Both Déjà Vu and Trados are Windows-based programs, but since I prefer working on a Mac, I have installed Parallels Desktop for Mac on my MacBook Pro in order to be able to cross over to the dark side (i.e. Windows), and run my Windows-programs.

Mostly, using Windows on a Mac is a delight compared to using Windows on a … eh, Windows-computer (my personal opinion). Some things are different though. For instance, a Mac doesn’t have an INS-key – you know, the key on a Windows-keyboard which turns the overwrite function on or off. On a Mac overwrite is per definition not an option. However, on a couple of occasions when I was working on the dark side, I somehow hit a key combination which turned on overwriting. It happened again yesterday when I was working in Déjà Vu, and all the help the Déjà Vu Help had to offer, was to press the INS-key if I wanted to turn off overwriting (this particular piece of advise obviously wasn’t of much help to me). I tried all the key combinations I thought I might have hit, to no avail. I couldn’t find any way to turn off overwriting. In the end I restarted Déjà Vu, and that solved my problem. This time I didn’t search the Internet, because I’ve spent countless hours doing just that on several occasions, but so far haven’t been able to find the solution to this particular problem.

However, I really would like to know how I managed to turn on overwriting, especially since the answer to this most likely also would be the shortcut to turning it off again (which would be somewhat easier and quicker than restarting a program). Do you know how to do the seemingly undoable? I’d be delighted if you’d share your knowledge.

I had just installed the new SDL Trados Studio 2009, and had updated my licenses for SDL Trados Studio 2007, when I encountered an error. I was trying to open a txt-file in TagEditor, but TagEditor simply refused to open the file, and instead gave me the (to me) following rather incomprehensible message:

Error when using plug-in file filters:

Unexpected failure in Codepage property for COM plug-in component
RegExFileFilter. TextFileFilterScanner

Would you like to try to open this file anyway?

I tried clicking “Yes”, and I tried clicking “No” – Trados didn’t care what I chose, but gave me the same reply no matter what:

80003: TagEditor is unable to open this document because the file type is
not recognized.

So off I went on my search for a solution. The Internet usually holds the answer to the technical problems I encounter, but at times it’s a long search. In this case I found several people asking for help with the exact same problem at both Proz.com and the Yahoo Group TW_users, but no one had offered any solution. In the end I did some pretty far-fetched searches in the SDL Knowledge Base, and found the reason for the error as well as the solution.

The solution

The error message means that a dll called EncodingTools.dll wasn’t properly updated during installation. To fix it you need to delete this dll, and then install it again (or rather, the version of the dll that actually works).

Deleting the EncodingTools.dll:

1. If you’re running Windows XP, go to the Start menu and select Run. (On Vista, press the Windows key + R).
2. Type Assembly in the dialog box, and click OK. The Assembly list is displayed.
3. Right-click EncodingTools.dll and select Uninstall.
4. Go to C:\Program Files\SDL International\T2007\TT (or …\T2007FL\TT) and delete the file EncodingTools.dll.

Reinstalling the correct version of EncodingTools.dll:

1. On Windows XP, go to the Start menu and select Control Panel > Add or Remove Programs. (On Vista, go to Program Files and Features).
2. Select SDL Trados 2007 and click Change, then follow the wizard to repair your installation of TagEditor. (On Vista, simply click Repair).

You should now have the correct version of the EncodingTools.dll, and can work on your txt-files in TagEditor.

Someone (who knows way more about these things than I do) told me that the fact that the dll-file wasn’t properly installed, basically tells you a good deal about the program as a whole. Mind you, he didn’t say what it tells you, but judging from my experience with Trados, I think he may just have a point …

… as a translator you can’t ignore them, not entirely at least.

Trados is a CAT-tool that it is very hard to ignore (provided you’re a free-lance translator). Not because it is better than all the other CAT-tools out there (well, I don’t think so, certainly not after I laid my busy little hands on Déjà Vu - others might disagree), but Trados is the industry leader, and a lot of agencies will not even consider collaborating with free-lancers who do not have Trados. On the other hand, once you have Trados grumpily sitting on your harddrive, your chances of landing a job from an agency are greatly improved.

Prospective clients who set it as a requirement before they would even consider sending me a test translation, was also the main reason I first invested a (to me) small fortune in this huge, clumsy and intimidating piece of software. But it’s earned its keep; with Trados on my harddrive, I got more agencies on my list of clients, and I was able to start translating full-time.

