PointFire Translator Express version 1.4.0 has been released and is available using Microsoft AppSource.  It translates modern pages, documents and metadata, and list items using an app without any server component, in your account, in your region, using a private endpoint.

As before, the free version translates documents.  The full version also translates pages and metadata, among other features.  It works with PointFire 365, or with SharePoint's Multilingual page publishing.

New and changed features:

• Tenant policy to publish on translate
  Turn it on and translations are immediately published, otherwise draft

• Policy to map language codes
  Mapping fr to fr-CA rather than fr-FR is the most common use case

• Policy for translating file names
  Turn it off and file names of translations are not translated, it is the original name then the language code

• “Translate Now” button on event pages

• If the translation is beyond the limits for synchronous translation but not async, use async
  for documents between 10MB and 40 MB

• More detailed testing of the Azure services in "Test the configuration"

• Show translations that can be overwritten
  If never translated "The selected item(s) already have translations to the following language(s):"
  If source modified after translation "Some translations are older than the source and can be overwritten:"

• Add a way to return to the first screen of the translation panel from management view

• Improve UI error messages when adding a license to show actual validation reason

• When there is a filter on Item Language = 'en' in a page, change the 'en' to the target language in the translation
  This allows you to put a language filter on a webpart in the original page, and have the corresponding filter on the translated page

•  

  Setting to indicate that Managed Identity should be used for service-to-service authentication
  If your Azure configuration does not allow SAS tokens to be used when the Translator service interacts with the Storage service, for example if there are IP restrictions on the Storage service, this defers to Managed Identity for authentication.  Note: SAS token is still required in the configuration, to allow the app to interact with the Storage service.

Bug fixes:

• Duplicate items created for translated copy
• Translation is not working when Glossary list is present in parent site
• In the list, "Translate Now' option is not showing
• timeEnd causing error
• Error when Syntex image tagging is turned on in a document library and no tag is defined

Other recent features and fixes you may have missed

• Instant translation: specially constructed URL to translate a page, for use in workflows and JSON format buttons
• Glossary sync button: if you added new languages to the site, adds them to existing glossary list.
• Fix metadata field ID in document upload process
• Remove outdated licensing message for Spanish localization
• Fix issue with homepage localization of the root site collection
• Fix button loading after navigation
• Error translating some list items with multi-choice columns
• Try to update the proofing language of translated Office files when feasible.
• Some German labels were actually in Danish

If you are not providing secure managed translation for your users, then where are they sending your internal data to be translated?  PointFire Translator Express translates your content without going through a service shared with other Microsoft clients or a third party service, and processes in your own Azure account in the region you choose.

This is a recommended official release. It can be used for production. It has major new features and corrects some issues from version 3.4.0.

The new "Recommended Actions" section is a new way to check the next steps in configuring the app on the site to take advantage of all its features, and to see what still needs translating, or re-translating if something has changed since the last translation.

If this is a new install, you will only need the "PointFire 365 Modern" app, not the "PointFire 365" add-in. It you are updating an existing install, you will still need both, as part of the transition to eliminating the add-in before Microsoft's April 2026 deadline. All configuration functionality has been moved from "PointFire 365" to "PointFire 365 Modern", and all PointFire screens are now side panels. After April 1 2026, you should delete PointFire-365.app from the app catalog and from the sites.

If you were using an earlier supported release, the upgrade requires no change to data or licenses, however you must sometimes press the "Activate" button on each site after upgrade if it is highlighted or use the ActivateApp script. Some JavaScript from the previous version will remain cached until the next session unless you press Ctrl-F5 or equivalent on your browser.

IMPORTANT NOTICE

All of our PowerShell scripts use the PnP.PowerShell module. The PF365 installation script will install it if that has not already been done. In addition, Microsoft has deleted the app registration on which the old "Interactive" login relied. You can run UserAuthentication.ps1 to create a new app registration in your own tenant, or to change authentication methods

Details here
https://github.com/pnp/powershell/issues/4250

To fully localize the interface, you will need to enter an Azure Translator key, failing which you will have to provide some of the translations yourself. You can find or create your Azure Translator service here:
https://portal.azure.com/#view/Microsoft_Azure_ProjectOxford/CognitiveServicesHub/~/TextTranslation
 

