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Translation Editor

Work in progress. A CAT (Computer-Assisted Translation) editor for line-by-line translation of Pali Canon texts — convenient input, quick templates, and two ways to work with the text.

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Demo

This is a demo — saving does not work.

Toolbar​

  • ◀ ▶ — previous/next text.
  • Sutta number — type an id (e.g. sn56.11, an3.70), with auto-detection of whether a translation already exists.
  • Source language — pick the source file's language.
  • DT.org — open dhammatalks.org/suttas/.
  • DG — open the current text on Dhamma.Gift.
  • Update — reload the translation from source.
  • Find/Replace — a search-and-replace window (escape (, ), [, ] as \(, \), \[, \]).
  • Format (checkbox) — auto-format line breaks.
  • Clear — clear the input field.
  • Open file / Load from server — open a previously saved draft.
  • Save — export the translation as JSON.

In the top bar, the Diff Checker icon opens an external tool for comparing text versions.

Two input modes​

Table mode​

A two-column table (Text | Translation) — each row is edited separately.

  • Click a cell — edit it.
  • The 🔗 icon — jump to this row in quick-entry mode.
  • ↑ / ← — move to the cell above.
  • ↓ / → — move to the cell below.
  • Enter — add an empty row, or wrap text onto a new row.
  • Ctrl+Enter — move text to the start of the next row.
  • Backspace at the start of a row — merge with the previous row.
  • Delete at the end of a row — merge with the next row.

Quick-entry mode​

One large text field — the whole translation at once, synced live with the table.

  • Ctrl+Q — select a range of rows and merge them into one.
  • Ctrl+F / Ctrl+H — search/replace (same escaping as the toolbar's find/replace, for ()/[]).

Quick templates​

Inside the Find/Replace window there are buttons for phrases that come up over and over in the canon. One click inserts the text at the cursor (in this editor, the inserted text is in Russian): 4nt / 4nt short (the Four Noble Truths formula, full and short), n8p / n8p short (the Noble Eightfold Path), Thus said… (a sutta's closing formula), plus an em-dash, curly quotes, and an inverted question mark for punctuation.

Settings​

Your translator name (used in the filename when saving) and a toggle to replace +edited+o in the filename with o — for final versions.