despite the fact that although due to the fact that because eliminate altogether eliminate for the purpose of for, to provide a description of describe give an indication of indicate give careful consideration to consider in conjunction with w ith It can be seen that --- in order to to in reference to regarding in the event that if on a daily basis daily refer back to refer to take into consideration consider the issuance of issue until such time as until © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc we suggest that you --- IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 7: The real world: ‘Creativity’ vs Readability Case Study:  In one 1,100,000-word software manual set:  15% of words were simply not needed  “We suggest that you use…” > “Use”  Translation: $40,000 per language  Production: ~330 pages less (~$66) per copy (~ $66,000)  30% of sentences were at a graduate-school reading level  50% of sentences were at a college reading level or higher  85% of sentences were at a high-school reading level or higher However,  Only 20% of Americans read at a level above 10th grade  Non-native readers typically have a lower reading level in other than their native language. © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 9: The real world: Duplication of Effort http://office.microsoft.com/en- us/powerpoint/HA012303211033.aspx http://support.microsoft.com/kb/291875 © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 10: The real world: Please enter start date before or equal to the end date. Please enter a start date earlier than or the same as the end Consistency??? date. Please enter an actual start date earlier than the actual end Please enter an end date that is later than the start date. date. The Start Date cannot exceed the End Date. Date To must be later than or equal to Date From. The End Date cannot precede the Start Date. The Date To must be later than the Date Received. End Date must be later than Start Date. The actual end date must be on or after the actual End date must be equal to or later than the start date. start date. The end date must be later than or the same as the start date. End date should be greater than start date. End Time must be later than the Start Time. End Date cannot be before the Start Date. The valid grade's end date must be later than or equal to its The start date must be prior to the end date. start date. You entered a start date later than the end date. Please enter an End Date that is later than or the same as the Ending range must be later or the same as starting Start Date. range C ompetence end date has to be later than or equal to the Please enter a new start date later than the original start date. end date. The start date cannot be later than the end date. The ending date must be later than or the same as the The appraisal end date must be later than or equal to beginning date. appraisal start date. The date to has to be later than or equal to date from. The Effective start date cannot be later than the Effective end End Date must be greater than Start Date. date. You cannot enter an "End Date" that is before your Date from cannot be later than date to. "Start Date." The start date must be on or before the end date. End Date must be greater than or equal to Start Date. The Start Date cannot be after the End Date. Please enter a start date that is before the end date. Your end date must be after your start date. The end date you enter must be between the grade's The end date cannot be before the start date. start and end dates. Start date must be before end date. The start date you enter must be between the grade's Your start date must be before your end date. start and end dates. Enter a Start Date that is on or later than &LL. The projected end date must be on or after the The Status End Date is either earlier than the Start Date projected start date. of the Assignment or later than its End Date. The Period start date cannot be later than the Period end date. © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 11: The real world: Creativity vs Translation Accuracy Ladies, leave your clothes here and spend the afternoon having a good time. (In a Rome laundry) Please fasten seatbelt to prepare for crash. (Tokyo Taxi) Please do not feed the animals. If you have any suitable food, give it to the guard on duty. (at a Budapest zoo) Caution: Blade Extremely Sharp! Keep out of children. (Multipurpose Knife Instructions) Ladies are requested not to have children in the bar. (In a Norwegian cocktail lounge) Drop your trousers here for the best results. (Thai Dry Cleaner) © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 12: Engineering Marketing Info UI Strings Info Support Now Then  Outsource Info Info Global Database Collaboration On Line Knowledge Training base 3rd Party Supplier Info Software Info Tech Info Apps Modular SGML/XML/DITA CMS Single-Source Reuse Repurposing Workflow English German French Spanish Japanese Etc. © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 13: The Result: An Evolving Product Information Ecosystem Marketing Technical Documentation “In-product” Information Pre-sales Information Support Knowledgebase Training FAQ Material © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 14: The Bottom Line  We’ve effectively applied technology to increase volume and speed of information development, production, and distribution, but ...  Information Quality and consistency has suffered  The costs associated with “Creativity” increase daily:  Translations cost more than necessary, and may retard your globalization strategy  Non-native speakers have difficulty reading your English content, and are less likely to buy your products  Misinterpretations of your content can lead to increased support costs, accidents, and/or litigation.  “Creativity” in authoring adds a corresponding cost - multiplied 5, 10, 15 … 30 times or more - in translation/localization. © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 15: Address the issue with Proven Quality Management Practices  Formal, documented Standards and processes  Approved Terminology  Approved Phraseology  Approved Reusable Sentences  Metrics Driven  Real-time feedback to process participants (QA)  Formal results/reports at process gates (QC) © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 16: Helpful Tools  Spelling and Grammar Checkers (spelling and grammar consistency)  Controlled Language Checkers (sentence structure and terminology consistency)  A Herd of Professional Copy Editors (subjective consistency)  Authoring Memories (reuse of existing inconsistent segments)  Acrolinx® Information Quality Tools (word-, phrase-, and sentence-level consistency; terminology, spelling, grammar, and style consistency) Shameless plug! © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 17:  IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ  Sophisticated Linguistic Analysis Engine developed over 15 years at the German Research Institute for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI)  Recognized Information Quality Management leader since 2002  Headquartered in Berlin, Germany  North American subsidiary in Colorado © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 22: acrocheck Writer/Editor Interface on-demand checking and guidance  acrocheck toolbar  Color-coded flags (like spell check on steroids!) an delay Style Terminology New term Spelling Grammar  Auto-fix  Suggestions and examples  New term harvesting and control Demo © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc Batch ROI IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 23: acrocheck Information Quality Status Report - I  acrocheck™ Checking Report Settings and Result Overview ▼show | hide Status Results Spelling 2 Results Grammar 3 Results Sty le 18 Results Terminology 11 Results New Terms Administrative Information ▼show | hide User Name kent License ID Acrolinx Internal / kent f ile://C:/Documents and Settings/Kent Tay lor/My File Name Documents/Acrolinx/sampleDocs/Word/Topspin 360 Quick Start-Reuse.doc Rule Set Demo File f ormat application/word Document language English Checking scope 618 word(s) / 77 sentence(s) Date and time of check Sat Sep 22 07:16:48 MDT 2007 Version inf ormation Plug-in : 3.1.0 (build : 384) / Serv er : 3.5.0 (build : 1622) Resources standard : 3.5.0 (build: 139 / 2007-09-10) Term banks used Switches © 2008, acrolinx NorthChecking status America, Inc (score: 138) IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 24: acrocheck Content Quality Status Report - II Result - Spelling ▼show | hide Word Count Suggestion Context One managment workstation, such as a PC running managment 1 management terminal-emulation sof tware chais chases chasms chasis 1 The chasis cable kit (included) chassis phasis Phasis Result - Grammar ▼show | hide Summary a_an_distinction 1 av oid_duplicates 1 wrong_sequence_of _words 1 Details a_an_distinction Install a additional switch blade: → Install an additional switch blade: av oid_duplicates Tighten the screws to the on the left and right- hand sides of the IB switch card. Tighten the screws on the left and right-hand sides → of the IB switch card. Tighten the screws to the left and right-hand sides of the IB switch card. © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 25: acrocheck Project Management Report metrics and reporting I  Summary metrics for entire project  Customer definable scores, weightings and thresholds  Overall scores can be used to optimize workflow © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 26: acrocheck Project Management Report metrics and reporting II  Summary report for each metric category  Color-coded status indicators  XML or Database storage  Active links to individual reports and document files © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc Start Demo IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 28: Intelligent Reuse ™  Micro-Clustering – analyzes corpora of relevant information, and identifies linguistically equivalent phrases and sentences.  Validation interface enables quick approval of “standard” for each micro-cluster  Once approved, “standard” phrases and sentences are stored in the Reuse Repository for linguistic matching against phrases and sentences in working documents. © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 29: Intelligent Reuse™ Sample Micro-Clustering Output Approved ‘Standard’  The following items come in your Topspin shipment:  The following items come in the Topspin shipment:  Check that the following items have come with your Topspin package:  Your Topspin package should have come with the following items:  The following items are found in your Topspin package:  The following items are found in the Topspin shipment:  Your Topspin package should include the following:  See that the following items arrived with your Topspin package:  These items are found in the Topspin shipment: © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 31: The Bottom Line: Information Quality Management with Intelligent tools provides:  Improved quality  A high level of reuse (at phrase- and sentence-level)  Improved translatability  Significant overall cost and time reductions – as much as 50% © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 32: Additional Operational Benefits  Greatly reduced human copy editing effort  Improved efficiency across the entire content supply chain  Improved TM performance – reduced ‘clutter’  Formal, objective metrics and reporting – reduced litigation risk  Improved indexing and retrieval  Improved quality and readability in all languages  Consistent corporate image/branding in all languages © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 33: Content Quality Management A Real-World Example Excerpt from a Best Practices Presentation, 2006  Savings of as much as $1M in a year so far  Projected savings of $3M per year for the next 5 years  Translation costs for MT projects cut by 50%  Time to market for MT projects cut by 50%  40% reuse of content  75% reuse for localization © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

Slide 35: Questions?  More Information: www.acrolinx.com US Contact: Kent Taylor 970.921.3700 | kent@acrolinx.com European Contact: Oliver Collmann +49 (30) 288 84 83 41 | oliver@acrolinx.com © 2008, acrolinx North America, Inc IMPROVING YOUR CORPORATE IQ

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