Summaries 2/1998

• Active cooperation between TSK and the EU continues

• Nordterm-Net – Nordic termbank services on the Web

• Golf vocabulary

• Literature

• TSK's Multimedia Vocabulary is ready

• Termwatch

Active cooperation between TSK and the EU continues

Finland's membership in the European Union has greatly affected TSK's activities, because it has increased the need for terminology work. As a consequence, some EU units, e.g. the Terminology Unit of the Commission's Translation Services, have become TSK's clients.

Now TSK is engaged in a new project where about 25 000 Finnish terms will be collected for Eurodicautom. The subject fields are e.g. agriculture, food industry, mechanical engineering, environment, civil defence, insurance and social welfare. As before, TSK will cooperate with Finnish subject field specialists in order to ensure that the quality and timetable requirements will be met.

In this spring TSK and the Federation of Finnish Fisheries Associations collected equivalents and quite a few definitions for two dictionaries published by the Commission. The material comprised about 1 500 terms concerning fishing gear and fishing vessels.

In fact, TSK's cooperation with the EU goes beyond the large projects. TSK offers e.g. its term service to the European Commission. In 1997 TSK arranged a consulting session on termbank management for the terminologists of the Commission. TSK also participates in two projects of the MLIS (Multilingual Information Society) programme. One of them is Nordterm-Net, described in another article in this issue. Another MLIS project is called TDC-net. It aims at building networks for European terminology documentation centres via the Internet.

Nordterm-Net – Nordic termbank services on the Web

The Nordic terminology organizations have started a project called Nordterm-Net, in order to set up a multilingual termbank service on the Web. The project is a part of the MLIS programme of the EU. The Nordterm-Net services should be in operation in the summer of 1999.

The key facility of Nordterm-Net will be a collection of terminological databases accessible through a common channel: the Nordic Termbank Gateway. One of these databases will be Nordtermbanken. Its anticipated size is about 200 000 term entries. Any Nordic termbank owner could become linked to the Gateway. Terminologies considered suitable are those concerning terms from at least one Nordic language, possibly including term equivalents in non-Nordic languages, and having at least one high-quality definition per entry.

The Nordterm-Net is a joint project between the Nordic terminology centres and the Nordic Language Council. The coordinator is the Swedish Centre for Technical Terminology (TNC). TSK and the University of Vaasa from Finland are also among the project partners.

Nordterm-Net will be useful for every user of LSP (Language for Specific Purpose) in monolingual or multilingual environment. Apart from Nordic users, e.g. people working in the EU's organizations will benefit from it. Nordterm-Net could help to decrease terminological problems, often in the connection of translations, and thus reduce costs.

Golf vocabulary

Golf is one of those games which compel their players to learn a great number of special concepts and terms. Some of the terms can be understood on the basis of general language, but it is typical for golf that many words have an essentially smaller range of meaning than in general language.

The language of golf is English. Sometimes the spelling of the English words is adjusted to fit better into Finnish, but often direct loan words are used. Golf concepts are mainly clear and established, but there are also some confusing terms, e.g. terms that have several meanings like grip, lie and loft. There are also differences between British English and American English.

This golf vocabulary does not teach anyone to play golf; its purpose is to help those who are interested in golf to get an idea of the principles of the game. It may be useful to experienced golfers, too, because it tries to describe golf terminology precisely and systematically.

The vocabulary does not give "official" term recommendations, but it reflects typical Finnish term usage. The compilers welcome any feedback.

Literature

Economy and trade in Russian
Translatio Rustica Oy has published a Finnish-Russian dictionary of economy and trade, based on material collected between 1994 and 1998. It includes 45 000 Finnish entries with 87 000 Russian equivalents and a Russian index.

Vocabulary of physics in radiotherapy
The Finnish Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority has published a vocabulary of physics in radiotherapy comprising over 600 terms and definitions in Finnish and equivalents in Swedish and English. The purpose of the vocabulary is to reduce terminological confusions and misunderstandings between the experts of radiotherapy, and it could be useful in the teaching and training of radiotherapy.

Revised vocabulary of metrology
The Finnish Standards Association SFS has revised its terminlogy standard of metrology (SFS 3700). It includes 120 terms and definitions in Finnish and terms in English, Swedish, French and German.

Ordbok for elektronikk
The Norwegian Council for Technical Terminology (RTT) has published a dictionary of electronics with about 4 000 terms and definitions in Norwegian and term equivalents in English.

TSK's Multimedia Vocabulary is ready

TSK's multimedia vocabulary project started last year and the vocabulary was published in May 1998. The objective of the project was to compile a vocabulary containing the most essential multimedia concepts in a rather short time. At last about 80 concepts with Finnish terms and definitions and their Swedish and English equivalents were included in the vocabulary.

The term multimedia proved to be problematic, because it is often used to refer to many different concepts. In order to avoid inaccuracies and to clarify communication it is recommended, for example, that the terms multimedia-aineisto (multimedia material) and multimediasovellus (mutimedia application) should be used instead of using only multimedia. The work group also considered that the word multimedia is correct Finnish, although some outside experts were of different opinion.

The work group also discussed whether multimedia and hypermedia are two different concepts. It was decided that they are not the same, but hypermedia is a species of multimedia, so multimedia does not necessarily have all the characteristics of hypermedia.

The Multimedia Vocabulary is available from Helsinki Media, phone (09) 120 671 and from bookshops. The price is about FIM 50.

Termwatch

New Finnish abbreviations, LVIA and LVISA, have emerged in the field of building and construction in addition to the old LVI and LVIS. LVI refers to HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning) in English, S means sähkö (electricity). The newly added letter A stands for automaatio (automation).

There are numerous terms for portable computers in Finnish. TSK suggests that either matkamikro or matkatietokone could be used, analogous to the word matkapuhelin for mobile phone. TSK also considers that so far the best Finnish equivalent for mobile computing is matkatietotekniikka.

One of the newest techniques becoming common in the World Wide Web is push technology. With push the user's browser retrieves information from a specific WWW address at regular intervals. It has taken some time to find and establish a Finnish equivalent for push technology. TSK recommends that tarjontatekniikka should be used. Another Finnish term that could be used is kanavatekniikka, although it is not as descriptive.

Another concept having many Finnish equivalents is the @ sign used in e-mail addresses. The old term is taksamerkki, some use at-merkki borrowed from English. There is also miuku (for the cat connotations of the @ sign), and now a new suggestion rengas-a.