translations

name	translations
description	Explains LocalExIm LCX and LCXZ translation file formats, compression headers, XML structure, RESX export rules, and language fallback behavior. Use when reading, writing, converting, or validating translation files.

Translation Files

LocalExIm uses two file extensions for translation editor files:

• .lcx: uncompressed XML.
• .lcxz: compressed LCX XML.

Both formats contain the same XML model. The compressed .lcxz format adds a fixed file header and Deflate compression.

LCX

An .lcx file is a plain XML document. It can be opened with XElement.Load(...) and saved with XElement.Save(...).

The root element is:

<Locales xmlns="..."
         version="1"
         created="..."
         modified="..."
         xml:space="preserve">

The file contains:

• Languages: one Language element per localized language, using names such as de, de-ch, en-gb, pl, or zh.
• Entry: one localizable resource entry.
• Default: the neutral language value.
• Translation: one translated value for a language.
• O: original text.
• M: modified text, used when the editor stores a changed value.

Resource IDs are repository-relative resource paths plus the RESX key, for example:

Some.Project.Name/i18n/LocalizedStrings/FooBar

maps to

./Some.Project.Name/i18n/LocalizedStrings.resx

<data name="FooBar">
  <value>...</value>
</data>

LCXZ

An .lcxz file is:

1. A 12-byte ASCII header: MSEALCXZ0010.
2. A .NET DeflateStream payload.
3. The decompressed payload is UTF-8 encoded LCX XML.

This is not a ZIP file and not GZip. It is raw .NET Deflate data after the LocalExIm header.

Reading LCXZ

To read an .lcxz file:

1. Open the file as bytes or a stream.
2. Read and validate the first 12 bytes as ASCII MSEALCXZ0010.
3. Deflate-decompress the remaining stream.
4. Decode the decompressed bytes as UTF-8 text.
5. Parse the text as LCX XML.

using System.IO.Compression;
using System.Text;
using System.Xml.Linq;

static XDocument ReadLcxz(string path)
{
    var expectedHeader = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes("MSEALCXZ0010");

    using var input = File.OpenRead(path);
    var header = new byte[expectedHeader.Length];
    if (input.Read(header, 0, header.Length) != header.Length ||
        !header.SequenceEqual(expectedHeader))
    {
        throw new InvalidDataException("Unsupported LCXZ header.");
    }

    using var deflate = new DeflateStream(input, CompressionMode.Decompress);
    using var reader = new StreamReader(deflate, Encoding.UTF8);
    var xml = reader.ReadToEnd();

    return XDocument.Parse(xml, LoadOptions.PreserveWhitespace);
}

Writing LCXZ

To write an .lcxz file:

1. Build the LCX XML document.
2. Serialize it as XML text.
3. Encode the XML text as UTF-8 bytes.
4. Create the output file.
5. Write the ASCII header MSEALCXZ0010.
6. Write the UTF-8 bytes through a .NET DeflateStream.

using System.IO.Compression;
using System.Text;
using System.Xml.Linq;

static void WriteLcxz(string path, XDocument document)
{
    var header = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes("MSEALCXZ0010");
    var xml = document.ToString(SaveOptions.OmitDuplicateNamespaces);
    var payload = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(xml);

    using var output = File.Create(path);
    output.Write(header, 0, header.Length);

    using var deflate = new DeflateStream(output, CompressionMode.Compress, leaveOpen: true);
    deflate.Write(payload, 0, payload.Length);
}

Reading LCX

To read an uncompressed .lcx file, load it directly as XML:

using System.Xml.Linq;

static XDocument ReadLcx(string path)
{
    return XDocument.Load(path, LoadOptions.PreserveWhitespace);
}

Writing LCX

To write an uncompressed .lcx file, save the XML document directly:

using System.Xml.Linq;

static void WriteLcx(string path, XDocument document)
{
    document.Save(path, SaveOptions.OmitDuplicateNamespaces);
}

RESX Export Notes

• Language names in LCX/LCXZ files are lower-case, for example de-ch, en-gb, and pt-br.
• Language names in RESX files are following the ISO 639-2 and IETF BCP 47 standard, for example de and de-AT.
• Language neutral values come from <ResourceFileName>.resx.
• Localized values come from <ResourceFileName>.<language>.resx
• Regionally localized values come from <ResourceFileName>.<language>-<REGION>.resx
• Localized files can omit entries when they should fall back to the neutral value.
• The neutral language is US english (en/en-US) and used as fallback. Therefore *.en.resx/*.en-US.resx files are omitted.
• The default region for english is en-US and the default region for german is de-DE, therefore those files are omitted.
• When a string is the same in a language file (e.g. *.en.resx, *.de.resx) as in the neutral-language file (*.resx), the value can be omitted from the language file.
• When a string is the same in the regional language (e.g. *.en-GB.resx, *.de-AT.resx, *.de-CH.resx) and the primary language (e.g. *.en.resx, *.de.resx), the regional value can be omitted.