A quick introduction to a few useful tools for video game translators. Presented at the LocWorld30 Game Localization Round Table in Tokyo.

1. Or how to boost your productivity
By Anthony Teixeira
Japanese/English > French Translator
IGDA Localization SIG Co-chair

2.  Ctrl + Backspace: Deletes a word
 Ctrl + Up/Down: Jumps to beginning/end of paragraph
 Shift + Left/Right: (Un)selects a letter at a time
 Ctrl + Shift + Left/Right: Selects a word
Did you know the following shortcuts?
You can use them right now

3.  Lack of time
 Routine
 We simply don’t know such shortcuts even exist
 To work more efficiently, we first need to be aware of
what is holding us back

4.  5 tools ready out of the box
- XBench
- Okapi Rainbow
- WinMerge
- XLTools
- RDBMerge
 AutoHotkey, a scripting&automation tool

5.  Free until v2.9
 QA checks
Inconsistencies
Glossary mismatches
Missing numbers, tags
Punctuation issues (double spacing, unmatched parentheses)
Repeated words
 Converts various formats into TMX

6.  Useful for large projects, especially when several translators
are involved
 Offers all the basic options you need from such a tool (stop
words, min/max number of words per term, etc.)
 Many other features (QA, batch search&replace, translation
package creation, etc.)
 Open source, cross-platform and regularly updated

7.  Tells you what lines have been changed, deleted or added
between two versions of a file
 Useful if you need to quickly compare two versions of a text
...you may also use Microsoft Word’s Compare function

8.  Free version available with the most important features
 Data cleaning: removes trailing/double spaces (common
issue with CAT tools)
 Switches case on any range of cells

9.  Merges Excel files/tabs
 Saves time for QA/proofreading, word counts and other
tasks when strings are spread over a large number of
tabs/files

10.  Okapi Olifant (TM management)
 Notepad++ (Text and code editor)

11.  Scripting and automation tool
 Maps hotkeys to scripts or mouse/keyboard operations
 Relatively easy to learn for non-programmers (macro recorder
available on AHK’s website)
 Runs in the background, works in any software

12.  Automate online searches
 Run/Switch to the program or folder of your choice
 Map hotkeys to different key combinations
 Switch case
 Count characters in selected text
 Output special ©haracte®s
 Generate text patterns
 About anything?

13. ^+g::
run "http://google.com/search?q=%clipboard%"
return
"^+g::“ represents the hotkey ("Ctrl + Alt + g" here)
"run“ is an instruction used to run a program/open a page. Here, we’re
opening a Google search with the content of the clipboard
“return“ marks the end of the function

14.  For more information about the tools introduced in this
document, feel free to contact me at:
contact@at-it-translator.com
 The AutoHotkey script used during this session is available at
the following address: http://bit.ly/AHK-Scripts
It comes with comments and links to help you create or
customize your own scripts