国内企业大多都有自己的网站，还有很多企业有英文网站。跨国公司或产品出口的企业肯定得有自己的英文网站，甚至像万科这个国内最大的住宅开发企业，也有英文网站。大多数企业的英文网站，或者是网站的英文版，都是从网站的中文版翻译过来的，很多翻译错误百出，严重影响公司形象。试想一下，如果有外国公司网站的中文版语句不通、辞不达意、错别字连篇，我们会怎样看待这家公司？买这家公司的产品时，会不会迟疑？本文以某大公司的英文网站为例，探讨英文网站的常见错误以及一些翻译技巧和网站的内容和形式。文中所引用的网站英文全部从某公司的英文网站复制粘贴，不存在笔者输入时出错的问题。字体、标点符号、空格保持和网站一样，只是将笔者认为有问题的词、短语改为加粗斜体。

第一部分      错误类型

一、文本规范类错误

㈠数字错误

例一：石油工业部所属单位在渤海和南海的北部湾、海南岛附近海域钻探井111口，有30口井获得工业油气流；在渤海开发了3个小型油气田，累计生产原油100万吨。

The units affiliated with the Ministry of Petroleum Industry drilled 110 wells in Bohai Bay, Beibu Gulf of the South China Sea and the sea areas near Hainan Island, and industrial hydrocarbon flows were obtained in 30 wells; 3 small oil and gas fields were developed.

例二：中国海洋石油有限公司成功发行40亿美元全球债券。自此，中海油已累计从国际债券市场融资100亿美元，成为利用国际债券市场募集资金最多的中国企业。

CNOOC Ltd. issued $4 billion aggregate principle amount of guaranteed notes,achieving a cumulative financing of 410 billion from the international market.

例三：实现世界上单套能力最大的年产27万吨生物柴油加工装置（FAME）试车一次成功；

We succeeded in the trial production of biodieselat a FAME processing facility, which has the world's highest production capacity for a single facility and a design capacity of 270,000 million tonnes per annum.

这类错误是最不该犯的，也是最严重的。如果公司的中期报告、年度报告等，数字错了，可能会影响投资者信心，股价大跌。令人不解的是数字都是阿拉伯字，不存在翻译的问题，怎么可以在中文里面和在英文里面非要弄得不一样？例三中，270,000就是27万，为什么后面还要加个million？

㈡空格错误

例一：CNOOC Limited was named 2012 Best Oil and Gas Company in Asia by theEuromoney.

例二：With our existing business foundations,we fully developed our brand values of the three famous national brands-Fudao, Tianye, Sakefu, to conductsoil testing, formula-designing and promotion of the scientific applicationof fertilisers in Hainan, Guangxi,Jilinand other locations, which achieved remarkable results and gained ageneral acceptance from farmers.

这种错误主要是单词之间没空格以及标点符号后面没空格，这种错误也是不该犯的，因为文档编辑软件能检测出来。

㈢拼写错误

例一：中国海洋石油总公司马六甲油田生产的原油3万吨运抵南京，这是中国产自国外运回国内的第一船油。

The shipment of 30,000 tons of crude oil produced from Maccala Strait for CNOOC shares arrived Nanjing. This is the first shipment of crude oil produced from overseas for China.

例二：Taizhou petrochemical integraton project started construction.

例三：Liu Tienan, Vice Director of National Development and Reform Commisssion and Director of National Energy Bureau, paid an inspection visit to CNOOC.

例四：Inthe ranking list CNOOC Limited took 532nd place concerning the integrated factors, and 1279th, 171st,1161 stand 340th places respectively in terms of sales revenue, net profit, total asets and marketable capitalization.

例五：CNOOC Limited was awarded four prizes: the Best Governed Company, Best Company, Best Company Lssuing Bonds and Best Accquisition in the survey and evaluation held by Assets, the famous financial Journal.

例六：CNOOC 111, the floating production storage and offloading (FPSO) facility invested and built by CNOOC was delivered in Waigaoqiao Shipyeard, Shanghai.

这种错误类似汉字的错字，写字时多了一撇或少了一点，而英文则是在拼写单词时多了个字母或少了个字母，英文叫typo，或是incorrect spelling，据说，这两者是有区别的，typo是不小心输错了，而incorrect spelling是学艺不精，记单词时就记错了。不管怎样，用电脑输入、编辑，这种错误完全可以避免。

㈣别字

例一：CNOOC singed a PSC with Devon Energy Corporation (Devon, NYSE:DVN) for deepwater block 42/05 in the Pear River Mouth Basin of South China Sea.

例二：In 2012, we received the honour of an Outstanding State-Owned Key Enterprise in Poverty Reduction and Development, won the Lifeline Express 15th Anniversary Special Award, and were among the first batch of companies, to be honoured with an appreciation plague from China Women’s Development Foundation (CWDF) for being a strategic partner of the Mother Water Cellar Project.

例三：In August 2009, the severe typhoon Morakot struck Taiwan. CNOOC contracted the Association for Relations across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) and contributed RMB 10 million to the disaster relief.

