[Summary]
Launched in 1997 by the Translation Service of the European
Commission, Eurodicautom was a multilingual terminology database
of economic, scientific, technical and legal terms and expressions,
with language pairs for the eleven official languages of the
European Union (Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German,
Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish), and Latin. There
were 120,000 daily visits on average in 2003. In late 2003,
Eurodicautom announced its integration into a larger terminology
database in partnership with other institutions of the European
Union. The new database, called IATE (InterActive Terminology for
Europe), would be available in more than 20 languages, because of
the enlargement of the European Union planned in 2004. IATE was
launched on the intranet of some European institutions in spring
2004 and on the internet for free in March 2007.
***
Eurodicautom was a multilingual terminology database of economic,
scientific, technical and legal terms and expressions, with
language pairs for the eleven official languages of the European
Union, and Latin.
Eurodicautom was initially developed to assist in-house
translators. A free online version was available on the web in
1997 for European Union officials and for language professionals
throughout the world.
Eurodicautom covered "a broad spectrum of human knowledge", mainly
relating to economy, science, technology and legislation in the
European Union (EU), to answer the needs of the 15 member
countries in 11 official languages (Danish, Dutch, English,
Finnish, French, German, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish,
Swedish), plus Latin.
The project of a larger terminology database was studied as early
as 1999 to merge the existing databases for a better inter-
institutional cooperation between the European organizations. The
project partners were the European Commission, the European
Parliament, the Council of the European Union, the Court of
Justice, the European Court of Auditors, the European Economic and
Social Committee, the Committee of the Regions, the European
Investment Bank, the European Central Bank, and the Translation
Centre for the Bodies of the European Union.
Eurodicautom had 12,000 visits a day in late 2003, when it closed
to prepare for a larger terminology database that would include
the databases of other official European institutions. The new
database would be available in many more languages, more than 20
languages instead of 12, because of the Enlargement of the
European Union planned in 2004 to include new countries from
Central and Eastern Europe. The European Union went from 15
country members to 25 country members in May 2004, and 27 country
members in January 2007.
IATE (InterActive Terminology for Europe) was launched in March
2007 as an eagerly free service on the web, after been launched in
summer 2004 on the intranet of the participating European
institutions, with 1.4 million entries in the 23 official
languages of the European Union (Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Dutch,
English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian,
Irish, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Portuguese,
Romanian, Slovak, Slovene, Spanish, Swedish), plus Latin.
The website has been maintained by the Translation Center of the
European Union institutions in Luxembourg. According to the IATE
brochure, also available in the 23 official languages, IATE
offered 8,4 million words in 2010, including 540,000 abbreviations
and 130.000 expressions.