Translating with memoQ editor

memoQ editor shows your translation divided into segments.

Usually, each segment contains one sentence. All the rows are presented in a two-column grid: the source text in the left column and the translation in the right column.

When you use structured content like tables, XML files, and databases, a single segment is usually a cell or a data record.

Start translating

1. Click a target segment (right side).

2. Type and format your translation

   

   • To format text, use the Bold, Italic, Underline, Toggle case, Superscript, or  Subscript options. You can also Undo or Redo your changes.

     You can find those formatting tools just above the translation grid or under the Format tab.

   • If you’re looking for options to edit and manage text, go to the Edit section where you can find the Cut, Copy, Paste, and Add comment options.

   • Click Clear translations of selected segments  to reset the content and start fresh.

     This option clears target segment text, target comments, and inserted match info.

     When you use this option the segment status is set to Not started and QA issues refresh automatically.

   • Click Copy source to target  to copy source text to its target segment.

     For this option only editable rows are overwritten. Target comments are also kept.

   • Under Tag format , you can switch between short, medium, and long tags. By default they are displayed in a short format. You can find these options under the View section as well.

   • Click Copy next tag sequence  to insert the next tag, tag pair, or tag combination from those not yet present on the target side. You can find tag related options under the View section as well.

   • Click Tracked changes  to view changes made in your review and decide which changes you want to see - all of them, made only by you, or the final ones. To activate this feature, click Turn on track changes toggle. You can find this option under the Tools section as well.

     This option has to be activated by the PM when they’re configuring all the settings for the project.

   • Click Check spelling and get suggestions  to ask memoQ editor to underline the suspect words or phrases and then get suggestions.

     

     Right-click the red underline and choose an option from the menu. If you want to keep the word as it is, simply ignore the red underline or click Skip all to ignore all suggestions for the underlined word.

     If you want to use and accept a specific suggestion for all the occurrences of the word in the future, click the selected example from the list.

     Check spelling and get suggestions is turned on by default. You can find it under the Tools tab as well.

     If you can't see red underlines, either all words are spelled correctly (congrats!), or the spell checker isn’t configured for your target language.

   • Click Filter  to filter for specific text or wording. All the results are highlighted in orange.

     You can filter by source or target text.

     You can also decide how you want to filter for text:

     • Case-sensitive: uppercase and lowercase letters need to be exactly as in the search term. Example: Filtering for "table" returns segments containing "table", but not "Table".

     • Any match: any part of the text can contain the search term. Example: Filtering for "table" returns segments containing "tables", but not "tabloid".

     • Words match: this option means that your search term must match whole words in the text. Example: Filtering for "table" returns segments containing "table", but not "tables".

     • Entire segment: this means memoQ only returns segments that fully match your search term. Example: Filtering for "table" returns only segments whose full text is "table".

     To confirm, click Apply filter.

     To clear the text field and filter for another phrase, click the Clear filter button below the dropdown list.

   • Click the Find and replace  icon to find specific text and then replace them.

     

     Here you can:

     • Enter the text you are looking for, decide if you want to search in the source, target, or both languages.

       You can then decide if you want your search to be case-sensitive or if you want words to match your search term exactly. All the results are highlighted in orange.

     • Jump between the results by clicking the Find next and Find previous buttons.

     • In the Replace with field, enter the text you want to use to replace the current text and click the Replace button.

       To undo this action, press Ctrl+Z.

   • Use the dropdown at the top of the translation grid to sort or reorder the content:

     

     Next to the dropdown you can see the number of the segment you’re currently into.

     The default selection is No sorting, but you can choose from:

     • Alphabetical by source (A-Z)

     • Alphabetical by source (Z-A)

     • Alphabetical by target (A-Z)

     • Alphabetical by target (Z-A)

     • Source text length (shorter first)

     • Source text length (longer first)

     • Target text length (shorter first)

     • Target text length (longer first)

     • Match rate (lower first)

     • Match rate (higher first)

     • Frequency (lower first)

     • Frequency (higher first)

     • Last changed (older first)

     • Last changed (newer first)

     • Row status

3. Use Concordance to search across your project’s translation memories and LiveDocs corpora, and get relevant matches for words, expressions, or similar translations. This way you can stay consistent.

4. Select a suggestion from Translation results

   To check the suggestions, click the Translation results  icon on the right-side panel.

   Translation results are all the results from local and online translation resources attached to the project, including translation memories, LiveDocs, term bases, fragment searching, auto-translation rules, etc. Whenever you work on a document, the translation results list is always active.

   When looking up suggestions in TMs, term bases, or LiveDocs corpora, memoQ editor respects sublanguage settings. For example: en-US and en-GB can be treated as separate languages. This affects suggestions in the Translation results pane, Pre-translate, and more. The setting can be changed by a project manager in the general settings.

   In the Translation results list, memoQ editor can display:

   • Translation memory hits - marked with a red number.

   • Regular terms - marked with a blue number, highlighted in light blue in the translation editor.

   • Forbidden terms - marked with a black number, and crossed out in the list. You can't use or insert them like regular terms.

   • Non-translatables - marked with a gray number and highlighted in light gray in the translation editor.

   Depending on the result you select, the Translation results list can look different.

   If you need more details about the selected suggestion, click Expand result. To check the important metadata, click Show metadata (this works only for TM hits).

   

   To insert a term into the segment, you can:

   • Press Ctrl and the number of the term you want to use (from 1 to 9), for example, Ctrl+8. You don’t have to select a specific word or phrase.

   • Double-click the term's row.

   • The Compare selected result option is visible by default, but you can minimize it if needed. To do so, click the arrow  next to the box name.

     

     This section may look different depending on the translation result you choose to check.

5. Focus on a specific row

   To get all the relevant information for the row being translated, click the Focus on row  icon on the right-side panel.