However, Trados might be a source of income in its own right, but it has also had me pulling my hair out in desperation multiple times when I’ve encountered technical problems, and a deadline was breathing down my neck. I don’t know how many hours I’ve spent searching the Internet for solutions to Trados problems, hours I could’ve spent translating (or sleeping for that matter, because business is business, and when you have a deadline to meet, you make sure you can meet it, before you allow yourself the luxury of some old-fashioned sleep), but they are not few, nor are they far between.

Recently, I added Déjà Vu, another CAT-tool, but one the agencies rarely ask for, to the contents of my harddrive. So it doesn’t give me any new clients, but … compared to Trados, I find it a breeze to work with, and I even have a feeling it’s actually speeding up the entire translation process more than Trados ever did. I never timed myself, so yes, I might be wrong, but I feel pretty certain that that’s how it is. Technical errors? Admittedly, I’ve encountered some, but, compared to what I’ve encountered with Trados, they have been few and far between (so far at least). I never really liked working in Trados much. With Déjà Vu I felt something like love at first sight - and keystroke. I guess you have to try both to understand the difference.

As mentioned though, I have encountered problems with both Trados and Déjà Vu, and the solutions to those problems have at times been so well hidden (in the deep layers of some knowledge base where the search function is out of order, or in the dusty and long-forgotten archives of a mailing list) that it seems a miracle anyone would ever come across them again. So I thought I’d make life a little easier for whoever finds themselves facing the same kind of problems I’ve been facing, by publishing the solutions to problems I come across here. Maybe it’ll save someone else a sleepless night when a deadline is looming.

Watch this space …

Dagens fantastiske historie er sakset fra Dagbladet: En 23-åring bet en 29-åring i øyenbrynet som reaksjon på et slag i ansiktet. 29-åringen sier nå i retten at det var traumatisk å bli bitt, og at han hadde nedsatt syn i to uker etterpå. Og det kan man kanskje forstå, men følgende tyder kanskje mer på at det er en som ikke har gjort hjemmeleksen sin – både i overført og mer bokstavelig forstand:

29-åringen frykter nå at han ikke klarer å gjennomføre masterstudiene og få seg en godt betalt lederjobb i næringslivet, og at han må klare seg til livets opphold med bare en bachelorgrad i stedet.

Det er ingen fin framtid, mener 29-åringen, som har regnet seg fram til et framtidig inntektstap på 15,9 millioner kroner og 20 millioner kroner i oppreisning.

Jeg har egentlig bare én kommentar:

This Is Not America - David Bowie

Hva hjertet er fullt av, løper munnen over med, sier vi der jeg kommer fra – og man skal høre mye før ørene faller av. Ørene (eller i dette tilfellet, øynene) mine sitter i beste fall litt løst etter at jeg i dag leste et typisk eksempel på en overløpende munn. Munnen tilhører Senterpartiets leder, Liv Signe Navarsete, som kanskje selv ble litt forbauset da hun sa følgende i et forsøk på å forklare hvorfor blasfemisaken er blitt en belastning for regjeringen:

– Jeg var nødt til å sette foten ned. Det har blitt skapt et inntrykk av at vi vil innskrenke ytringsfriheten, noe som er selve grunnpilaren i Sps verdisyn. Dette kunne vi ikke leve med lenger.

– Sakset fra Aftenposten

Hvorfor de ikke kan leve med at det blir skapt et inntrykk av at de vil innskrenke ytringsfriheten, når en slik innskrenking er selve grunnpilaren i verdisynet deres, kan man jo lure litt på. Det er da alltid noe at de endelig har valgt å vedkjenne seg denne holdningen.

Jeg må uansett konstatere at Senterpartiets hjerte er fullt av helt andre ting enn jeg trodde …

… eller kanskje Navarsete bare burde lære seg litt om setningskonstruksjon.

