Computer-assisted translation

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages) This article possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed. (January 2011) (Learn how and when to remove this message) This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Computer-assisted translation" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (December 2011) (Learn how and when to remove this message) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Part of a series on
Translation
Types
Legal Literary Bible Quran Kural Linguistic validation Medical Regulatory Technical Interpretation Cultural Word-for-word Sense-for-sense Homophonic
Theory
Translation studies Skopos theory Translation project Translation criticism Dynamic and formal equivalence Contrastive linguistics Polysystem theory
Technologies
CAT Machine translation Mobile translation Translation management system Dubbing Subtitling Pre-editing Postediting Multimedia translation
Localization
Glocalization Internationalization and localization Language localization Video game localization Dub localization Website localization Software localization
Institutional
Associations Awards Organizations Schools
Related topics
Untranslatability Transcription Transliteration Video relay service (VRS) Telephone interpreting Language barrier Fan translation (of video games) Fansub Fandub Scanlation Journalistic translation Books and magazines on translation Bible translations by language Translated books List of most translated works Translators Kural translations by language
v t e

Computer-aided translation (CAT), also referred to as computer-assisted translation or computer-aided human translation (CAHT), is the use of software, also known as a translator, to assist a human translator in the translation process. The translation is created by a human, and certain aspects of the process are facilitated by software; this is in contrast with machine translation (MT), in which the translation is created by a computer, optionally with some human intervention (e.g. pre-editing and post-editing).^[1]

CAT tools are typically understood to mean programs that specifically facilitate the actual translation process. Most CAT tools have (a) the ability to translate a variety of source file formats in a single editing environment without needing to use the file format's associated software for most or all of the translation process, (b) translation memory, and (c) integration of various utilities or processes that increase productivity and consistency in translation.