   Here you can check:

   • Translation results - all the suggestions for this specific row.

     These come from translation memories, term bases, and non-translatable lists in the project.

     In the Translation results list, memoQ editor can display:

     • Translation memory hits - marked with a red number.

     • Regular terms - marked with a blue number, highlighted in light blue in the translation editor.

     • Forbidden terms - marked with a black number, and crossed out in the list. You can't use or insert them like regular terms.

     • Non-translatables - marked with a gray number and highlighted in light gray in the translation editor.

     Depending on the result you select, the Translation results list can look different.

     If you need more details about the selected suggestion, click Expand result. To check the important metadata, click Show metadata (this works only for TM hits).

     

     To insert a term into the segment, you can:

     • Press Ctrl and the number of the term you want to use (from 1 to 9), for example, Ctrl+8. You don’t have to select a specific word or phrase.

     • Double-click the term's row.

   • Comments - the list shows all the comments added to this row. In the translation editor, the commented text is highlighted in green.

     There are three types of comment icons you can see in the memoQ editor:

     - no comments added yet

     - comments added by other users

     - your comments

     Here, you can:

     • Add a comment about a whole row - click its Add/view comment  icon.

     • Add a comment about a part of the row - select the text, then hover over it and use the Add comment tooltip or click the Add/view comment  icon assigned to this row. A comment field appears with information about the content you want to comment on.

     • Add comments to rows that already have comments. The comments list shows how many comments you and others added to each row.

       You can also click the Add/view comment  icon.

       The memoQ editor opens the comments for the row you're reviewing, and the number next to the icon shows the total count of comments for that row.

     • To edit or delete a comment, click the falafel menu  icon in the top-right corner of the comment. You can only edit or delete your own comments.

       To check all the comments, you can also click the Comments  icon on the right-side panel.

   • Issues - the QA warnings and errors mentioned for the selected row.

     

     Here you can check:

     • Errors marked in red.

     • Active warnings marked in yellow.

     • Ignored warnings marked in gray.

6. Check reference files

   To check reference files uploaded by your project manager:

   1. In the sidebar click the Reference files  icon.

   2. You'll see a list of downloadable files. You can sort them by file name, file type, or language.

   

   memoQ editor displays them in alphabetical order and includes:

   • Full name with extension

   • Description (if any)

   • Keywords (if any)

   • Source language

7. Confirm or reject the selected segment

   To confirm a segment, press Ctrl + Enter. To reject a segment, press Shift + Enter.

   Those options are also available under the Segment tab, or simply by using the and buttons just above the target column.

   Depending on the action you take, memoQ editor displays an icon on the grid:

   • For confirmed rows - depending on who confirmed the row,  for translator,   for Reviewer 1, and  for Reviewer 2.

     When you confirm your translation, memoQ editor saves the translation in the document and in the working translation memory of the project.

   • For rejected rows – .

   Select multiple segments at once

   1. To select multiple segments: Click the first row to start, then hold Shift and click the last row to select everything in between or use the Up or Down arrow keys.

   2. Ctrl+Shift+A selects all visible rows (filters applied).

   3. Selecting is cleared when you click outside of the selection or start doing a different action in the editor.

   4. Available actions for multiple rows include copy source, confirm, reject, clear, join, lock, and unlock.

8. Review the translation

   To review and validate your translation, use QA checks and warnings:

   • Any segment with potential issues (e.g., missing punctuation, terminology mismatches) is marked with a warning .

   • Click QA issues  in the right sidebar to review and resolve them.

     To make your review easier, click the View options  icon and decide how you want to filter and group your QA issues. Your choice appears next to the icon even if you close the selection window.

     

     Here you can decide if you want to:

     • View all issues, only errors, or only warnings.

     • Group them by:

       • Row - display all issues identified for a specific row in one card. This option is set as default.

       • The issue type - display dropdowns with identified issues like consistency, numbers, or punctuation and whitespace.

     • Show ignored warnings - this option is switched off by default. Switch it on to display already ignored warnings.

     By default, this feature shows all issues and they are grouped by row.

     It is possible that during your work you'll see:

     • Active warnings marked in yellow

       If you decide to group your warnings by row, in the top-left corner of the card, memoQ editor shows you the row number, then the issue type and its description.

       If you decide to group your warnings by issue type, in the top-left corner of the card, memoQ editor shows you the identified issue type, then the row number, and its description.

       To ignore a warning, click the falafel menu icon in the top-right corner of the warning and then click Ignore. The field and its icon will change color to gray and will be marked as an ignored warning.

     • Ignored warnings marked in gray  

       By default, ignored warnings aren't visible in the QA issues tab.

       To make them visible, click the View options  icon and switch on the Show ignored warnings slider.

       If you decide to group your warnings by row, in the top-left corner of the card, memoQ editor shows you the row number, then the issue type and its description.

       If you decide to group your warnings by issue type, in the top-left corner of the card, memoQ editor shows you the identified issue type, then the row number, and its description.

       To make your warning active again and take it into consideration, click the falafel menu  icon and then click Restore. The field and its icon will change color to yellow, and will be marked as an active warning.

     • Errors marked in red 

       Errors can't be ignored.

       If you decide to group your errors by row, in the top-left corner of the card, memoQ editor shows you the row number, then the issue type and its description.

       If you decide to group your errors by issue type, in the top-left corner of the card, memoQ editor shows you the identified issue type, then the row number, and its description.

9. Preview your translation

   You can use the Preview pane at any time to see a real-time view of your translated document.

   You can move it to the top of the page (or back to the bottom), change its height, or just hide it if you don’t need it at the moment. Don’t worry, you can bring your hidden preview back at any time.

   To work with your Preview options, click the View section and then choose Preview.

What's more

When you finish