You can request in-promptu translations with Unbabel through the creation of Projects. These translations can be requested for any given text, to any onboarded language pair, directly at the Unbabel Portal, without resorting to any integration or setup process. Just type or upload your content and we'll be ready to go.

 

What is a project?

A project is an object entity that is comprised of files to be translated (orders). Each project can contain up to 20 translation Orders, each one translated into up to 30 languages (individual translation requests). Using Projects you can quickly organize and group translation requests together.

 

The Projects app introduces new advantages:

 

• Streamlined Organization: You can now aggregate related content within a project, making it easier than ever to maintain an organized workspace.
• Comprehensive Status Tracking: Keep tabs on the status of both individual orders and the entire project from a single, intuitive view. No more switching between screens.
• Effortless Downloads: Downloading individual orders or entire project translations is now a breeze, ensuring you have quick access to the information you need.
• Drafts: Need to collaborate with a colleague or locate a missing file? You can save your work in progress and return to it when you're ready to submit.

 

To manage and create projects, access the Project app in the Customer Portal.

 

Note: If you do not have access to projects, but would like to, please reach out to your Account Manager.

 

Requesting translations

To begin translating, you'll start by accessing the Projects app in the left app panel of the Customer Portal. 

Click the Projects app and create a new Project.

 

Step 1 - Add content

A new window will appear, guiding you through the necessary steps to request the translation. The first step is to provide the source text for translation. There are two ways to provide the source text:

 

• Typing/Pasting: Add text content directly to create a file:
  • 1) optionally provide a file name. If no name is provided, one will automatically be generated when creating the file;
  • 2) select the format from plain text (txt) or html
  • 3) paste or type the text
  • 4) create the file

 

 

You can create multiple file up to the project's limit of 20 using this method. 

 

• File Upload: Upload a file in one of our several supported formats.  he file format should be automatically detected, but please verify it is correct to ensure translation quality (ex: don't send an html file with a txt extension). Add files by clicking Select to open a new window, or drag and drop them to the designated area. File size limit is 5 Gb*.

 

*Some customer use-cases may have different limits enforced.

 

You will be able to see the progress of the upload for each individual file along with the project overall.

 

Warning: Please don't close or navigate to another page while the upload is in progress. This will corrupt the uploaded file.

 

You can use a mix of uploaded and pasted files to created your project. You also have the option to name your project during step 1. Once you have completed the steps, click the "Next" button in the bottom right corner of the screen. If the button is greyed out, you most likely have missed one of the required fields.

 

Each uploaded file will correspond to an Order within the Project.

 

A file can be cancelled during upload or removed at any time during this step.

 

Step 2 - Select Pipeline group

In the next step, you will need to select the Pipeline Group to be used for the translation. Pipeline Groups are collections of linguistic resources, translation flows and instructions adapted to different purposes, set up by you and/or your LangOps specialist. Pipeline groups often also reflect the quality setup in place for the translation flow.

 

 

Step 3 - Select Languages

In step 3 you will select a source and target languages for your project.

You can select only one source language. This means that all the files in your project need to be written in the same language.

You can select as many target languages as the ones included in the pipeline group, up to a maximum of 30.

 

Warning: It's not recommended to submit text with mixed languages in the source. This may carry consequences ranging from poor quality output to the translation being cancelled.

 

 

 

Note: The pipeline group and the selected languages will apply to all orders (files) in the Project, and each language will create a Translation job.

 

As such, you will have a Project that is parent to one or multiple Orders, which are in turn parent to one or multiple Translation jobs.

 

Step 4 - File Settings

In this step you can apply specific file settings to the files making up your Project. These include File Filter configurations, file and/or language specific instructions, and services*. Read more about this topic by clicking on the previous respective links.

 

*Services are limited to some customer use cases

 

Warning: Make sure your filter and services configurations are correctly set. Choosing the incorrect one can have severe consequences on the output and SLA of your translated files.

 

Step 5 - Review

In the review step, we will ask you to confirm the project details before submitting the request. You have another opportunity to edit the project's name and see if the pipeline group and language settings are correctly selected.

 

 

Until a Project is created, it will remain in Draft mode. A draft Project can be edited concerning its contained orders, languages, and name. Any Portal user with access to the Projects app can make changes to any Project, regardless of author. 

Once you click next and complete your review, you "lock" your project - don't worry, this action is reversible. However, we need the project not to be subject to further changes in order to provide an accurate estimation in the next step.

 

Note: Confirming the review of your project doesn't imply you are compromised with the following estimation. You can delete or re-estimate a project.

 

Step 6 - Estimations*

*Estimations are limited to some customers. If they are not available for you, the project will go from review to progress

 

In the final step before submitting a project, we will estimate the total cost and turn-around-time of the request. Estimation will take into consideration the pipeline group being used and the number of words in all the jobs in the project. As such, it is expected that for a project containing the same amount of translatable content, the cost will be lower if you only use machine translation when comparing with human reviewers, for example.

Estimation is done by performing a "mock" extraction of the translatable content and calculating the cost, so it may take a few minutes to complete, especially if your project is large. While the estimation is taking place, your project will remain under Estimating status.

 

You can choose to submit a project before estimation is complete, either immediately of any time you access it during estimation, by clicking Submit project.

 

 

Once an estimation is ready, you will receive an email with that information. Opening the project will direct you to the estimation step.

 

 

Here, all the information on the estimation is available for a drill-down analysis. You have access to the project summary, the delivery time estimate, and how will the project subtract from your current balance. In the board to the right, cost estimates are provided per file, and you can further check the cost per each language.

 

Note: the estimated cost is always the same or higher than the actual cost of the project. You will never pay more than what is provided as an estimation.

 

Once you are ready to accept the estimation, click the corresponding Submit project button.

 

Re-calculating an estimation

It is possible that you may want to perform changes, such as adding a file, or changing the pipeline group, to an estimated project. You can do this by opening a project that is estimated and clicking on Previous. The following message will appear. Click to confirm and edit your project again.

 

 

Estimations with Services

If your project contains any service, estimation is not automatic, and you will find the previous screen instead. In this case, please wait for an email from the Unbabel team with the final quote for the translation project.

 

 

My project is created. What now?

When you submit a project, you will no longer be able to perform additional changes. The project will undergo translation and be completed in time.

Once the Project is ready, you will receive an email notification informing you that the Project has been completed, and the status on the Portal will be updated accordingly.

To know how to check on Project status and manage downloads, check this article.