Glossary

The Babelize Glossary feature gives you control over how specific terms, brand names, and technical jargon are translated. By establishing a project glossary, you can prevent automatic translation of trademarked terms or enforce specific translations for key words.

Glossary Entry Types

You can define two types of glossary rules for any given term:

1. Never Translate

Used for words that must remain exactly as they are in the source text across all target languages.

• Examples: Brand names ("Babelize", "Stripe"), product names ("Pro Plan"), technical terms ("Next.js", "WebSocket").
• Behavior: The translation engine preserves the exact casing and characters of the term in all target locales.

2. Always Translate As

Used to map specific source terms to exact translations in target languages, overriding the default behavior of the LLM.

• Example: Translate the English word "workspace" always as "espace de travail" in French and "espacio de trabajo" in Spanish.
• Behavior: Enforces the exact translation you specify, regardless of surrounding sentence context.

How It Works: Engine Masking

To ensure glossary terms are handled reliably, the translation engine uses an advanced masking system:

graph TD
    A[Source Text] --> B[Glossary Scanner]
    B --> C[Apply Placeholders / Masking]
    C --> D[AI Translation Engine]
    D --> E[Restore Terms / Unmasking]
    E --> F[Final Translated Output]

1. Scan: Before sending text to the AI translation engine, Babelize scans the string for matching glossary terms.
2. Mask: Matches are replaced with temporary, translation-safe placeholders (e.g. __BBLZ_TERM_0__). This prevents the LLM from translating or altering the word structure.
3. Translate: The AI translates the sentence structure around the placeholders.
4. Restore: The translation engine swaps the placeholders back with the correct glossary terms ("Never Translate" terms or "Always Translate As" target mappings).

Managing Your Glossary

To manage glossary entries for a project:

1. Open your project in the dashboard.
2. Click the Glossary tab in the project navigation.
3. Add terms individually or upload a CSV file.

CSV Import / Export

You can bulk manage your glossary using standard CSV files:

• Columns: source_term, type, target_lang_code, target_term
• Import: Click Import CSV to upload and merge new rules.
• Export: Click Export CSV to download a backup of your project glossary.

Plan Availability

The Glossary feature is available on Starter, Growth, and Studio plans. It is not supported on the Free plan.