ProZ.com Translation Forums

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | Why port

kd42 — Sun, 14 Jun 2026 10:52:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: kd42
Post title: Why port

[quote]CafeTran Trainer wrote:[quote]Samuel Murray wrote:[quote]kd42 wrote:[quote]CafeTran Trainer wrote:
There's also a Python 3 port of the original LF Aligner written in Perl...[/quote]This sounds like extra-terrestrial gibberish for 99.99999% of translators, which it is. [/quote]Nothing beats the original version of PlusTools, written in pure JavaScript 1.0. [/quote]But this 4.16e was written in VBA. Would be nice if Yves would donate it to the open domain, so that we can port it to LibreOffice. Perhaps I should ask him to do so? [/quote]
All you need to do is replicate the general philosophy and the keyboard shortcuts. I don't think you need a permission for that. It's a bicycle.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | VBA

CafeTran Trainer — Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:26:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: CafeTran Trainer
Post title: VBA

[quote]Samuel Murray wrote:

[quote]kd42 wrote:
[quote]CafeTran Trainer wrote:
There's also a Python 3 port of the original LF Aligner written in Perl...[/quote]
This sounds like extra-terrestrial gibberish for 99.99999% of translators, which it is. [/quote]
Nothing beats the original version of PlusTools, written in pure JavaScript 1.0. [/quote]

But this 4.16e was written in VBA. Would be nice if Yves would donate it to the open domain, so that we can port it to LibreOffice. Perhaps I should ask him to do so?

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | JavaScript rulez!

Samuel Murray — Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:24:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: JavaScript rulez!

[quote]kd42 wrote:
[quote]CafeTran Trainer wrote:
There's also a Python 3 port of the original LF Aligner written in Perl...[/quote]
This sounds like extra-terrestrial gibberish for 99.99999% of translators, which it is. [/quote]
Nothing beats the original version of PlusTools, written in pure JavaScript 1.0.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | Ha. Ha.

kd42 — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 19:37:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: kd42
Post title: Ha. Ha.

[quote]CafeTran Trainer wrote:
There's also a Python 3 port of the original LF Aligner written in Perl:[/quote]

This sounds like extra-terrestrial gibberish for 99.99999% of translators, which it is.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | Python 3 port of LF Aligner

CafeTran Trainer — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 14:42:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: CafeTran Trainer
Post title: Python 3 port of LF Aligner

[quote]Samuel Murray wrote:

An aligner that many people swear by is LF Aligner:
[url removed]

However, it creates TMX files, and since it doesn't parse Word files like WFP does, the TM won't contain any tags. [/quote]

There's also a Python 3 port of the original LF Aligner written in Perl:

[url removed]

Creator: [url removed]

[Edited at 2026-06-12 04:18 GMT]

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | Heavy-duty mode

Samuel Murray — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: Heavy-duty mode

[quote]kd42 wrote:
...use the 2-document mode and use only the keyboard, after you get accustomed to the process you will see how fast you work, and with less fatigue and fewer errors. [/quote]
Some people swear by it (-: One upside of the heavy-duty mode (a.k.a. 2-document mode) is that it's much easier to move segments around in files where the source and target paragraphs are not originally in the same order.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | The best aligner is PlusTools 4.16e

kd42 — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 08:42:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: kd42
Post title: The best aligner is PlusTools 4.16e

Try +Tools, use the 2-document mode and use only the keyboard, after you get accustomed to the process you will see how fast you work, and with less fatigue and fewer errors.

Tip: In order to see the whole sentences, remove the "hidden" format from the text and set "wrap text" in Word settings.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | OmegaT aligner

Samuel Murray — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 08:41:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: OmegaT aligner

And since I've mentioned the OmegaT aligner in my previous post, allow me to link to a forum post about it from 2016:
[url removed]
I personally find it cumbersome to use, but it has some nice features. It generates a TMX file. It can handle any format that OmegaT can handle, including e.g. DOCX, and you can choose to have OmegaT tags in the TM or not. OmegaT puts tags in similar places as other CAT tools.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | The old PlusTools aligner

Samuel Murray — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 08:37:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: The old PlusTools aligner

For the benefit of people who have never used the old PlusTools aligner, here's how it works. It can only one pair of files at a time, and it can only create Wordfast TMs (which is a tab-delimited file).

1. Open the two files in Word. It can be in any format that Word supports.
2. Launch PlusTools, and go to the Align tab.
3. If your documents are already segmented, i.e. one segment per line, check the box that says "These documents have been segmented by Wordfast". If you don't check that box, PlusTools will attempt to segment your files into sentences. If you check that box, PlusTools will assume each line of text is one segment, and will align them without further attempts at segmentation.
4. Then select either "Classic" alignment or "Heavy-duty" alignment. Heavy-duty alignment is for extremely large documents (i.e. hundreds of pages long), and is quite cumbersome to use. In fact, I think the heavy-duty option was only retained for people who had very slow computers. Classic alignment is for small to medium sized documents and for reasonably fast computers (i.e. anything less than 15 years old). Classic alignment uses a single table in Word.
5. Press "Start alignment".