New and Changed Features

• Translate folder names in a list/library is now available under the Multilingual Settings page and in Recommended Actions.
• Enabling the Null Filter Item Language will display items, folders, pages, or documents in all languages where the Item Language column is null.
• New "Advanced Settings" button for tenant configurations such as "Enable Custom Scripting","Filter Null Item Language", "Enable/Disable 'Translate Page' link option" and "Manage User Profile Language", as alternative to PowerShell.
• If activation is not completed and the license is not present, the Recommended Action button will be shown, and the other panels will be disabled.
• Disabled the 'Continue' button during activation and closed the activation panel after the activation process was completed.
• When a new language is added and no translations are available, it will appear under the Pages Needing Re-translations.
  
  

Resolved Issues

• If the configuration setup failed, the error message was not displayed in the panel for the Enable/Disable Translate Page Link and the Manage User Profile panel.
• When opening the PF365 panel and navigating back to the Site Contents page, opening the language menu without refreshing the page caused the languages not to display.
• Ensure that page redirection works correctly even when the older redirection setting is present.
• Ensure that web part and page title translations work correctly even when the older webpart setting is present.
• Applying the license on the tenant root site was showing an error and the license was not being applied.
• Webpart hiding did not work properly when MLP was enabled on the site.
• Handled scenario where the Multilingual Translations list is not present, preventing infinite "Checking" state.
• Translate the Interface's Step-3 was getting stuck on sites containing classic or Wiki pages.

PointFire makes SharePoint truly multilingual and lets your users collaborate in their language.  Two different users going to the same page on the same site will each see it almost entirely in their language, both UI and content, without using Variations.

To get your copy, go to http://community.icefire.ca/index.php?/Knowledgebase/List/Index/1/pointfire-installation-packages and log in or create an account.

The fully-featured trial version can be downloaded for free and can be used for development and testing, with some pre-sale support.

This is a mandatory release if you are using the PointFire Translator Server Add-in in SharePoint. It deprecates the existing Add-in and replaces it with a new SPFx app that has similar functionality. Add-ins will stop working on April 2, 2026. It also fixes several errors in v2.4.0 and adds several features.

It makes it simple to translate Modern pages such as the ones in Communication and Teams sites and those produced by the Multilingual Page Publishing feature, as well as classic pages, documents, lists, and metadata.  It has several interfaces, including via a SharePoint App, a web interface, scripting, and Power Automate.

IMPORTANT NOTICE

All of our PowerShell scripts require the new PnP.PowerShell module.  Installing the latest version may require global admin consent.  In addition, Microsoft has recently deleted the app registration on which the "Interactive" login relies.  You can run UserAuthentication.ps1 to create a new app registration in your own tenant, or to change authentication methods

New and Changed Features

• The existing classic add-in is overwritten with a stub that informs users that they should use the modern app instead.
• Install the PFT modern app in sites where required.
• Added changes to the server to show a translation processing bar and to show result after translating through PFT modern app.
• Option to create a new app registration or upload new certificate to the existing app registration.

Resolved Issues

• When a document is retranslated, the document name is sometimes not translated properly.
• On a pt-br base language site or when selecting "pt-br" as target language, it is showing error "Documents Failed to translate"
• When translating Site Pages or documents from sites with non-English base languages, library names containing special characters (e.g., "Páginas do Site") failed with "The given list/library is not present in site."
• Translation from Flow using http port(33080) is showing error "Something went wrong in getAuthorizedContext: Cannot contact site at the specified URL {URL}. There is no Web named "{URL}/_vti_bin/sites.asmx". 

PointFire Translator can translate individual items or entire libraries or lists in SharePoint Online.  It includes the PointFire Translator App which will use PointFire Translator Server as a translation service.

It can be downloaded here (login required)

http://community.icefire.ca/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/146/30/pointfire-translator-server

For more information, contact sales@icefire.ca

In late January 2026, Microsoft started rolling out a change that may affect the setting of new tenant license keys and of tenant-level configurations of PointFire products, and many other apps. Changes to Tenant Storage Entities will now be blocked by default. Two years ago, Microsoft had done this for all sites except for the App Catalog site, where apps and their settings are kept, but is now extending it to the App Catalog.  This does not affect any existing license keys or settings.

