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File types

If you are just getting started and you are translating files that SDL Trados Studio supports, you can rely on the defaults. If you want to translate files of an unsupported file type, to improve translation leverage or to optimize translation for the files you have, customize the file type settings.

File type (sometimes called filetype) is a term used to highlight the difference between the types of data held in different files. Examples of file types are program executable files, Microsoft Word files and MP3 files. SDL Trados Studio supports a number of file types. For these, supported, files, SDL Trados Studio can extract the translatable text from the file so that you can translate it. Conversely, if you try to open a file of an unsupported type, SDL Trados Studio displays an error message.

Important settings specified by the file type options

  • How SDL Trados Studio identifies the type of the presented file, for example, what file name extensions are used for files of that type.
  • How SDL Trados Studio identifies which part of the file contents should be translated and what content should not be translated. For example, the options specify what content in the file is structural information and so is not translated.
  • How SDL Trados Studio extracts and displays embedded content from XML, XHTML, Java and Excel files.