Word Count Analysis in Studio

I’m often asked about how to do a word count analysis in Studio. It’s not surprising because the feature stays somewhat hidden if one translates without creating projects. When using the previous versions of Trados, I used to run the analysis more or less automatically for every job because it was so easy to do. However, in Studio it’s a bit more complicated and I’ve noticed that I don’t do it nearly as often (if I don’t create a project). So here’s a summary on how the analysis is done in Studio for those who might still be wondering about it.

1. When creating a project: This is easy and automatic. You get a full word count and analysis statistics report if you include the “Analyze Files” batch task in a task sequence (such as Prepare [with or without project TM]) when creating a project. The results can be viewed in the Reports and Files views. If you only want the analysis results you can select the Analyze Only task sequence instead of Prepare but you still need to go through the whole process of project creation. This might save some time since the files will not be pre-translated as they would if you used Prepare.

2. When translating a single file: This is when it gets a bit more complicated. Since no project batch tasks are run, you need to run the analysis task separately. Open the file for translation in the editor and save it in SDLXLIFF format (File > Save), if not done already. Open the Files (or Projects) view. Right-click the file (or project) name and select Batch Tasks > Analyze Files. Note that the batch tasks are grayed out if you haven’t saved the file in SDLXLIFF format first. Click Finish in the Batch Processing dialog box to start the analysis. This will give you the full analysis statistics without having to go through the actual project creation process. The results can be viewed in the Reports and Files views. Another option would be to create a project but to select the Analyze Only task sequence, as described above (#1).

Note also the new Report  internal fuzzy match leverage option in the analysis settings.

By the way, don’t expect to get the same word count results with Studio as compared to Trados 2007. I haven’t had the patience (or time) to figure out the reasons for that but I’d be interested in hearing from others who might have looked into this in more detail. Anyhow, this offers a great opportunity to test your negotiation skills with clients who use the other version.

UPDATE: You can find a new article about the word count differences here.

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