There are two simple ways to overcome this, one that works for 24 hours while you make changes, and the other that permanently allows apps and scripts to modify Tenant Storage Entities. We recommend method 2, the permanent change, which respects the security intention of Microsoft's change but exempts app setting changes.

1. This method allows changes for 24 hours. Using PowerShell, connect to the app catalog site using tenant admin or app catalog site admin permissions and enter this command:
Set-SPOSite <AppCatalogSiteURL> -DenyAddAndCustomizePages $false

2. This method allows changes to Tenant Storage Entities indefinitely. Connect to the app catalog site and enter this command:
Set-SPOSite <AppCatalogSiteURL> -AllowWebPropertyBagUpdateWhenDenyAddAndCustomizePagesIsEnabled $true

This procedure is not required if you have previously set "AllowWebPropertyBagUpdateWhenDenyAddAndCustomizePagesIsEnabled" at the tenant level.

Detailed instructions are in the attached document.

This is a recommended official release. It can be used for production. It has major new features and corrects some issues from version 3.3.0.

The new "Recommended Actions" section is a new way to check the next steps in configuring the app on the site to take advantage of all its features, and to see what still needs translating, or re-translating if something has changed since the last translation.

If this is a new install, you will only need the "PointFire 365 Modern" app, not the "PointFire 365" add-in. It you are updating an existing install, you will still need both, as part of the transition to eliminating the add-in before Microsoft's April 2026 deadline. All configuration functionality has been moved from "PointFire 365" to "PointFire 365 Modern", and all PointFire screens are now side panels.

If you were using an earlier supported release, the upgrade requires no change to data or licenses, however you must sometimes press the "Activate" button on each site after upgrade if it is highlighted or use the ActivateApp script. Some JavaScript from the previous version will remain cached until the next session unless you press Ctrl-F5 or equivalent on your browser.

IMPORTANT NOTICE

All of our PowerShell scripts use the PnP.PowerShell module. The PF365 installation script will install it if that has not already been done. In addition, Microsoft has deleted the app registration on which the old "Interactive" login relied. You can run UserAuthentication.ps1 to create a new app registration in your own tenant, or to change authentication methods

Details here
https://github.com/pnp/powershell/issues/4250

To fully localize the interface, you will need to enter an Azure Translator key, failing which you will have to provide some of the translations yourself. You can find or create your Azure Translator service here:
https://portal.azure.com/#view/Microsoft_Azure_ProjectOxford/CognitiveServicesHub/~/TextTranslation
 

New and Changed Features

• Major new feature: "Recommended Actions" tells you what should be configured, or needs to be translated or re-translated
• Added a new button, "Test Configuration", to verify whether the Azure Text Translator is configured correctly.
• Option for PF365 language toggle to affect current site only not the M365 user profile. Handle-UserProfileLanguageTenantLevel.ps1
• Support for language-specific adaptive cards, in dashboard or webpart, works like webparts

Resolved Issues

• Fixed the web part hiding issue for specific web parts that have no language
• Section title did not translate when changing the language
• Translate Footer option was not displaying properly
• Improved performance: If a site has more than 2000 web part using single-page method, the page was taking 20 seconds to load
• MUI step2 showing the error "The body of the request is not valid JSON"
• MUI step2 will wait for 60sec if the text translations fails.
• Activation button is unclickable for new sites or when configuration list is not present
• The PointFire-365 language button was replacing the Sign Out button for guest users
• Web part title translations were not functioning correctly.
• When Tenant License is applied and clicking on PointFire 365 app on a new site, sometimes it is showing the license expiry date as "Expired Undefined"
• Error at the time of activation "Value was either too small or too large for a Double."
• Activation button is unclickable when for new site or site without recent configuration
• ActivateAppHubAndAssociateSites.ps1, UpgradeAppHubAndAssociateSites.ps1: While fetching the Hub Site information, the process gets stuck

PointFire makes SharePoint truly multilingual and lets your users collaborate in their language.  Two different users going to the same page on the same site will each see it almost entirely in their language, both UI and content, without using Variations.

To get your copy, go to http://community.icefire.ca/index.php?/Knowledgebase/List/Index/1/pointfire-installation-packages and log in or create an account.

The fully-featured trial version can be downloaded for free and can be used for development and testing, with some pre-sale support.