PlusTools then creates a new Word file that contains a two-column table, with source text and target text, segmented. PlusTools also enables a set of shortcuts in Word that you can use to fix any misalignments. The shortcuts are:

Alt+S = split segment at the cursor position and move that column's cells down by one
Alt+D = delete cell at the cursor position and move that column's cells up by one
Alt+M = merge cell at cursor position with the cell below it, and move that column's cells up by one
Alt+I = insert a cell at the cursor position and move that column's cells down by one

You can also manually edit the table, like any table in Word (including adding or removing rows or cells). This is what makes the aligner in PlusTools so powerful: you edit an actual table in actual Word.

The one downside of the old PlusTools aligner is that deleting, splitting or merging affects all cells further down. But you can split the table, align just the table that you're in, and then merge that table with the larger table again, as you would split and merge tables in Word anyway. You can save the file with the table and then continue the next day.

Since this is a table in Word, you can use e.g. highlights and font colours to make certain things more visible, you can run a spell-check, you can edit the text e.g. using find/replace or just by editing directly, etc. You have more control over how the text is segmented because you can split and merge segments on the fly. I usually highlight all numbers in yellow and all unusual punctuation marks in pink. This allows me to see at a glance when a misalignment occurred. (I'm happy that I was able to convince the OmegaT developers to include this highlighting feature in their aligner as well.)

There is a bug in the keyboard shortcuts whereby you can't enable the keyboard shortcuts without having done an alignment first. So, if you have a table in an existing Word file that you wish to refine the alignment in further, you have to start with two dummy files first, then press the "Start alignment" button, then close that file without exiting Word, and then open the file with your existing table in it. The shortcuts will then work.

6. When you're happy with your table and you want to create a TM, run PlusTools again (with the file still open) and press "Create TM". It will ask for the source and target languages codes, and then create the Wordfast TM as a new Word document, which you can save. The user ID of aligned files is always "+A!", but as with any Wordfast TM, you can easily edit that to something else.

Only rows that have text in both the source and target column will end up in the TM. If you have rows where the source or target cell is blank, those rows will not be added to the TM. If you have rows where both source and target cells are blank, they won't be added to the TM either.

If you have a Word file with a two column table in it, you can convert that file directly into a Wordfast TM by launching PlusTools and pressing "Create TM", without having done an alignment first.

[Edited at 2026-06-11 08:57 GMT]

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | New PlusTools

Samuel Murray — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 08:06:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: New PlusTools

[quote]Epameinondas Soufleros wrote:
If you have fond memories of PlusTools, there is a brand new product under the same name, in the final beta stages... [/quote]
This product is not in its final beta stages. It's alpha, at the most. E.g. when I tried to align two files, and I forgot to specify a user ID for the TM, it gave me an error message to that effect, but then it closed the aligner, so I had to start the alignment process from scratch. Plus, when I tried it, it created a TXT file with just a header -- no segments.

The "aligner" in the new PlusTools is nothing like the aligner in old PlusTools. To use the new aligner, you have to click on the word "align" on the splash screen. You then paste the source and target text into two boxes, specify a user ID and file name, and then it creates the TM. There is no option to preview the alignment before it creates the TM, and there is no functionality to fix misalignments inside the tool, like the old PlusTools does.

I have tried many aligners, but I always return to the aligner in the old PlusTools. You can download it [url= [url removed] ]here[/url] (get version 4.16e, because version 4.18 is buggy).

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | New PlusTools

Epameinondas Soufleros — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 15:17:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Epameinondas Soufleros
Post title: New PlusTools

Is you have fond memories of PlusTools, there is a brand new product under the same name, in the final beta stages, which can do alignment.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | Thank you so much! LF Aligner is the way to go.

Charlotte Allen — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 14:00:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Charlotte Allen
Post title: Thank you so much! LF Aligner is the way to go.

[quote]Samuel Murray wrote:

An aligner that many people swear by is LF Aligner:
[url removed]

However, it creates TMX files, and since it doesn't parse Word files like WFP does, the TM won't contain any tags. [/quote]

Thank you for your clear answer! I've downloaded LF Aligner and aligned three previous translations - it's really very good at segmenting the source and target files in a useful manner. There was also a little bit of nostalgia experienced, as I had to do a 'find and replace' to convert the usual gobbledygook characters into apostrophes - reminiscent of my old Notepad experiences. I was then able to import these 'clean' TMX files into Wordfast and merge them into my TM. Everything worked pretty seamlessly! So much time and frustration saved - I'm really extremely grateful.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | LF Aligner

Samuel Murray — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 12:19:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: LF Aligner

An aligner that many people swear by is LF Aligner:
[url removed]

However, it creates TMX files, and since it doesn't parse Word files like WFP does, the TM won't contain any tags.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist? | No, it doesn't.

