Translation-friendly text

Learn a few tips to make your text easier to translate and less likely to cause translation errors.

Clarity

A text that is easy to understand is usually also easier to translate. To make your writing clearer, use these tips:
  • Avoid overly long sentences and paragraphs.
  • Repeat important words to avoid misunderstanding.
    For example, instead of writing 'If the shaft of your wand breaks, you can get a new one online,' write 'If the shaft of your wand breaks, you can get a new wand online.'
  • Don't describe more than one action in a sentence unless writing about strictly related actions.
  • Use words such as "and," "then," "but," "a," "the," "this," and "that" to make your message clear.

Grammar

You can make your text easier to understand by using certain grammatical forms. To make your writing clearer, follow these rules:
  • Express actions with verbs, not nouns.
    For example, instead of writing 'Applying excessive force can lead to rupture of your wand,' write 'If you apply excessive force, your wand can break.'
  • Use active voice.
  • Split clusters of nouns into smaller logical units.
    For example, instead of writing 'magic wand cleaning center,' write 'center for cleaning magic wands.'

Formatting

Search your text for unintended line breaks and punctuation marks (such as periods in place of commas). CAT tools may misinterpret such characters and split sentences into separate units. This can lead to translation errors and inconsistencies.

Avoid using page breaks and empty lines to set the layout of your document. The same content can have a different volume in different languages.

Important: When localizing a DITA project, always send the translators your source files rather than the output (such as PDF or HTML files).