personal glossaries - order out of chaos Thread poster: Susan Welsh
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Susan Welsh 
United States
Local time: 16:30
Russian to English
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It would be great if there were some way to organize personal glossaries by language pair and alphabetically within language pair. Right now, they seem to appear in either a random order, or the order in which I created them (more likely--which is also random). I have two language pairs, and it makes it hard to find things.
Also, I would love to have a "comment" field, such as -- "see useful Kudoz discussion on this."
Thanks for giving this consideration.
| | | | Henry Hinds
United States
Local time: 14:30
English to Spanish
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In memoriam
I would think the search function in your word processor would enable you to find anything in a flash, so no further order would be necessary.
| | | | Susan Welsh
United States
Local time: 16:30
Russian to English
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TOPIC STARTER | not exactly for finding particular things | Jul 2, 2011 |
It's more like when I know there was a useful discussion of (for example) different uses of the past tense in German compared to English, but I don't remember where it was. It's useful to review the German list without having all the Russian stuff in the way. Or, when I simply want to review terminology that I've asked about, to try to fix it in my memory (I try to make a point of doing this, but usually don't get around to it, I'm afraid).
| | | | Tina Vonhof (X)
Canada
Local time: 14:30
Dutch to English
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I have noticed that nothing on the Proz website is in alphabetical, or any other, order, for example the directory or the Blue Board. The search function is there but only if you know exactly who or what you are looking for. There is no option of browsing any lists.
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Yaotl Altan
Mexico
Local time: 14:30
Member (2006)
English to Spanish
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Susan Welsh wrote:
It would be great if there were some way to organize personal glossaries by language pair and alphabetically within language pair. Right now, they seem to appear in either a random order, or the order in which I created them (more likely--which is also random). I have two language pairs, and it makes it hard to find things.
Also, I would love to have a "comment" field, such as -- "see useful Kudoz discussion on this."
Thanks for giving this consideration.
Yes, it would be great to sort them just pressing a button like we do with filters in datasheet.
| | | | opolt
Germany
Local time: 22:30
English to German
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| Agree with Susan 100% | Jul 8, 2011 |
Susan, thanks a lot for bringing this up. As I see it, and to put it bluntly, the Proz personal glossary functions are rather limited and clumsy, and look a bit outdated.
Months ago I submitted a support request asking why my glossaries weren't in alphabetical order anymore -- I was informed they never were, they are sorted according to creation date/time.
However, in the course of this support request I made some suggestions (AFAIR) which weren't answered, namely:
... See more Susan, thanks a lot for bringing this up. As I see it, and to put it bluntly, the Proz personal glossary functions are rather limited and clumsy, and look a bit outdated.
Months ago I submitted a support request asking why my glossaries weren't in alphabetical order anymore -- I was informed they never were, they are sorted according to creation date/time.
However, in the course of this support request I made some suggestions (AFAIR) which weren't answered, namely:
* Glossaries should be sortable, by column. This would be especially useful if the list contains terms which are overlapping/very similar/close to each other, to avoid repetions etc. It is also useful if the list has grown very long, and if you want to provide a really comprehensive glossary on a very specific topic (as I was trying to do -- but I gave up on this). -- Wikipedia, for instance, they have been introducing sortable tables all over the place in recent years, and they are very useful.
* Glossaries should be exportable, at least for the author and/or paying members. I don't know why this hasn't been implemented yet, it can't be that difficult. Please, please, give us at least the option to export to CSV/plain text! If glossaries can be imported, surely they can also be exported. It only requires some (limited) programming effort.
* More columns should be allowed, for comments and other info, such as "US/UK (English)", or context hints. Technically this should be a no brainer, and every decent glossary should allow for such additional columns.
Also, the glossary itself is not displayed on the page where you can enter new terms. There are numerous other improvements I could think of, but hey, let's start with the low-hanging fruit. The web has evolved and ProZ should move with it. I recognize that ProZ might have limited manpower to deal with this, but OTOH the competition isn't sleeping ...
To sum it up, the (personal) glossaries are in serious need of an update, wrt to display options, data exchange, and usability.
My criticism may sound a bit harsh, but given that ProZ calls itself a "translator's workplace" and that glossaries are our daily bread & butter, these functions should be more advanced IMHO. ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Search function is not there | Jul 8, 2011 |
Tina Vonhof wrote:
I have noticed that nothing on the Proz website is in alphabetical, or any other, order, for example the directory or the Blue Board. The search function is there but only if you know exactly who or what you are looking for. There is no option of browsing any lists.
The problem is that for glossaries, the search function is not really there for some language pairs. In mine, a search of the glossaries can bring you what you are looking for, nothing, or a random list of irrelevant results depending on such things as how precise you are in the search (being more precise does not always give you better results; something quite the opposite) or sometimes what seems to be pure randomness.
I know ProZ is already aware of this, but I think I still should repeat myself…
[corrected for typo]
[Edited at 2011-07-08 21:36 GMT]
| | | | Susan Welsh
United States
Local time: 16:30
Russian to English
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TOPIC STARTER | search of glossaries - not just Chinese <> English | Jul 8, 2011 |
Ambrose Li wrote:
The problem is that for glossaries, the search function is not really there for some language pairs. In mine, a search of the glossaries can bring you what you are looking for, nothing, or a random list of irrelevant results depending on such things as how precise you are in the search (being more precise does not always give you better results; something quite the opposite) or sometimes what seems to be pure randomness.
The same for me, with Russian to English and German to English. Sometimes a search for a German word, with German-English as the requested pair, yields a Russian entry that has (of course) no relationship to the German, which after all is in a different alphabet. Or vice versa. Frequently I get a huge list of glossary entries in the correct language, but where the word I am searching for does not appear in the title or anywhere else. I have found that if I specify "exact phrase," even if it is only one word, it does better.
Also (while we're at it), the "Save Language Pair" button (or however it's labeled exactly) does not work. It reverts to German every time I've done a Russian search.
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| Thanks for the feedback | Jul 11, 2011 |
Hello everyone,
Thanks for the feedback on how to make the personal glossaries tool more valuable. I have made note of your suggestions on this thread, and they will be considered when that tool is up for an update. Please note, though, that it may take some time until this happens.
If you can think of any other improvement, please let me know by posting on this thread or submitting a support request.
Best regards,
Alejandro
| | | | opolt
Germany
Local time: 22:30
English to German
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| Gracias Alejandro | Jul 11, 2011 |
Thank you Alejandro for the feedback, I'm happy this area is being considered for a much needed update!
Personally I don't have any further suggestions at the moment, but I would be happy to serve as a tester if there's a beta phase before going fully online with the new features.
| | | | hazmatgerman (X)
Local time: 22:30
English to German
sorry but the ProZ logo refers to "translation workplace", and no longer to "translator's workplace", and has been doing so for about three years.
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