Samuel Murray — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 12:15:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: No, it doesn't.

First, there is the online aligner, which is a "dumb" non-interactive aligner:
[url removed]

Second, at some point WFP3 came with a standalone aligner, but it only worked if you had a WFP licence. I'm not sure if the current download includes it. Your WFP11 licence also includes a licence for WFP3, but you have to download and install WFP3 and then find the file "Wordfast_Aligner.exe" somewhere on your computer (there is no link to it from within WFP as far as I can tell). Installing WFP3 will not affect your WFP11. I'm not sure if the TM formats are compatible.

Anyway, the aligner included in WFP3 is an unfinished project. It was designed to look like the Trados aligner, but it lacks any of the features that made the PlusTools aligner great. It doesn't have any keyboard shortcuts, for example (you have to use the menu at the top for every action). I'm not even sure if you can move segments around except for moving all segments up or down. To use it, you have to create a "source" folder and a "target" folder and put your files in those folders. It accepts Word files but it doesn't accept TXT files.

So, no. There is no Wordfast Aligner.

Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?

Charlotte Allen — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 11:38:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Aligner - does it actually exist?
Poster: Charlotte Allen

I'm just getting back into legal translation after a break. As I'm mostly doing pro bono work right now, I'm keen to keep costs down if I can, although I've invested in Wordfast Pro (having previously used Classic), a subscription to DeepL which I'll use on a month by month basis as needed, and membership of ProZ (of course!)

I'm *slowly* getting my head around Wordfast Pro, but what I miss most is the ability to align my source and target files to create a 'clean' and accurate TM - multiple changes to my translated files have been made outside of the Wordfast environment by me, the proofreaders, and the final checker, therefore the TM created within Wordfast Pro is not the final, polished product.

AI assures me that Wordfast Aligner is available both online as a standalone and within Wordfast Pro, but I can't find a working version in either place!

I'd be happy to use an alternative aligner tool if one exists, as long as the TM will 'play nicely' with Wordfast at the end of the process. I can't believe I'm actually yearning for the days when I would be aligning documents with PlusTools within Word for Windows, manually correcting misalignments, then opening the TM within Notepad to make massive batch replacements of faulty characters, before reimporting the whole thing into my enormous BTM!

Wordfast 11 | I get an error message, when I try to update it

Massimo Gilardenghi — Sun, 31 May 2026 17:21:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast 11
Poster: Massimo Gilardenghi
Post title: I get an error message, when I try to update it

I have now tried a few times, but I'm getting an error message, so I cannot update it to 11.2.0. Something similar happened to me last year, but I was able to uninstall it and then install the newest version. Now, I cannot do that because the newest version is not (yet) available on the website.

[quote]WolfgangS wrote:

[quote]Epameinondas Soufleros wrote:

Where is it? The site still offers a download for 10.5, and the documentation for the GlobalLink variant of Wordfast Pro 11.1.

[Edited at 2026-05-06 12:51 GMT] [/quote]

You choose update and you can download WFP11 [/quote]

Wordfast 11 | Cross-platform compatibility issues are a concern for many

Rodolfo Abachi — Tue, 12 May 2026 13:39:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast 11
Poster: Rodolfo Abachi
Post title: Cross-platform compatibility issues are a concern for many

The Linux/macOS compatibility issues Epameinondas mentions are concerning for users who rely on non-Windows systems. While I primarily use Windows myself, the growing trend of CAT tools gradually dropping Linux and macOS support (or delivering a degraded experience) is something the community should push back on.

Regarding the WFP11 update itself: the DeepL integration fix is a welcome improvement. Has anyone noticed any changes in the TM matching engine or significant new features beyond the module upgrades mentioned in the GlobalLink release notes? Would be useful to have a proper changelog directly from the Wordfast team.

Wordfast 11 | I guess

WolfgangS — Thu, 07 May 2026 14:17:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast 11
Poster: WolfgangS
Post title: I guess

[quote]Epameinondas Soufleros wrote:

I opened a terminal and ran sudo ./Wordfast to see if it would make a difference.

Instead of a splash screen that closes immediately, I got a splash screen with the progress bar below, which gets stuck at "Loading window content". The console output is this:

[/quote]

You better ask Support

Wordfast 11 | You are right

WolfgangS — Wed, 06 May 2026 15:50:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast 11
Poster: WolfgangS
Post title: You are right

[quote]Epameinondas Soufleros wrote:

[quote]WolfgangS wrote:

You choose update and you can download WFP11 [/quote]

Wordfast Pro 10.5 doesn't launch on Kubuntu 25.10, so this is not an option for me on Linux, but I will try it on macOS.