“I think you must be lacking the bitch-gene.”
– Tor Willy to me today

The above wasn’t meant as a compliment - not entirely at least, although it was said with a certain fondness. To understand this, you should know that I really, really don’t want to be the kind of girl who calls her boyfriend/husband/lover/partner every half hour whenever he is not at home, just to make sure that he isn’t having too much fun or is in risk of forgetting all about her (believe me, girls like that do exist). And, may I add, Tor Willy knows how my mind works. And I guess this knowledge is what caused him to utter the above-mentioned statement when he arrived home tonight. It is worth nothing that he said it after I told him that the network had been down for many hours and that I had tried to fix it myself, rather than calling him when he was out and about. And that it still didn’t work. He said it after I told him of one of the ways I had tried to fix it, namely by pressing a pen into that little hole on the Airport Extreme which resets it, and after kindly explaining to me that simply unplugging the Airport Extreme would have been a lot wiser – then at least I wouldn’t have caused all our settings to disappear. And then he wouldn’t have had to spend any amount of time fixing the mess I’d caused. Then he said it - with a certain fondness and shaking of his head.

Still, I’ll label this ‘Compliment of the Day’.

Sett på nettsidene til Falck:

Jeg er ikke Falck-medlem lenger (selv om Falck å dømme fra dagens vinduskonvolutt ser ut til å tro det – det var for øvrig det som fikk meg til å stikke innom nettsidene deres nå i kveld; for å finne ut av om det fantes en annen måte å si opp medlemskapet enn ved å si fra, siden det nå ikke virket, selv om han karen jeg snakket med, påstod det rakk den gangen i februar), men selv om jeg hadde vært det, medlem, altså, er det nok tvilsomt om jeg hadde deltatt i akkurat denne konkurransen. *pustepause* Nei, heller ikke hvis premien hadde inkludert demontering av den gamle tanken og isetting av den nye. (Har Falck for øvrig sikret seg at de kan oppdrive en bensintank til selv den mest obskure bilmodellen fra førkrigstiden? Ja, jeg lurer bare. Vi kjører tross alt ikke alle ihop Auda eller hva de nå heter, de der bilmerkene som skryter av å være A4. Jeg for eksempel kjører en Alfa Romeo 166 som heter La Divina. Å – har jeg nevnt det før?) Ny frontrute eller nye vinterdekk hadde vært en mye nyttigere premie – eller en tankfull bensin om du spør meg. Det kommer alltid godt med.

P.S.: Hvis de nye eierne av Trillian skulle lese dette, så kan jeg betro dere at Falck-medlemskapet fortsatt er i kraft, faktisk hele to uker til (på tross av at jeg sa det opp i februar da dere kjøpte babyen min). Men jeg kommer ikke til å forny det når det utløper 1. august, bare i tilfelle dere skulle lure …

Hvis jeg kunne, ville jeg forby samboeren å gjøre det han nå har bestemt seg for å gjøre. Jeg er ganske så overbevist om at han kommer til å angre hvis han lykkes med sitt forehavende. En eller annen – gi den gamle, lettere rustne kjærligheten hans tak over hodet i Oslo/Bærum. Pretty, pretty please …

… or perhaps peer pressure – whatever you call it, it has lead me to start blogging in English again (as the observant reader has no doubt already noticed). I haven’t really decided how much I’ll write in English – definitely not everything, because some things simply wouldn’t make much sense in English (and that’s not just because my head goes off on its own now and then), and some times I may just feel more like writing in Norwegian – but I promise: I will make sure the Norwegian-challenged will find something to read here from time to time. I will have to reorganize my blog, methinks, but I’m not going to do that right now, nor within the coming weeks – but when time permits, I probably will try to think out some way of redoing my blog that will make things look a bit more organized when I’m blogging in both English and Norwegian. For starters I’ve created at category called “In English” where I’ll publish (you guessed it) the posts I write in English.

Let me add that I know what it means when several people independent of one another hint or tell me directly that they’d like me to write in English again. Yup, peeps, I love you too.

Some people still get bright ideas. Most of us get tons of spam, and up to now there’s been little to do about – or with – it. Well, yes, if you’re like me you may have forwarded it to your e-mail provider (if they have a special address for the purpose, that is), hoping vaguely that perhaps it’ll help them improve their spam filters, but I’ve never had any real pleasure from all the spam I have received. I’ve won the main prize in at least fifty lotteries (if only), received thousands of offers to buy drugs, a bigger penis, hot and willing girls, certificates of one sort of the other, and whatnot, but just an inkling of pleasure? No, Sir, I did not get that from any of it.

But wonders never cease to happen, do they? If I told told you that I’ve gotten real pleasure from some of the spam I’ve received recently, would you believe me? Probably not. But then you’ve never heard of spam recycling, have you? Honestly, you should give it a try.

It may not exactly be useful, but it certainly is a pleasure to watch if you ask me. As I said, some people still get bright ideas, and this is one of the better.