Microsoft glossaries: My turn to ask a question now. Can anyone tell me where I might find the Microsoft Glossaries that contain the multilingual terminology for Windows 7? This used to be available as part of the MSDN program, but I wonder if the multilingual GUI terminology for Windows 7 is more widely available?

Brand names in different languages are a bit of a minefield, and companies are well advised to undertake research before running with a brand name in different countries.

For example, the French soft drinks brand called Pschitt. Looks OK, huh? Until I tell you that the P is silent when the name is pronounced in French. That may explain why Orangina made it big world-wide, but Pschitt didn't.

I recently stumbled across a website that explains (in Spanish) some classic instances of brand names gone wrong. I already knew several of them, but the Mazda Laputa was a new one to me. That'd be a hard one to sell in any country with a Latin-based language - "La puta" in Spanish means "the whore", and I can't see many people buying a car with that writ large across the back!

If you need help with international brand names, contact us at SalfTrans for professional advice.

Time flies, and October is suddenly upon us.

The autumn is a season of conferences for me. On Saturday October 10th I will be giving a talk on Keeping Customers Happy to the West Midlands group of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting (note to self: Look up how to get to Aston University!).

Saturday 14th November will see me in Manchester, taking part in the NWTN "Boost your productivity" day, which will look at how translators actually work, at the tools we use, the techniques we use, and at how the tools and techniques that translators use have changed.

Then on 19th November, Sarah O'Keefe and her lovely colleagues at Scriptorium have kindly invited me to present a webinar with them on document design issues. That will look at how to design your company's documents with cost-effective translation in mind, looking at ways to maximise the return on your translation budget. That promises to be fun.