Website@School Translators

Chapter 2. Learn to use OmegaT in 5 minutes!

1. Set up a new project
2. Translate the file
3. Validate your tags
4. Generate the translated file
5. A few more things to remember

1. Set up a new project

Note:
On an Apple Mac, use the Command key instead of the Control key.

Note:
Linux specific, Windows specific.

To start using OmegaT, first create a mproject that will hold all your files, such as your source file, translation memories, glossaries, and eventually your translated file.

To create a project:

Start OmegaT.
Select in the Menu bar Project and in there select New... The 'Create a New Project' window opens.
In the field Selection:/home/user/ or Folder name type a name for your project, for example websiteatschool. Remember where you are creating the project, because you will need to return to it later. Click the [OK] or [Save] button.
The Create New Project dialog opens. At the top of that dialog, with the two dropdown menus select your source file's language and the language that your translated file will be. Next click [OK] to continue.
The 'Project Files' dialogue opens.
Note:
If you are interested in other settings of this dialog, you can return to it any time by pressing Ctrl+E.
The Project Files dialog was opened. Click on Import Source Files... The 'Import Source Files' window opens. Select your source file, for example basics.html. OmegaT will then copy the selected file to the /source/ subfolder of your newly created project.
Note:
You must have saved the basics.html file before you can import it in OmegaT. You cannot copy the text from an e-mail.
After importing the file in OmeagaT, the content of the file is visible in the editor.
After the source files have loaded in the Editor pane, you can click [Close] to close the Project Files dialog.

Note:
Put a new file to translate in the same folder as the first file.

OmegaT will present one segment at a time for you to translate. After you have translated each segment, press Ctrl+U to move to the next untranslated segment (or Ctrl+Shift+U to move to the next translated segment). Whenever you want to see what your translation will look like in its final format, press Ctrl+D to generate the translated documents, which will be created in the /target/ subfolder of your project folder. During translation, use the Edit and Go To menus to perform various useful functions.

3. Validate your tags

If your source files are formatted files, e.g. Microsoft Word, LibreOffice Writer or HTML, OmegaT will convert the formatting into tags that surround the text that you translate. Often documents will also have tags that have nothing to do with formatting, but which are also important in the source files (and in the translated files). A source sentence might look like:

OmegaT, however, will present this sentence in the following fashion:

The tags in OmegaT are greyed, so they are easy to recognise. They are protected, so that you cannot modify their contents, but you can delete them, enter them by hand or move them around in the target sentence. However, if you made mistakes when you typed the formatting tags, your translated files might fail to open. Therefore, press Ctrl+T before you generate your translated files, to validate that your tags are correct.

4. Generate the translated file

Once you have made certain that there are no tag errors in your translation, press Ctrl+D to generate the target files, which will be created in the /target/ subfolder of your project folder.

5. A few more things to remember

If a file does not load into the Editor pane, then it could be that it is in a format that doesn't work in OmegaT. See File Filters for a list of file formats that OmegaT can handle.
You can create a new project for each new job, and you can add new source files to a project at anytime time.
To remind yourself of the project's initial settings, open the project settings dialog by pressing Ctrl+E. To see a list of files in the project, open the Project Files dialog by pressing Ctrl+L.
At the end of your translation, OmegaT exports three translation memories called level1, level2 and omegat to your project folder. The level1 and level2 memories can be shared with users of other translation programs. The memory named omegat can be used by OmegaT itself, in future projects that you create. If you place such translation memory files in the /tm/ subfolder of a project, OmegaT will automatically search them for similar segments, called "fuzzy matches".
You can add a new term to the glossary by pressing Ctrl+Shift+G, or copy existing glossaries to the /glossary/ subfolder of your project folder, and OmegaT will automatically look up words in them.
It is often useful to search for words and phrases in the source text and in your translation, so press Ctrl+F for the Text Search dialog at any time.
For a more comprehensive introduction see OmegaT for beginners on the OmegaT web site. If you need assistance with any aspect of OmegaT, feel free to join the OmegaT users group.

Copied and slightly modified from http://ob.nubati.net/ditundat/omegat/docs/en/chapter.instant.start.guide.html.
The complete Users Guide: http://ob.nubati.net/ditundat/omegat/docs/en/.