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Announcing Multilingual App Toolkit v3.0

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The Multilingual App Toolkit v3.0 was release on April 2nd at the //build 2014 event. This was an exciting release as we were able to coordinate with the //build 2014 and present at the build event! This release expands the scope of the Multilingual App Toolkit as well as implements additional feedback received from the Multilingual App Toolkit user voice site.

The team was able to add support for desktop apps as requested by the community. As a result WPF, WinForm and ASP.NET MVC projects are now supported using the same workflow as that of Store and Phone apps.

Support for the new Universal Apps in Visual Studio 2013 Update 2 RC required some key implementation decisions. One key decision was how enablement should function. After some debate, we decided to enable MAT based on the specific project instead of the shared project. The key reason for this approach was to enable form factor specific translation management.

Another key area of focus was around overall performance improvements. While we still have more work in this area, we believe the current improvements will make a significant difference in your build times. We understand that overall build performance is very important and will continue to work to make it even better.

A subtle, but important improvement was made to the Microsoft Translator provider. As you may know, the Microsoft Translator HUB empowers businesses and communities to build, improve, and deploy customized automatic language translation systems. MAT v3.0 has added support for the HUB. By default it is set to the “tech” category, but can be switched to any category that you may already be using. Simply edit the Microsoft Translator configuration file and change the <category> element to specify your desired category.

The file is located here: %ProgramData%\Multilingual App Toolkit\MicrosoftTranslatorProvider\TranslatorSettings.xml.

…
<ID>B7F979A8-D491-451C-84E8-F0C49BE620E3</ID>
<Category>Tech</Category>
<Languages>
…

The MAT team believes these product and community driven improvements will help your efforts to create the best global apps around!  As always, feel free to comment below and make use of the user voice site to request or vote for your favorite MAT feature.

Summary of key changes in MAT v3.0:

  1. Support for Windows Desktop apps (WPF, WinForms and ASP.NET MVC)
  2. Store Universal App support
  3. Build performance improvements
  4. Added MT HUB support for the Microsoft Translator provider.
  5. Added editor support for alt+xxxx combinations
  6. General bug fixes throughout the product

Thank you,

The Multilingual App Toolkit team
multilingual@microsoft.com

Comments

  • Anonymous
    April 14, 2014
    Hi, According to the list above, ASP.NET MVC projects are now supported. Where can I find an example of Multilingual App Toolkit v3.0 usage with an ASP.NET MVC5 Project in VS 2013 Web Developer Express? Thanks, Martin

  • Anonymous
    April 14, 2014
    Martin, We don't have any published examples at this time.  It works the same as a Windows Phone Silverlight project by managing the RESX files.  See the phone video as the workflow is the same and overall process is the same.  http://aka.ms/matphone Unfortunately support for VS 2013 Web Developer Express did not get enabled before our release date.  This is planned for a future release.

  • Anonymous
    June 02, 2014
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    June 05, 2014
    Can we get a follow up article about the Toolkit ant UAs? The UAs use resw rather than the resx files that the toolkit uses. The resw files do not appear to be populated, In WP7 selecting a language for a list was all that is needed, in UAs thought the xlf files are created, you need to create the folder and the resw files. A good walkthrough of what has changed would be useful

  • Anonymous
    June 05, 2014
    Sure.  I'll try to write out in the next day or so.  Until them, this might help with how it currently works Universal apps are supported, but at the specific project level and not at the share project level. Enabling the toolkit on the Windows Store and Windows Phone project will populate the related XLF files during the build step with the resources from the shared project resource files (resw or resjson). If you have the XLF files professionally translated, select only one project to send for translation. Then simply import the received translated XLF files into both projects to have your professional translations applied to both projects.

  • Anonymous
    September 30, 2014
    Cameron i don't quite see how this translates to "Universal Apps Support" when the thing that makes them Universal i.e Shared Project is not supported

  • Anonymous
    October 21, 2014
    Good to see it working with universal apps, however I hope you are working on the solution that won't require constant re-importing of .xlf files among projects.

  • Anonymous
    December 02, 2014
    Hi Cameron, I couldn't locate TranslatorSettings.xml. The path where MAT was installed on local machine is: C:Program Files (x86)Multilingual App Toolkit. I am using  Microsoft Translator’s Hub to create customized translation system for some minority languages. It is going great and this tool is a wonder addition to visual studio that I have been looking for. Please help.

  • Anonymous
    December 02, 2014
    @ FahmiHusseinOmar, The file is located at %ProgramData%Multilingual App ToolkitMicrosoftTranslatorProviderTranslatorSettings.xml.  On most systems this expands to C:ProgramDataMultilingual App ToolkitMicrosoftTranslatorProviderTranslatorSettings.xml. Thanks, Cameron

  • Anonymous
    December 02, 2014
    Cameron, Thank you very so much. I re-installed the toolkit with "Complete" option and found the file exactly at the path you specified in your article and your reply at  C:ProgramDataMultilingual App ToolkitMicrosoftTranslatorProviderTranslatorSettings.xml. You made my day. Thanks.

  • Anonymous
    December 03, 2014
    Hi, I like using this toolkit for apps and I read it should work with WPF now but I still can't find any information on how this works. I added a Resource.resx file to my project and clicked on "Enable Multi..." but nothing happens. Am I missing something?

  • Anonymous
    December 03, 2014
    @Patrick, The most common problem with enabling WPF apps is the neutral language is not set since the default template uses 'None'.  MAT will display a message in the output panel (which is often not visible by default) when this happens.  To set (or check) your neutral language setting, open the project's property page, then click the Assembly Information button.  In the displayed dialog, set the Neutral language to match your apps source language. Thanks, Cameron

  • Anonymous
    December 03, 2014
    Thanks. All you said was true. It is working now.