What is Document Translation?
Document Translation is a cloud-based feature of the Azure Translator service and is part of the Azure Cognitive Service family of REST APIs. The Document Translation API can be used to translate multiple and complex documents across all supported languages and dialects, while preserving original document structure and data format.
This documentation contains the following article types:
- Quickstarts are getting-started instructions to guide you through making requests to the service.
- How-to guides contain instructions for using the feature in more specific or customized ways.
- Reference provide REST API settings, values, keywords, and configuration.
Azure Document Translation key features
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Translate large files | Translate whole documents asynchronously. |
| Translate numerous files | Translate multiple files across all supported languages and dialects while preserving document structure and data format. |
| Preserve source file presentation | Translate files while preserving the original layout and format. |
| Apply custom translation | Translate documents using general and custom translation models. |
| Apply custom glossaries | Translate documents using custom glossaries. |
| Automatically detect document language | Let the Document Translation service determine the language of the document. |
| Translate documents with content in multiple languages | Use the autodetect feature to translate documents with content in multiple languages into your target language. |
Document Translation development options
You can add Document Translation to your applications using the REST API or a client-library SDK:
- The REST API. is a language agnostic interface that enables you to create HTTP requests and authorization headers to translate documents.
- The client-library SDKs are language-specific classes, objects, methods, and code that you can quickly use by adding a reference in your project. Currently Document Translation has programming language support for C#/.NET and Python.
Supported document formats
The following document file types are supported by Document Translation:
| File type | File extension | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Adobe PDF | Portable document file format. | |
| Comma-Separated Values | csv | A comma-delimited raw-data file used by spreadsheet programs. |
| HTML | html, htm | Hyper Text Markup Language. |
| Localization Interchange File Format | xlf. , xliff | A parallel document format, export of Translation Memory systems. The languages used are defined inside the file. |
| Markdown | markdown, mdown, mkdn, md, mkd, mdwn, mdtxt, mdtext, rmd | A lightweight markup language for creating formatted text. |
| MHTML | mthml, mht | A web page archive format used to combine HTML code and its companion resources. |
| Microsoft Excel | xls, xlsx | A spreadsheet file for data analysis and documentation. |
| Microsoft Outlook | msg | An email message created or saved within Microsoft Outlook. |
| Microsoft PowerPoint | ppt, pptx | A presentation file used to display content in a slideshow format. |
| Microsoft Word | doc, docx | A text document file. |
| OpenDocument Text | odt | An open-source text document file. |
| OpenDocument Presentation | odp | An open-source presentation file. |
| OpenDocument Spreadsheet | ods | An open-source spreadsheet file. |
| Rich Text Format | rtf | A text document containing formatting. |
| Tab Separated Values/TAB | tsv/tab | A tab-delimited raw-data file used by spreadsheet programs. |
| Text | txt | An unformatted text document. |
Legacy file types
Source file types will be preserved during the document translation with the following exceptions:
| Source file extension | Translated file extension |
|---|---|
| .doc, .odt, .rtf, | .docx |
| .xls, .ods | .xlsx |
| .ppt, .odp | .pptx |
Supported glossary formats
The following glossary file types are supported by Document Translation:
| File type | File extension | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Comma-Separated Values | csv | A comma-delimited raw-data file used by spreadsheet programs. |
| Localization Interchange File Format | xlf , xliff | A parallel document format, export of Translation Memory systems The languages used are defined inside the file. |
| Tab-Separated Values/TAB | tsv, tab | A tab-delimited raw-data file used by spreadsheet programs. |
