Translation Graphs

Use

Translation graphs define the translation directions for a group of collections (which are called packages in the development environment).

In a translation graph, you define the source language for each target language and for each language in which you develop.

Concepts to Help You

Term	Definition
Target language	The language into which you translate
Source language	The language from which you translate
Original language	The language in which a developer created an object. In other words, the development language. It is possible for a collection to contain objects with different original languages. For example, your German developers have created objects in German, while your American developers have created objects in English, all in the same collection.

Term

Definition

Target language

The language into which you translate

Source language

The language from which you translate

Original language

The language in which a developer created an object. In other words, the development language.

It is possible for a collection to contain objects with different original languages. For example, your German developers have created objects in German, while your American developers have created objects in English, all in the same collection.

Your choice of source language depends on two factors:

The original language of the majority of objects. It is always more efficient to keep the source language the same as the original language. This means an object created in English is translated from English, for example.
The ease with which it is possible to find translation resources for a specific source and target language combination.

Example
The original language of the majority of objects requiring translation in your system is German, but it is very difficult and expensive to find translation resources for source language German and target language Japanese. You therefore decide to define English as the source language for target language Japanese. This means that the objects with original language German first need to be translated into English before they can be translated into Japanese. You need to run regular evaluations so that the objects arrive in the worklists for the Japanese translators after the English translators have translated them from German.

Graphs also enable you to group together collections according to their translation relevance.

Example

20 collections created by your developers are relevant for translation into the five target languages that you have defined in transaction Translation Administration (LXE_MASTER).

There are, however, a further 10 collections that are only relevant for translation into two of the target languages. You therefore need to create two separate translation graphs.

You also need to bear in mind that your development may have added lines to objects delivered by SAP, that belong to SAP collections. You do this when performing Customizing, for example. Creating a text in Customizing usually adds a line to a table delivered by SAP that also contains text lines that were created and translated by SAP. Obviously, you only need to translate the lines that you created in these objects!

Recommendation

We recommend that you place all SAP collections in one graph so that you can easily display statistics for the SAP objects to which you have added texts.

Integration

When you run an evaluation, only objects that belong to collections that are assigned to graphs are included in worklists and statistics.

Features

You can use graphs as a selection criterion when selecting collections, which enables you to display statistics, assign collections to a translator, and create an object list for the collections in a particular graph, without having to select each collection individually.

You can also assign collections to a translation graph for which no language directions have been defined. This effectively locks all objects belonging to these collections for translation, by ensuring they never arrive in the worklists and statistics for any combination of source and target language.

Activities

Create a translation graph. For more information, see Defining Translation Graphs.
Assign collections to a translation graph. For more information, see Assigning Collections to a Translation Graph.
Repeat steps 1 and 2 as required.

Example

You develop in both German and English so you have both objects with original language German and objects with original language English. You need your development to be 100% available in German, English, French, and Spanish. You have found that the most suitable translation resources for French and Spanish translate from English. You therefore need to define a translation graph as follows:

Target Language	Original Language	Source Language	Status
deDE	enUS	enUS	A
enUS	deDE	deDE	A
esES	deDE	enUS	A
esES	enUS	enUS	A
frFR	deDE	enUS	A
frFR	enUS	enUS	A

This graph ensures the following:

Objects created in German are translated into English and objects created in English are translated into German.
Objects created in English are translated into French and Spanish.
Objects created in German are first translated into English, and then translated from English into French and Spanish.

You then need to ensure that all collections created by your developers that are relevant for translation are assigned to this graph.

Note

If you want automatic distribution to take place in objects belonging to collections that are assigned to this graph, you need to ensure that the status in the Status column is D (Active with Distribution).