The MQM error typology contains seven high-level dimensions. The tree view format presented below displays the MQM-Core error typology. Each dimension comprises more specific error subtypes. For example, Accuracy contains subtypes such as Addition, Mistranslation, and Omission. MQM-Full expands to provide a wide range of more detailed error types that can be used where implementers require greater granularity.
(You can also download the FULL MQM Typology from About Us / Downloads page on this Web site. )
Here is a brief description of the seven high-level error type dimensions:
- Terminology – errors arising when a term does not conform to normative domain or organizational terminology standards or when a term in the target text is not the correct, normative equivalent of the corresponding term in the source text
- Accuracy – errors occurring when the target text does not accurately correspond to the propositional content of the source text, introduced by distorting, omitting, or adding to the message
- Linguistic conventions (Fluency in version 1) – errors related to the linguistic well-formedness of the text, including problems with grammaticality, spelling, punctuation, and mechanical correctness.
- Style – errors occurring in a text that are grammatically acceptable but are inappropriate because they deviate from organizational style guides or exhibit inappropriate language style
- Locale conventions – errors occurring when the translation product violates locale-specific content or formatting requirements for data elements
- Audience appropriateness (Verity in version 1) – errors arising from the use of content in the translation product that is invalid or inappropriate for the target locale or target audience
- Design and markup – errors related to the physical design or presentation of a translation product, including character, paragraph, and UI element formatting and markup, integration of text with graphical elements, and overall page or window layout
The original full version of the MQM typology (MQM 1.0) is available here (archive on the Wayback Machine). Note that the current version makes important changes from this version.
A history of changes to MQM 2.0 is available here.