Hello Matthieu and all,

I would like to ask if you have any experience with translating INDD files (files from Adobe InDesign), which are imported to Trados in the IDML format. 

I am supposed to translate such a file, but I am not sure how to handle possible formatting discrepancies after the translated IDML file is exported, converted and imported as INDD file (back) to Adobe InDesign.

If there are any formatting differences after the translation, could I possibly solve it in a different way than manually? Because it is a catalogue with 200 pages... and I have not had any experience with DTP programmes.

Jerzy Czopik , does disabling the option Skip tracking and kerning apply also for files, which are then converted to the INDD format, please?

Thank you in advance for any help.

Miriam 

This question cannot be answered so simple. Do you have InDesign on your PC? If so, you need the complete INDD package including pictures and fonts! Fonts are extremely important, as without these you will never be able to create a precisely formatted target file.

Depending on how the file is formatted I would still delete all tracking and kerning, i. e. leave this said option shown above activated. But I would also siwtch Studio to show all tags and NO formatting to avoid font replacement.

Without seeing the file or knowing more about what you exactly need or have I cannot tell you more.

@Jerzy, I do not have InDesign, the client has it, but I do not know if the complete INDD package.

Didn't you mean "disabled" (not "activated")?

I have chosen the option on the "View" tab to show no tags:

...however, I do not know what you mean by choosing an option to show "NO formatting" to avoid font replacement. Where can I find the option, please? 

Miriam 

If you do not have InDesign, then it is not your responsibility to do any formatting.

Important tips:

• Only use the formatting present in source. NEVER ADD any bold, italic or similar via formatting buttons.
• Leave the setting mentioned above ACTIVATED
• Go to File -> Options -> Editor and chose "Show all tags but do not show formatting" instead of "Show formatting but hide recognized tags" (the default setting)
• Try to keep your translated text not longer as the source
• Do not merge segments with any tags
• From time to time try to generate the target file (Save target as) to be sure this works

The "complete InDesign package" corresponds to what you would get if you would have had InDesign on your computer. This includes the InDesign fie itself, the pictures and the fonts. In your case you can simply forget about it, as you cannot have and use of it without InDesign.

Miriam 

If you do not have InDesign, then it is not your responsibility to do any formatting.

Important tips:

• Only use the formatting present in source. NEVER ADD any bold, italic or similar via formatting buttons.
• Leave the setting mentioned above ACTIVATED
• Go to File -> Options -> Editor and chose "Show all tags but do not show formatting" instead of "Show formatting but hide recognized tags" (the default setting)
• Try to keep your translated text not longer as the source
• Do not merge segments with any tags
• From time to time try to generate the target file (Save target as) to be sure this works

The "complete InDesign package" corresponds to what you would get if you would have had InDesign on your computer. This includes the InDesign fie itself, the pictures and the fonts. In your case you can simply forget about it, as you cannot have and use of it without InDesign.

Jerzy Czopik Ok, thank you very much, I will try these settings and just to be 100% sure...

This option should definitely stay enabled (unlike Matthieu's case), right? :

The thing is that the client awaits that they will not need to make any changes to the formatting after my translation. They do not want to pay for additional services regarding formatting changes/DTP services. 

So they also want me to provide DTP services if necessary, but I would like to prevent this if possible, as I have not had any DTP experience yet and would do not want to pay for Adobe InDesign if it can be avoided.

So thank you for your reassurance.

Miriam 

How shall you provide DTP services without the software? You have NO—literally NO—possibility to influence the formatting of your final document in Studio. All fonts and sizes will be exactly the same. The size of textboxes cannot be influenced in any way in Studio, they will remain the same. What you have got is a translation assignment and no DTP job. From what you write here I strongly assume you've never seen InDesign or done any DTP job in any tool. Do you know what tracking and kerning are? Anyway, in this very case deselect this option. This may lead to many additional tags, so I would run the analysis again and agree on a payment based on that analysis. Before analyzing your file go to TM settings of your TM and change them like here:

Jerzy Czopik I have just read on the web what tracking and kerning are... OK, thank you, I will let you know how it turns out.

Miriam 

Perfect.

But please be careful what kind of responsibility you take with this job. If your task is to deliver translation AND DTP, it is a job you CANNOT perform! So please clarify with your customer the responsibility for DTP, which you cannot deliver even if you wanted. You do not have InDesign and therefore it is simply impossible to do any DTP. You task is to deliver translation. What you can do is to try to fit the length of your translation to the original and keep all the formatting like bold or italic from the original using the tags from there, but there is no possibility to influence page layout, text boxes, position of pictures, text size and so on. So you need to settle the expectations of your customer down to that. Otherwise you run into danger of not being paid because of not providing the agreed service in full. DTP is not a piece of cake, you need specialist knowledge on that.

Thank you very much.

Hello, @Jerzy, I have tried to generate a target file (Save target as) from a partially translated idml.sdlxliff file, but when I open the target idml file in Trados Studio again, the strings that I translated are empty. The same happens when I choose Batch tasks → Export files (or Generate target translations). 

How can I solve this, please?

Miriam 

Could you please post a screenshot showing the emptiness mentioned?

Hello, Jesús, this is the idml.sdlxliff file: 

And this is the opened idml file (after "Save target as"):

Miriam 

The expected behaviour if I understand you correctly.

The XLIFF is a bilingual file, so it has Source and Target content.

On the other hand, the Target file (IDML or DOCX, anything) is monolingual with the target text set in Trados Studio. So when you open the Target IDML it has only text extracted in the Source column.

Does it make sense?

Oh, I see, ok, great, thank you! :) :) :)