Using Memsource Editor as a freelance translator is easy: you only need to download the editor and download the files that need to be translated. In Memsource Editor you login and the software then automatically connects to an online translation memory. Segment suggestions (whether it be fuzzy matches or machine translations) show up really fast and new translations are saved in a flash. The major caveat of Memsource Editor from a translators perspective however is that the translation memory only is accessible while working on a specific job. As soon as the job is done and the file is sent, you will loose access to all your home-made translations. I found a workaround that enables you to use your translations in a later stage.

Why should you export your Memsource translations?

Before I will explain the procedure to export a Memsource TM it is good to speak about reasons to export the TM. Why should you export your Memsource translations? And is it ethical?
To begin with the last: that depends. If you as a freelance translator signed a contract that prohibits to use your translations for other clients or that forces you to hand-over the copyrights to the client, exporting a translation memory from Memsource Cloud can be a violation of the terms. If you didn’t sign such a contract it can still feel wrong, but it doesn’t have to be that wrong.
When you translate offline in Trados or MemoQ, you can use your own translation memories. Depending on the contracts you signed and the confidentiallity of certain projects you can use your translations for one project freely in another project. In the end you are the creator of your own translations so you own the copyrights.
That’s where the first question comes into play. If you are the owner of your translations, you want to use them. Memsource technically limits you to do that. As said, your translations are stored in the cloud and because you don’t own the TM, you do not have any access to your translations anymore when you finish a job.
So if you want to use your own translations for other jobs, you need to intervene before it is too late.

Exporting Memsource TM: the prerequisites

There are without doubt more ways to export a Memsource TM if you don’t have access to the TM. However, I figured out a method in Trados Studio 2015. If you have Trados Studio 2014, you can give the MEMSOURCE Plugin for Studio a try. It currently works only with Trados Studio 2014. Furthermore it doesn’t work if you don’t have access rights to the TM.

Mxliff Trados: opening Memsource files in Trados Studio

A second thing to note is that Trados Studio by default doesn’t allow to open Memsource mxliff files. You can easily edit this setting to open mxliff files in Trados by following this short procedure:

1. Go to “Options”
2. In the dialog box click on “Filetypes”
3. Select in the tree structure “XLIFF”
4. Add “*.mxliff” (without brackets) to the field “File dialog wildcard expression”
5. Click “OK”

To make it easier to find the mxliff Trados feature:

Sdlxliff2Tmx

In order to make the most of this you also need to download and install Sdlxliff2Tmx from SDL Open Exchange. This great peace of software is an additional program that converts bilingual SDLxliff files (the native Trados Studio file format) into translation memory exports (*.tmx). It works fast and will speed up the process of exporting the Memsource TM.

Mxliff Trados and the exporting process

If you added the *.mxliff extension and installed Sdlxliff2Tmx you’re almost done. Now you need to open the translated Memsource files in Trados Studio. You will then see the normal interface with at the left the source language. In the right column you will see your translations. Please note that it is a requirement to open translated files. If you open an untranslated file, there is nothing to export.
If you have opened the file, save it (Ctrl+S). Trados Studio now saves the file to a *.sdlxliff file.
Open Sdlxliff2Tmx, drag and drop the *sdlxliff file and click on “Run”. I recommend you to deselect the box that asks to copy the source segment to empty segments in the *.sdlxliff file. Sdlxliff2Tmx now creates a .tmx file that you can import in other TMs. Done!

To summarize:

1. Open the Memsource file in Trados Studio 2015 (mxliff Trados)
2. Save the file to a *.sdlxliff file
3. Export the *sdlxliff file to a *tmx file in Sdlxliff2Tmx