By name: d-transcreate description: Faithful translation and transcreation workflow for books, long-form documents, technical material, fiction, scripts, and mixed-format source files. Use when Codex needs to translate, localize, adapt, or quality-check a substantial document with terminology research, style control, glossary management, continuity tracking, chunking, and optional parallel subagents.
D Transcreate Skill
Canonical workflow:
core/d-transcreate.md
Use this skill to translate or transcreate long documents with controlled terminology, consistent voice, and durable state across context windows.
Quick Start
- Read
core/d-transcreate.mdfor operating principles and the 7-phase workflow. - Follow the phase sequence: Intake → Scan → Research → Plan → Translate → Coordinate → QA.
- Persist all artifacts (brief, glossary, style sheet, manifest, summaries) as workspace files.
Operating Principles
- Preserve meaning, intent, register, structure, and factual accuracy before surface fluency.
- Translate literally only when literal wording carries the intended effect.
- Prefer natural target-language prose when idioms, humor, slogans, dialogue, or cultural references need adaptation.
- Never silently invent, omit, simplify, or reorder source meaning.
- Mark uncertainty with a concrete note and a proposed resolution path.
- Do not copy existing copyrighted translations — use lawful samples only to infer terminology, register, and structural conventions.
- Keep reusable decisions in artifacts (files on disk), not in chat history.
Core Workflow (Summary)
| Phase | Action | Key Artifact |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Intake | Identify source, target, audience, mode, quality bar | Translation Brief |
| 2. Scan | Whole-document inventory before any translation | Source Map |
| 3. Research | Mine terms, research style, build glossary | Glossary + Style Sheet |
| 4. Plan | Create Context_Plan, segment by semantic boundaries | Context_Plan + Chunk Manifest |
| 5. Translate | Multi-pass per chunk: draft → compare → revise → update | Chunk outputs |
| 6. Coordinate | Create Subagent_Dispatch_Plan, dispatch (if parallel), merge, voice pass | Merged output |
| 7. QA | Run all QA gates before delivery | QA Report |
Subagent Roles
When the platform supports parallel execution, the following roles may be dispatched:
- Transcreate Coordinator — final authority on glossary, style, voice, continuity, and merge.
- Terminology Researcher — mines and proposes terms; never writes global glossary directly.
- Style Researcher — researches target-language conventions; proposes style rules.
- Chunk Translator — owns one chunk through the multi-pass cycle.
- Continuity Reviewer — checks cross-chunk consistency and story/domain continuity.
- Fidelity Reviewer — checks source faithfulness (omissions, additions, distortions).
- Formatting Reviewer — checks structural and formatting integrity.
See core/prompts/ for full role definitions.
Workflow Reference Files
core/workflows/long-document.md— full staged workflow for books and large documents.core/workflows/terminology-research.md— term mining, source priority, d-research integration.core/workflows/fiction-continuity.md— story bible, reveal timing, character voice.core/workflows/technical-domain.md— domain map, acronyms, units, standards.core/workflows/qa-gates.md— the 8 QA gates.core/workflows/context-management.md— context budget, chunk loading, resume procedure.core/workflows/subagents.md— readiness gate, role dispatch, parallel rules.
Artifact Schemas
core/schemas/translation-brief.mdcore/schemas/source-map.mdcore/schemas/glossary.mdcore/schemas/style-sheet.mdcore/schemas/story-bible.mdcore/schemas/domain-map.mdcore/schemas/chunk-manifest.mdcore/schemas/chunk-summary.mdcore/schemas/context-plan.mdcore/schemas/subagent-dispatch-plan.mdcore/schemas/unresolved-issues.mdcore/schemas/qa-report.md
Orchestration Contract
Before chunking, create a Context_Plan (core/schemas/context-plan.md) to record context budget and chunk-size limits. Before dispatching any worker role, create a Subagent_Dispatch_Plan (core/schemas/subagent-dispatch-plan.md).
If Codex does not support real parallel subagents, execute the same role contract sequentially while preserving the artifact handoff rules. See core/workflows/subagents.md for the sequential fallback procedure.
Default Deliverables
For a substantial translation task, produce or maintain these artifacts in the workspace:
- Translation Brief
- Source Map
- Glossary
- Style Sheet
- Story Bible (fiction) or Domain Map (technical/legal/medical)
- Context Plan
- Chunk Manifest
- Subagent Dispatch Plan (when delegating work)
- Chunk Summaries
- Unresolved Issues Log
- QA Report
For short tasks, apply the same logic mentally and return only the translated text plus any necessary notes.
Context Management
- Never load the full source document into context unless it genuinely fits with room for QA.
- Per chunk, load only: brief, glossary slice, style rules, story bible/domain map excerpt, previous + next chunk summaries, current source chunk, and relevant unresolved issues.
- After completing a chunk, write a compact summary and unload the raw source.
- On context reset, re-open the chunk manifest first, then brief, style sheet, glossary, and current chunk source.
See core/workflows/context-management.md for the full resume procedure.