汉字的别字通常是张冠李戴，主要原因有三种：一是由于形似，如：松弛——误做“松驰”；二是由于同音，如：提纲——误做“题纲”；三是由于义近，如：擅长——误做“善长”。而英文的别字似乎都是由于形似导致的，例一中将pearl写成了pear；例二将plaque写成plague，前者在文中是牌匾的意思，后者是瘟疫、灾祸的意思；例三中我认为是将contacted写成的contracted。

㈤标点符号

例一：国务院发布《中华人民共和国对外合作开采海洋石油资源条例》，确定了海上对外合作第一轮国际招标的《标准合同》。

The《Regulations of People's Republic of China Concerning the Exploitation of The Offshore Petroleum Resources in Cooperation with Foreign Enterprises》was promulgated by the State Council. The《model Contract》for the first round of international bidding for the offshore cooperation with foreign enterprises was finalized.

不管英文有没有这种标点符号，就直接将中文的标点符号照搬到英文当中。上面例子中的书名号就属于这种错误。还有的甚至直接照搬中文里的顿号。简单地判断英文里面是不是有某种标点符号，就是在纯英文状态下，直接用键盘可以输入的，才是英文的标点符号。

例二：The public biding of the first phase of the Guangdong LNG importterminal was unveiled, Australia, Indonesia and Qatar had been shortlisted as potential suppliers.

例三：The company always put "production safety"at the first place in operational management activities, it further enhanced the QHSE management system, also improved the effectiveness of "hazard safety check" and "implementation performance".

逗号错误是英语写作中常犯的错误，特别是母语是中文的，原因是中文的标点符号使用本来就不像英文那么严谨，不少人写文章甚至一逗到底。而英文是严谨的，文章可以千变万化，但句型结构只有4种：Simple Sentences（简单句），Compound Sentence（并列句），complex sentence（复合句）和Compound-Complex Sentence（并列复合句）。如果是简单句，句子再短，完成了就是句号。上面两个例子要不就写成两个简单句；要写成并列句，中间就要有coordinating conjunction（并列连词）。Mt. San Jacinto College的在线公开课Crafting an EffectiveWriter教材指出了这类错误以及纠正方法，特摘录如下：

Acomma spliceis anerror that occurs when you join two independent clauses with a comma. Instead,use a coordinating conjunction, period, semicolon, or a semicolon and adverbial conjunction.

·Comma Splice:The last time we saw him was in December, you won’t believe how much he has changed since then.

·Correct:The last time we saw him was in December, but you won’t believe how much he has changed since then.（加并列连词）

·Correct:The last time we saw him was in December. You won’t believe how much he has changed since then.（变成两个简单句）

·Correct:The last timewe saw him was in December; you won’t believe how much he has changed since then. (将逗号改成分号。这是分号的用途之一，用于连接两个关系紧密的简单句。)

·Correct:The last time we saw him was in December; however, you won’t believe how much he has changedsince then. (将逗号改成分号，再加上副词连接词。)

例三：为了完成产量目标，公司将精心组织资源，推动新项目按时投产；加强管理，保持在产油气田的基础产量；加强调整井等增产措施的部署；精心施工，安排好重大计划内关停检修项目。

In order to accomplish this target, the company will carefully coordinate its resources to facilitate the timely commencement of production of new projects; strengthen its management and maintain the basic production at existing oil and gasfields; enhance the deployment of measures such as infill drilling wells to increase production; plan its construction in a meticulous manner and arrange planned shutdown and maintenance at its major projects.

文中中文用分号，英文也跟着用分号，是否合适？University of Ottawa的人文网站，有个栏目叫hypergrammar，在讲到semicolon的用途时，除了上面说到的semicolon用在并列句里面，还提到：

It may be useful to remember that, for the most part, you should use a semicolon only where you could also use a period.

There is one exception to this guideline. When punctuating a list or series of elements in which one or more of the elements contains an internal comma, you should use semicolons instead of commas to separate the elements from one another:

Henry's mother believes three things: that every situation, no matter how grim, will be happily resolved; that no one knows more about human nature than she; and that Henry, who is thirty-five years old, will never be able to do his own laundry.[1]

维基百科在描述semicolon的用途时，也有类似说法，以下是维基百科的例子：

·The people present were Jamie, a man fromNew Zealand;John, the milkman's son; and George, a gaunt kind of man.

·Several fast food restaurants can be found within the following cities: London,England; Paris,France; Dublin,Ireland; Madrid,Spain.

·Here are three examples of familiar sequences: one, two, and three; a, b, and c; first, second, and third.[2]

在描述一系列事项或内容时，里面已包含了逗号，就应该用分号以便区分各事项。例三中尽管有一系列的事项，但是中间没有逗号，因此，不必用到分号。尽管例三的句子比较长长，仍是个简单句，中间用逗号隔开就行了，例如：

The sleek black seals in the pool leaped eagerly out of the shimmering water, slid quickly upon the wooden deck around the pool, and barked noisily at the stunned spectators in the half-empty bleachers.

[1]http://arts.uottawa.ca/writingcentre/en/hypergrammar/punctuation

[2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semicolon

[3]《柯林斯英汉双解大词典》