[onion2k]

For the app I work at the moment we use https://lokalise.com/. We add translation strings to a SaaS app, and then the translation team translate them. I've written a build tool that downloads the translation JSON files from the API using the CLI, or as part of our CI process. Other teams have tools that download their language packs for different iOS and Android apps. The translations are versioned in Lokalise and we using a branching strategy to manage the work. Lokalise has an option to generate xlf files (and JSON, xliff, arb, etc).

This is a very typical workflow. Most people are not out there modifying xlf files by opening them in a text editor. For a start, translations usually aren't done by developers.

(Huge shoutout to Lokalise btw. I can highly recommend it. It makes building a multi-lingual app across different platforms so much easier.)

[lultimouomo]

This still doesn't make them generated files!

You opted to keep translation files out of version control; you could also keep images there, or source files. All this stuff is the (pretty direct) output of non-deterministic human intervention.

(BTW, how do you build an old version of your application? Is lokalise able to give you the appropriate translations for a specific git commit / app version?)