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thelinguist.uberflip.com APRIL/MAY 2017 The Linguist 17 FEATURES using various colours, and strike-out text when you're proofreading. These tools pop up as soon as you select one or more words. Similarly, you can add typed text or 'post- its' to a document, which comes in handy when preparing a speech that will be read out more or less verbatim. In that case, I use text boxes or post-its to note down the translation of things such as bible quotes and articles from legal texts that would otherwise be very difficult to render correctly. You can even scribble on the document, just like you would on paper. Additional benefits of working electronically include complete control over how documents are displayed: from single-page, two-page or continuous display to 'reading mode' (text without page breaks) and 'night mode' (white text on black background). Navigating long documents is much easier when you can search, jump to a specific page or use digital bookmarks and an interactive table of contents. Oh, and all those annotations, text boxes and post-its? They're listed in the table of contents, too, and are always just a tap away, no matter where they are in the document. Your mileage may vary, but I have grown so accustomed to paperless meeting preparation that I now prefer it to working with heaps of paper. DIGITAL NOTE-TAKING In some ways, using a tablet and stylus to take consecutive notes, instead of paper and pen, is the holy grail of tablet interpreting. In contrast to Scanbot and Adobe, digital note- taking may not immediately seem superior to the old way of doing things, but I think it's fun. Let me be honest: the perfect hardware combination for this is an iPad Pro with an Apple Pencil. But unless you already own those two, I wouldn't encourage you to buy them just to see if digital note-taking is for you. Instead, work with the tablet you already have. If you don't own a stylus yet, borrow one or buy an inexpensive option: Wacom's Bamboo styluses are very affordable and widely available. A stylus also makes it a little more comfortable to annotate documents in Adobe Acrobat. Wacom also provides a free note-taking app, aptly called Bamboo Paper. Download it and take it for a test drive. Almost all note- taking applications work with the familiar notion of notebooks organised on a shelf or in a library. When you open up Bamboo Paper, you'll see one or more blue notebooks that you can rename to your liking. Tap on a notebook to open it and choose your favourite writing utensil (ball pen or felt pen) stroke width and writing colour at the top of the screen. An eraser is available too. I wouldn't recommend taking interpreting notes straightaway. Instead, you may want to start slowly by doodling to get a feel for how the app works. Move on to jotting down a shopping list or short text, and when you feel more comfortable, try taking notes for a short test-style speech from Speechpool or the EU Speech Repository. If you get hooked, digital note-taking is for you. You can then customise Bamboo Paper with in-app purchases, upgrade your hardware and consider a 'tablet assignment'. Just make sure you're confident, and do bring a pen-and-paper backup. You never know! If this short introduction has whetted your appetite, feel free to contact me to share your experiences or to ask any questions. Happy tablet interpreting! www.adrechsel.de IN THE BOOTH Alexander Drechsel on assignment