Swiss cheese

French translation: découpez la en portions

13:46 Mar 28, 2017
English to French translations [PRO]
Social Sciences - Linguistics / gestion du temps
English term or phrase: Swiss cheese
Planning is one of the best ways to overcoming procrastination.
If you have a hard or 'undesirable' task, put a little more planning around it.
Can you get other people to help?
Or, you may just need to break it up into smaller, manageable chunks.
Try doing short 'dashes' (promise yourself to spend 15 minutes on it each day) or 'Swiss cheese' it (promise you'll do 1 section each day).
Claire Mendes Real
French translation:découpez la en portions
Explanation:
Suggestion
Selected response from:

Alain Boulé
Local time: 05:49
Grading comment
Merci
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer



Summary of answers provided
3 +3découpez la en portions
Alain Boulé
4 +1découpez là en tranches
HERBET Abel
4 +1divisez-la en plusieurs tranches/étapes
Elisabeth Mol
3 +1saucissonnez-le
polyglot45
3découper-le en camembert
Tony M
3 -1découpez-le en (petits) dés
Hélène OShea
3 -1fractionnez la tâche en fines lamelles comme un gruyère
Marie-Pascale Wersinger


  

Answers


1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5 peer agreement (net): +3
swiss cheese
découpez la en portions


Explanation:
Suggestion

Alain Boulé
Local time: 05:49
Native speaker of: French
PRO pts in category: 4
Grading comment
Merci

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  katsy: j'allais proposer découper en "portions de camembert"; trop proche de votre suggestion pour faire une réponse à part. Mais au moins on peut visualiser une portion de camembert et ça garde l'image fromagère!
1 hr
  -> Merci

agree  Tony M: Yes, sorry, hadn't read your answer before I posted mine :-)
6 hrs
  -> Merci

agree  Annie Rigler
23 hrs
  -> Merci
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1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5 peer agreement (net): -1
swiss cheese
découpez-le en (petits) dés


Explanation:
je pense que le gruyère est souvent servi en dés dans les cocktails avec un cure-dents, peut-être s'agit-il de cette image.


Hélène OShea
Ireland
Native speaker of: Native in FrenchFrench

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
disagree  Tony M: Not the EN image at all, and doesn't really convey the right idea either. No, wedges (see my answer) Yes, Vache Qui Rit — see image link in my answer. In GB, it's cubes of Cheddar we put on sticks for cocktails ;-)
5 hrs
  -> Ok see what you mean, portions like in the Trivial Pursuit game kind of shape? Anglophones wouldn't be mad about camembert though:) Cheddar on sticks! Shocking :)
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1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +1
swiss cheese
découpez là en tranches


Explanation:
suggéré

HERBET Abel
Local time: 05:49
Native speaker of: French

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
neutral  Tony M: Not really the right image.
6 hrs
  -> C'est la pelle à fromage et pas le couteau:https://fr.amara.com/produits/coupe-fromage-alfredo-acier-in...

agree  marewa
13 hrs
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1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5 peer agreement (net): +1
swiss cheese
saucissonnez-le


Explanation:
j'ai trouvé des références à un "modèle du fromage suisse" mais tout cela est très technique

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Note added at 1 hr (2017-03-28 15:46:44 GMT)
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je l'ai souvent entendu en international - projets saucissonnés etc. - et cela ne date pas d'hier !

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Note added at 21 hrs (2017-03-29 10:53:04 GMT)
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To Tony et al, I never said it was the Swiss cheese model but there is a slight parallel. If they had meant "camembert" they would have said it, since camembert is a French cheese.

Camembert is used in French to mean a piechart in English. Now whose lines are crossed !

polyglot45
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish, Native in FrenchFrench

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
neutral  Françoise Vogel: oui mais cela évoque beaucoup plus l'idée de ligoter // c'est intéressant, wiki (modif 20.3.2017) ne prend en compte que cette acception; http://www.cnrtl.fr/lexicographie/saucissonner - que j'avais vérifié - correspond plus au(x) sens que je connais.
15 mins
  -> https://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/saucissonner

agree  Schtroumpf: C'est à quoi j'aurais pensé en premier aussi !
3 hrs

neutral  Tony M: This misses out the idea of something divided into a pre-determined number of 'segments' in the original image. / Of course they could — but it still wouldn't be a translation of the source text.
6 hrs
  -> but it is what a French speaker could easily say// heavens Tony, I never thought I'd have to tell you the difference between translating words & translating ideas - "Swiss cheese" doesn't mean pre-set segments per se - that bit is explained in brackets
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1 day 2 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +1
swiss cheese
divisez-la en plusieurs tranches/étapes


