Translate an XLIFF file into Italian

What Italian changes in your XLIFF targets

Italian uses the Latin alphabet, left to right, but it brings accented vowels and frequent elision into interface strings. Three practical consequences for an XLIFF file:

• Length. Italian runs noticeably longer than English and roughly as long as French: Save changes becomes Salva le modifiche, Settings becomes Impostazioni. From an English source, leave room in buttons, tabs and narrow columns.
• Accents and encoding. Italian needs à è é ì ò ù, and the accent changes meaning: è ("is") is not e ("and"), while perché takes an acute accent. The capital form is È, not E'. The returned file keeps its declared encoding, so make sure it is UTF-8 or another encoding that contains these characters.
• Apostrophes. l'utente, dell'account, un'opzione: inside a <target> element the apostrophe is harmless XML. Watch it only if strings are later pasted into code delimited by single quotes.

Plurals, gender and placeholders: the Italian traps

CLDR gives Italian three plural categories: one, many and other. one covers 1, other almost everything else; many applies to exact millions and compact notation, where Italian inserts "di": 1 milione di utenti. If your XLIFF carries ICU expressions such as {count, plural, one {# elemento} other {# elementi}}, the keywords and {count} must stay intact; only the text inside each branch is translated. Some nouns are invariable, so one {# file} other {# file} is correct Italian. Adding a many branch is a decision for your code: put it in the source before uploading if you need it.

Gender is the other trap. In <x id="PH"/> è stato aggiunto, the participle agrees with whatever the placeholder stands for: aggiunto for a file, aggiunta for a cartella (folder). The article in front of a placeholder shifts too: il progetto, lo spazio, l'archivio. Notes in the file are used as context for the translator, so a note such as "PH = folder name" prevents a wrong agreement. Otherwise, a wording with no article or participle (Elemento aggiunto: <x id="PH"/>) is the safe choice.

Register and Italian UI conventions

• Lei or tu. The formal Lei ("Inserisca la password") suits business and administrative software; many consumer apps use tu ("Inserisci la password"). The most visible flaw is a mix of both in one file, so check the register on the free sample before paying.
• Buttons and menus. Short forms are expected: Salva, Annulla, Elimina, Esci.
• Punctuation. No space before : ; ? !. If your source is French, its spacing must not carry over. Both « » and " " quotation marks are in use.
• Capitals. Italian does not capitalise every word of a heading (Impostazioni dell'account), nor days and months (lunedì, gennaio).
• Numbers and dates. Italian writes 1.234,56 and 31/12/2025. Numbers and date formats are not translated: a hard-coded MM/DD/YYYY inside a value stays as it is and belongs in your locale formatting code.

Exactly what Manuce returns, and what it does not do

• XLIFF 1.2 and 2.0: the source is translated into the target and the state attribute is updated.
• Units marked translate="no" are respected; notes are used as context.
• Inline tags (<g>, <x/>, <ph>…) are kept in the same order. An Italian string that would lose them is rejected and flagged.
• Every translated value is checked against the source (placeholders, tags); if a mismatch persists, the source value is kept and the report says so.
• Not translated: keys, empty values, URLs, email addresses, numbers, colours, date formats, identifiers and anything marked non-translatable.
• The returned file is the same file: indentation, order, quotes, comments, line endings, encoding and BOM are preserved; only the values change.

Pricing is based on the words in the values, excluding keys and tags; Italian is charged at the base rate (×1). Manuce does not take glossaries or translation memories: for a product name that must stay unchanged, mark it non-translatable or check the sample and then the translation. Manuce does not produce sworn or certified translations.

Preparing the file and checking the result

1. Make sure the target language attribute says Italian: target-language="it" (or it-IT) in XLIFF 1.2, trgLang="it" in XLIFF 2.0. Since the rest of the file comes back as it was, setting this is up to you.
2. Check the encoding declaration, ideally UTF-8.
3. Add notes wherever a placeholder forces a gender or number.
4. After delivery, read the report: a string left in the source language points to a placeholder or tag mismatch worth looking at.
5. Import the file and test the interface: truncated labels, È at the start of sentences, a consistent register, articles before placeholders.

In practice

1. Set target-language (1.2) or trgLang (2.0) to "it" and check the encoding.
2. Add notes for placeholders that require Italian agreement.
3. Upload the file: the quote is based on the words in the values.
4. Review the free sample (register, accents), then start the translation.
5. Download the file and its report, import it and test the interface.