Update: The first thing it showed after installation was a warning that this version of WFPro will not run on the next version of macOS. So, I soon I won't be able to launch WFPro on either Linux or macOS. This will essentially make it a single-platform app.

[Edited at 2026-05-06 13:02 GMT] [/quote]

But I have WFP on the Windows side of my Mac, too, so hopefully I can still use it, albeit on a platform I do not like too much.

Wordfast 11 | Thanks!

Nihan Pekmen — Wed, 06 May 2026 12:55:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast 11
Poster: Nihan Pekmen
Post title: Thanks!

I just updated it, and everything works fine.

Wordfast 11 | Just open WFP10

WolfgangS — Wed, 06 May 2026 12:52:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast 11
Poster: WolfgangS
Post title: Just open WFP10

[quote]Epameinondas Soufleros wrote:

Where is it? The site still offers a download for 10.5, and the documentation for the GlobalLink variant of Wordfast Pro 11.1.

[Edited at 2026-05-06 12:51 GMT] [/quote]

You choose update and you can download WFP11

Wordfast 11

WolfgangS — Wed, 06 May 2026 12:15:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast 11
Poster: WolfgangS

WFP11 has been released, no release notes so far.
DeepL now works alright, couldn't find any other noticeable changes so far.

Is Wordfast Pro still in active development? | Thanks

WolfgangS — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 16:02:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Is Wordfast Pro still in active development?
Poster: WolfgangS
Post title: Thanks

[quote]Epameinondas Soufleros wrote:

There is a webinar in two days, entitled "Wordfast tools for LSPs and corporations".

Perhaps they will have delivered the update by then. In any case, you can join and ask them directly. [/quote]

as always for your tips.

[Edited at 2026-04-27 16:30 GMT]

Is Wordfast Pro still in active development? | Wordfast Anywhere?

Epameinondas Soufleros — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 16:01:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Is Wordfast Pro still in active development?
Poster: Epameinondas Soufleros
Post title: Wordfast Anywhere?

Don't you have free access to WFA as a WF Pro user? They say DeepL works fine there. Just remember to mark non-confirmed segments as provisional, to make interoperability better.

Or you could make a roundtrip: Feed your document to WFA, pre-translate with DeepL enabled, then download the pre-translated and work interactively in WF Pro.

[Edited at 2026-04-27 16:02 GMT]

Is Wordfast Pro still in active development? | Come join the webinar on Wednesday

Epameinondas Soufleros — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 15:57:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Is Wordfast Pro still in active development?
Poster: Epameinondas Soufleros
Post title: Come join the webinar on Wednesday

There is a webinar in two days, entitled "Wordfast tools for LSPs and corporations".

Perhaps they will have delivered the update by then. In any case, you can join and ask them directly.

[Edited at 2026-04-27 16:02 GMT]

Is Wordfast Pro still in active development? | No

WolfgangS — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 15:40:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Is Wordfast Pro still in active development?
Poster: WolfgangS
Post title: No

[quote]Epameinondas Soufleros wrote:

They have delivered a workaround for the time being. Have you seen it? [/quote]

I did not see the workaround, will do.
Thanks

Is Wordfast Pro still in active development? | They have delivered a workaround

Epameinondas Soufleros — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 14:32:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Is Wordfast Pro still in active development?
Poster: Epameinondas Soufleros
Post title: They have delivered a workaround

They have delivered a workaround for the time being. Have you seen it?

Is Wordfast Pro still in active development? | Hey Wordfast

WolfgangS — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 13:35:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Is Wordfast Pro still in active development?
Poster: WolfgangS
Post title: Hey Wordfast

[quote]WolfgangS wrote:

Today I got an answer to my question, that is, when do we get an update with a working DeepL plugin.
Wordfast support said: "DeepL has changed the authenticating method and we'll fix that in the next update, which is expected for mid April."
[/quote]

Mid-April has long since passed, so what ???

Wordfast Anywhere, new multilingual U.I. Translate it and get rewards! | @Philippe

Samuel Murray — Sat, 18 Apr 2026 07:34:00 +0000

Forum: Wordfast support
Topic: Wordfast Anywhere, new multilingual U.I. Translate it and get rewards!
Poster: Samuel Murray
Post title: @Philippe

[quote]Philippe Locquet wrote:
To translate the U.I. you don’t need anything, you can do it directly online, they have created a dedicated page for this. [/quote]
How unfortunate that one cannot translate the WFA UI in WFA itself.