New Paratext Add-On

Question

Hello folks,

As you know, one of our biggest problems in Bible Translation is that we simply don’t have enough people. It occurred to me that we can use our Paratext projects as the basis for training “workbooks” for new Translators and Consultants in Training. This would help mentors train more people with minimal effort through guided practice and feedback. It is simply a supplemental tool and does not replace formal training or face to face practice.

I’ve developed the Translation Presenter program but I could use more feedback before sharing it publicly. I can’t attach XLSM or PPT files so I’ve put download links below. I’d appreciate any feedback you may have.

Thanks,
-anon062569
[Email Removed]

Files need to be downloaded to run correctly:
Demo File
Sample Output
Main program

More Details:

• This program is language independent. The instructions are in English, but I’ll be translating them to Spanish soon. Hopefully I can get other people to translate the instructions and we can use it for training more non-English speakers.

• It can be tweaked to further integrate Paratext with the Microsoft suite (or other applications). It also wouldn’t take much work to adapt this to make Paratext projects into personal books in Logos.

• This version is based on the standard back translation, but I have different version that is based on the interlinearizer. I will be adding that feature in, but it isn’t my highest priority at the moment.

• I’m specifically looking for feedback on common USFM markers. I based the program on \id, \s, \c, and \v but I’m not sure what landmines I’ll run into when working with other projects.

• I will be adding in a second Comparison Text in order to have a more literal and more dynamic example at hand. I want to connect with people at DBL because their API has so many more options than the Biblia API that I’m currently using. Send me an email if you know who I should contact.

Answer 1

Very interesting what you’re working on here. I enjoyed working through the Genesis 39 example. Thank you for sharing.

What do you see as the advantages of exporting to PowerPoint and making comments there versus working in Paratext with the notes feature? Perhaps you could elaborate on what you mean by “practice workbook.”

Comments

Hi drwww,

Yes, I had thought about doing it in Paratext and believe it would also be a good system. I know many people have had the idea for a training project in Paratext, but to my knowledge no one has actually made one. I even considered stopping development on this because it was similar to what is possible in Paratext. I am happy to work on any training projects in Paratext, but I don’t know of any.

The main advantage that I see with doing it this way is that you can easily share it with anyone. You’re not limited by the Paratext roles. I’d rather have Paratext secure than acessible, but that means it isn’t a great program for sharing data. I know two people who I’d like to recruit as CiT’s and we recently had an online seminar with 75 people interested in in consulting work. I can share a slideshow with them and don’t need to worry about them downloading Paratext and registering and learning the system. Perhaps it is my lack of experience, but it also seems a lot easier to email a slideshow to other consultants (or make a shared folder) than to figure out names and permissions and making sure everyone has a separate copy in Paratext.

You can also do things in Powerpoint like cross stuff, circle things, highlight, add pictures, etc. It is just generally more accessible for technophones.

Doing it in Powerpoint certainly has disadvantages as well. In my mind the main one is that my program might break down if we change the way we use the USFM codes. So this isn’t the one size fit all solution, but it might be better for people who are really new to Bible translation.

Thanks,
-anon062569

P.S. I forgot to mention it in my orignal post, but another feature that is almost ready is to have it automatically import consultant notes to the appropriate slides.

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Interesting.