Explanation:
Après recherches, il semblerait que l'expression se réfère bien à la méthode de gestion du temps "Swiss cheese" mais elle serait surtout utilisée dans le monde anglophone. Il n'y a donc pas vraiment de traduction officielle en français pour ce terme. Selon moi, il faudrait donc oublier la métaphore que je ne trouve d'ailleurs pas très parlante (que ce soit en anglais ou en français) et revenir au sens.


    Reference: http://blog.gailgauthier.com/2012/03/time-management-tuesday...
Elisabeth Mol
Belgium
Local time: 05:49
Works in field
Native speaker of: Native in FrenchFrench

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Tony M: Yes, though it IS quite a good image in EN, the key point is having the pre-cut portions of cheese set out neatly before you, and being able to tackle them individually; it's the visual thing, cf. pie-chart > camembert.
1 hr
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7 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5
swiss cheese
découper-le en camembert


Explanation:
The use of this expression in EN is curious to say the least, as when we talk about Swiss cheese, what we normally think about is the fact it has holes in it — not at all a helpful image for this kind of context!

However, it's pretty clear what they mean (as explained next) — they are talking about cheese spread in portions à la Vache Qui Rit; back in the (very!) olden days of my youth, this used sometimes to be called Swiss cheese (goodness knows why, though perhaps it was made using processed gruyère?), though the UK brand I remember most clearly was Dairylea.

So they mean breaking the job down into 'segments' like those cheese spread portions — but I think 'camembert' conveys the idea much better in FR!


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Note added at 7 heures (2017-03-28 21:10:29 GMT)
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And here you have it!

Swiss cheese, American-style:

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/92/a7/91/92a791c38...

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Note added at 7 heures (2017-03-28 21:25:51 GMT)
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Isn't it fascinating how the FR native-speakers and the anglophones have quite different images of what 'Swiss cheese' is all about? :-)

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Note added at 20 heures (2017-03-29 10:30:54 GMT)
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There is nothing in the context provided to suggest this is referring to the well-known "Swiss cheese model" that is used in fields like risk / accident analysis.

The source text clearly explains this is about breaking a job down into smaller, more manageable chunks, which can help with time management and target-setting.

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Note added at 1 jour4 heures (2017-03-29 18:11:15 GMT)
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It's important to visualize this with American eyes, where 'Swiss cheese' will just as well conjure up triangular portions of ghastly processed cheese spread — an unappetizing image which will however be immediately understood by anyone in the field, of breaking soemthing down into more manageable, but logical parts, so it can be approcahed in a systematic but less frightening way; this is a quite different image from cutting bits of the end of something without necessarily knowing how long it is, how many slices it will make, or even, whether or not you cans atrt with one of the slices from the middle.
The visual metaphor with a pie-chart is obvious, which is why I think the 'camembert' image is sufficiently parlant even in FR — even better, of course, if one imagines those little sanitized individually-wrapped portions of Camembert that are now available:

http://www.panierduclos.fr/PartageWeb/Photos_produits/12500....

Tony M
France
Local time: 05:49
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in category: 21

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
neutral  polyglot45: if you look up the "swiss cheese model" you will see that it is all about the "holes" in the cheese. I don't know where you buy your camembert
11 hrs
  -> Ah, but THAT's the red herring! THIS is NOT about the "Swiss cheese model" (note: no model), it's all about breaking it down into more manageable chunks. The thing about cheese segments is that you see how many there are, but can tackle them individually.
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1 day 21 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5 peer agreement (net): -1
swiss cheese
fractionnez la tâche en fines lamelles comme un gruyère


Explanation:
A possibility

Marie-Pascale Wersinger
Local time: 05:49
Works in field
Native speaker of: Native in FrenchFrench, Native in EnglishEnglish

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
disagree  Tony M: It isn't anything about fine slices, and I think this would be misleading.
1 hr
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