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Writer's pictureReed James

Don't Throw it Away!


Part of the lyrics of Get Some Cash for your Trash. I loosely refer to trash in this case as files we want to delete from our hard drive. They may have been stellar translations, but they don't necessarily have any business taking up space.


Rule #1 When in doubt, don't throw it out. You may have to refer to a similar file to the one you are translating for the same client, so you don't want to dispense with it unnecessarily.


Rule #2 If you're pretty sure you're not going to use it again, save it on removable media or send it to the cloud. Create a special folder for that purpose. When you're certain it's trash, delete it without remorse.


Rule #3 If you know beyond a doubt you will never use a file again, don't be afraid to hit that delete button. If you hit Shift+Del, you will bypass the Recycle Bin, thus saving yourself an additional deletion step.


I used to save every single file that I translated in my life up until a decade or so ago. I did it in part as a trophy, something to pride myself in. I also indexed it with Logiterm so I could find terms fast as a reference. However, these days, there isn't much need to research or look for terminology, because with the giant translation companies, it's all there. There is an online translation memory and terminology database. If a fuzzy match doesn't tell you what terms to use, you can always use the concordance function. In my case, I pretty much have other unlisted terms right in my own head, so dictionary lookups are far and few between.


What is/will be your strategy?

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