Open architecture for multilingual parallel texts

1. Abstract Multilingual parallel texts (abbreviated to parallel texts) are linguistic versions of the same content (" translations "); e.g., the Maastricht Treaty in English and Spanish are parallel texts. This document is about creating an open architecture for the whole Authoring, Translation and Publishing Chain (ATP-chain) for the processing of parallel texts. • Public discussion: with an emailing list (or similar) to reach a rough consensus, in particular on aspects such as the required specifications. Organise the necessary meeting(s). • Tools: implement some tools. This might be done simultaneously with the public discussion to better illustrate the approach and support the discussion. To obtain the best quality, speed and the lowest possible cost (QSC) in the production of parallel texts, one should aim for: • Generating all the linguistic versions ready for publication, from linguistic resources. Probably one of the best approaches. • Seamless ATP-chain implementations. • Authoring: Computer-aided authoring (CAA) tools with a controlled authoring environment; it should deliver source texts prepared for translation. • Translation: Computer-aided translation (CAT) tools to allow translators to focus only in translating and unburden translators from auxiliary tasks such as formatting. These tools should have functionalities such as side-by-side editor and the re-use of previous translations. • Publishing: Computer-aided publishing (CAP) tools to minimise human intervention. The open architecture (i.e., based on open standards) must allow the proper interoperability of programs from different software producers. It must be possible to implement client tools that give the impression to the users (e.g., authors, translators) of interfacing with one seamless system. These client applications might be interacting (through open standards) with many application servers that might be from different software producers; hence the complexity can be hidden from the users.