Recently, I was asked to teach a resources workshop to aspiring translators as part of WritePoint’s translation course. Countless hours spent collating everything I have learnt during my decade in the industry and researching some things I have managed to miss,
Hi Leah,
Just looked up your blog. Amazing! What a service for your fellow translators and writers.
I don’t know if you remember me; we met at the social media conference this winter.
I’d love to come hear you speak but not sure i can make it.
thanks again,
Yocheved Leah Perkal
perkal@zahav.net.il
Yocheved, Thank you for your kind words. I am happy you found this useful. Stay tuned for more “Tools for Wordsmiths” posts in the coming weeks.
Regarding online backup services, such as Dropbox: are you really sure you want the confidential documents that you translated stored on a server that is not really under your control. Are you sure that no one will take a peek at what you have stored there? It may also be in breach of non-disclosure or confidentiality agreements you may have signed.
Given the prices of external hard drives these days, it may be more economical to have one or two of these – and keep one at a neighbour’s house – and get into the discipline of doing the backups yourself. If you don’t want to have to select the folders manually each time, you can use a program such as SecondCopy, which has a variety of backup options.
Hello Perry, Thank you for your input. In my opinion, Dropbox has take adequate security measures (you can access their security policy here: http://www.dropbox.com/terms#security). The concerns you have raised are valid regarding any internet service, including email. External drives are a valuable alternative for people who are disciplined enough to back up regularly. Personally, I love the convenience of live back up. It’s one less thing to worry about.
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Leah,
Thanks. It’s not the tools that are difficult it’s changing my habits to allow me to use the tools. Office 2010 is coming out in June, and I plan on buying it if for no other reason that I will hopefully have three years to get used to it before I have to upgrade again.
I am familiar though with dropbox. It can also be used for file sharing, which I do with my family.
@Sarina, Thank you. It was great seeing you at the Kishor meeting
@yehoshua Habits are best changed one bit at a time. Pick just one tool and use it for a week. It will become second nature very soon.
Thanks Leah. I thought I was pretty savvy, but your post has added some useful tools to my toolkit. I look forward to your future posts.
See you at Nina’s and shabbat shalom,
Sarina