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There are five ways of translating texts in an SAP system:

  • You can translate objects developed in ABAP directly after you have created them by choosing   Goto   Translation   from the respective development transaction.

  • You can export the texts to be translated outside of the translation system. You can then import the translations back into the translation system. For more information, see Exporting Texts for Offline Translation.

  • You can call up an individual object for translation directly in transaction SE63. You must know the object type, and the technical name of the object, to do this.

    For more information, see Translating Objects Directly.

  • You can call up all or some objects in a transport request in a temporary worklist to translate them quickly and without having to set up the translation environment

    For more information, see On-The-Fly Translation.

  • You can set up the translation environment in transaction LXE_MASTER, and create worklists and statistics for each target language into which you want to translate.

    The translation-relevant objects are then translated via worklists. You can divide up the objects to be translated among more than one translator for each target language. Statistics are generated so that you can monitor the progress of the translation project.

    This option is recommended for large translation projects where a large number of objects needs to be translated into multiple languages. For example, over a thousand objects need to be translated into 3 different languages.

    For more information, see Setting Up the Translation Environment.

The first four options do not require you to set up the translation environment, but fewer translation functions are available to you as a result.

The fifth option requires the set up of the translation environment in transaction LXE_MASTER, but opens up a wide range of functionality to enable you to translate efficiently and consistently.

Implementation Considerations

Regardless of the translation option you choose from the 5 options above, you need to prepare the system in which you want to translate as follows:

  • If you have not done this already, you need to install and configure the languages into which you want to translate. This ensures that logon in, and translation into, these target language is possible.

    See SAP Notes 42305 and 73606 in the SAP Online Service System for more information.

  • If you have not done this already, you need to import the translations that are available on the language CDs delivered by SAP for the software components available in your system. This prevents the unnecessary translation of SAP objects, for which SAP has already delivered a translation, so that you can concentrate on translating the texts that you created and want to translate.

    This takes place using the Language Management functionality in transaction SMLT. For more information, see Language Imports Using Transaction SMLT.

  • If you have already translated in another system, we recommend that you reuse the proposal pools (translation memories) that you created during translation, as this will save you translation time and ensure consistent translations throughout your systems. It may also be necessary for you to generate fingerprints for any long texts that have previously been translated in another system.

    For more information, see Proposal Pool Transports and Creating Fingerprints for Translated Long Texts.

If you decide to set up the translation environment in transaction LXE_MASTER (the fifth translation option listed above), see Setting Up the Translation Environment for more information on the next steps you need to perform.

SAP delivers three roles for translation:

  • SAP_TRANSLATOR Role for Translators

    • This role allows the user to call the standard translation transactions such as SE63, SLLS, SLPP, LXE_MASTER and other transactions that a translator might require for research in the system during translation.

  • SAP_TRANSLCOORD Role for Translation Coordinator

    • Assigning this role to a user (together with SAP_TRANSLATOR) allows the user to use those transactions as listed for SAP_TRANSLATOR plus transaction SM37 which allows the translation coordinator to refresh statistics in SLLS as a background job.

  • SAP_TRANSLENV_ADM Role for Administration of Translation Environment

    • Assigning this role to a user (together with SAP_TRANSLATOR, SAP_TRANSLCOORD, and SAP_TRANSLSUPERCOORD) allows the user to use those transactions as listed forSAP_TRANSLCOORD plus all other transactions that are required to administer a translation system, such as transactions SLXT, SMLT, SMLT_EX for language transports, and SU01 to create system users.

      Note Note

      Users with the authorization profile SAP_ALL can perform all translation activities without having to be created as a translator or having a translator profile assigned to their user.

      End of the note.