How to Prevent Auto-Populating Target Terms When Using an Empty Glossary in Trados Studio

Hello,

I need to create an English-to-German glossary for translation. I started by creating an Excel spreadsheet with three columns: “English,” “German,” and “Notes.” The German column has been left empty as I don’t have the target terms yet and only want to provide English clarifications to translators. This will be filled in later.

I used Glossary Converter to convert the Excel file into a format that can be used in Trados Studio 2022. The file was automatically converted into an SDL Termbase (.sdltb). This is the field structure I set up in Glossary Converter:

Screenshot of Glossary Converter settings with fields for English and German set as Language and Note set as Entry Field Text.

I then opened the Termbase in SDL MultiTerm to confirm that everything looked correct, and it did. Here’s how it appears:

SDL MultiTerm interface showing a term 'Benchmarks' in English with its note, but no German translation provided.

Termbase Management window in SDL MultiTerm with the structure showing Note at Entry level and a Descriptive Fields section.

Next, I created a project in Trados Studio for translation from English to German and added the Termbase. Now, when I opened the files for translation and click on a segment containing a term with a corresponding entry in the Termbase, the source term is underlined, indicating that the Termbase recognizes it. However, the problem is that the target section is automatically populated with the English term, even though the German column in my Termbase is empty. and I don't see the notes section of the English term.

Trados Studio translation editor with a segment selected showing term recognition but no German term or notes displayed.

I’ve also tried creating the glossary with only two columns, “English” and “Notes,” to avoid this issue, but the result was the same. Additionally, I created the Termbase from scratch in SDL MultiTerm by importing the XML and log file instead of using Glossary Converter, but the problem persisted.

How can I ensure that the text from the "Notes" column in the Termbase appears as reference information, prevent the target section from being automatically filled with the source term, and successfully create glossaries?

Thank you,

Virginia



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[edited by: RWS Community AI at 12:51 AM (GMT 0) on 25 Jan 2025]
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    In your project settings click the name of the TM used. Then click Settings:

    Screenshot of Translation Memory Settings in Trados Studio with a red box highlighting 'Alphanumeric strings' and an arrow pointing to a dropdown menu with text 'Click here to edit the list'.

    After doing so the TM should request reorganization. If no, go to TM View, open the TM there, click Settings and go to Performane and Tuning and perfom all tasks listed there. Then go to Fragment Alignment and perform the task there. Restart Studio. You should be done now.

    This said, I think the solution provided by is better. To be found here: File -> Options -> Editor -> Automation:

    Screenshot of the 'Options' menu in Trados Studio under 'Editor' and 'Automation' showing various checked options for Translation Memory and segment handling.

    However, please bear in mind, that this is a global setting and will be used in all your projects.

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    [edited by: RWS Community AI at 6:07 PM (GMT 0) on 27 Jan 2025]
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