This is the guide about Simple Delimited Text in SDL Studio Trados 2019, that help you to use SDL Studio Trados 2019 easier.

Simple Delimited Text file types have the following extensions: *.txt and *.csv.

Configuring Simple Delimited Text file types

Specify how SDL Trados Studio extracts and displays text from files processed with the Comma Delimited Text file type, Tab Delimited Text file type, or any new Simple Delimited Text file type that you create.

About this task

SDL Trados Studio uses Simple Delimited Text file types to process files in which the text is divided into columns separated by special characters. Each line contains source text in one column and the corresponding translation in another column. Other examples of such files are *.csv files processed with the Comma Delimited Text file type or *.txt files processed with the Tab Delimited Text file type.

Note: SDL Trados Studio only applies simple delimited file types to files where at least 40% of the lines contain the delimiter character that you specify on the Format page.

Procedure

1. Decide for which projects you want to configure file type settings:
   • For the active project, go to the Projects view, and on the Home tab, select Project Settings.
   • For all future projects, go to File > Options.
2. Select File Types.
3. Select New.
4. In the Select Type dialog, select Simple Delimited Text, and then select OK.
5. In the Create File Type dialog, provide file type information details, and then select Finish.
6. Expand the File Types tree, and then select the Simple Delimited Text file type.
7. Select the Format page, and configure the available options:

a. Under Delimiter:

• • • Select Tab or Comma, to specify the columns which are separated by a comma or a tab in your file. Make sure that at least 40% of the lines in the file use a tab or a comma as a column delimiter.
    • Select Other, to specify which custom character is used to separate the columns in your file. Make sure that the custom delimiter character you choose does not exist in the source or target columns, and that at least 40% of the lines in the file use the custom delimiter.
    • Under Source Column and Translation Column specify the number of columns which contain source and target text respectively. If you give the same number of source and target columns, the source text is overwritten.
    • Select Extract comments as structure information to convert any comments into document structure information.
    • If you selected Extract comments as structure information, in the Comment column, specify which column contains comments that SDL Trados Studio should extract as structure information.
    • If you selected Extract comments as structure information, select Exclude line without comments so that SDL Trados Studio extracts for translation only those lines of text for which a comment is available in the column that you specified under Column.

b. Under Exclude:

• • • Select the Lines without delimiter checkbox, to exclude from translation only those lines of text which contain the delimiter character specified under the Delimiter section.
    • Select the First line is column headings checkbox, to exclude from translation the first line of text in the file.

c. Under Existing translations:

• • • Select the Make existing translations confirmed checkbox, to have each extracted source and target segment set to Confirmed.
    • Select the Lock existing translations checkbox, to have each extracted source and target segment locked. Locked segments cannot be translated in the Editor view.

d. Under Process, select the Files not matching formatting requirement, so that SDL Trados Studio processes files with many empty lines or with lines which contain only a delimiter.

8. Select the QuickInsert page.

9. Specify QuickInsert settings to insert tags and formatting, or to insert text and special characters.

10. Select OK.

Simple delimited test settings

This topic presents the list of options you can customize in the settings of the Simple Delimited Text file type.

Delimiter

Exclude

Existing translation

Process

Example: Structuring a Simple Delimited Text file

Specify a structure applicable to a file which contains two columns separated by custom delimiting characters. This ensures that SDL Trados Studio processes the first column as the source text and the second column as the translated text.

Procedure

1. Create a *.txt file and enter text in two columns separated by ### as delimiting characters.
2. Open the text file in SDL Trados Studio and go to Project Settings > File Types to change the processing settings for the current project only.
3. On the File Types page, select New… and create a new Simple Delimited Text file type.
4. Give a relevant name and identifier to the new file type, for example ### Delimited Text.
5. On the File Types tree, expand the new ### Delimited Text file type and select the Format page.
6. In the Delimiter section, select Other and enter ### as delimiter characters.
7. Set the column selection settings to source column 1 and the target column 2.
8. Select OK to close the Options/Project Settings dialog and save your settings.
9. Open the file in the Editor view to display the source text in the source language pane and the translation in the target language pane.

Note: SDL Trados Studio saves the file with each line containing the source and corresponding translation separated by ###.