Even for a professional boasting a 35-year track record, each new translation job poses fresh challenges, underlining the age-old wisdom: The more you know, the more you realize you don’t know!

Every technical writer views the world through his or her own conceptual spectacles. An adequate understanding of this framework, achievable with the help of suitable tools, is essential for best translation results.

The key resources of LANGUAGE SERVICES FOR CONSTRUCTION include:

Construction Term Base (CTB): Own construction terminology database embracing nearly 25,000 entries (36,000 terms in English). All entries are classified using a system featuring 110 main groups and 700 sub-groups. Numerous entries include source information, definitions from standard reference works, links to co-ordinate and subordinate terms etc. Processing of the CTB is assisted by in-house developed computer programs and macros.

Library: Comprehensive library with around 600 English and German reference works on construction, architecture and real estate plus a substantial collection of specialist articles. Over 70 books are single-language dictionaries and glossaries, many illustrated, on the three main areas or on specific disciplines and trades.

Translation dictionaries (German/English): While the library also includes all standard translation dictionaries for the construction field, these can only ever serve as the starting point for further research using the relevant textbooks and/or reliable Internet sources. Moreover – particularly with terminology from highly specialized texts – the search terms may be missing or the reliability of the proposed translation doubtful due to the lack of adequate contextual information. Upon closer analysis, dictionary translations surprisingly often turn out to be questionable or, at the very least, inconsistent with standard professional or trade practice.

FACHÜBERSETZUNGEN SEIT 1990

 TECHNICAL TRANSLATIONS SINCE 1990