"\" is not parsed in Java Properties file

Question

Hello everybody 
 I think my problem might be similar to https://community.rws.com/product-groups/trados-portfolio/passolo/f/passolo-general/7960/escape-character-and-unicode-spaces-not-visible-in-passolo, so I don't know whether there's a solution, but I'll try to describe it as clearly as possible: 
 I have to translate German Java Properties files into English, French and Italian. They contain strings such as these: 
 
 See my blue marks: The resource contains the character "\" that is inserted to break the line in the source, as far as I understand for pure readability reasons. In the translation, the text of the element with the same ID should be kept together, so no further segmentation - which Passolo does correctly. 
 However, the "\" character is escaped and shown neither in the source segment, nor in the target segment. When I generate the target file, the "\" character is also not rendered, which results in a different number of lines in the target source and thus a compilation error. I therefore have to re-insert the "\" characters by hand. On top, every time a string in the string list is changed and I generate the target file, all the strings with "\" are overwritten once more and I end up spending hours on manually re-inserting the "\" character in the java file. 
 Is there an elegant way of avoiding that Passolo escapes the "\" character and renders it properly so I can also place it in the target segment?

Adrian Maniu · Accepted Answer

I would suggest to check with the provider of the files as they do not seem to be valid properties files. 
 As Achim mentioned in the post you linked "\" is a special character and is used to escape certain values. For example \ would generate a single \ char. Or equal sign needs to be escaped as \=. 
 If the file contains a single backslash then it will be dropped by Passolo. You could try to escape them using \ format but the best would be to check with the provider of those files and use proper format.

Achim Herrmann · Answer

Lines ending with \ concatenate to the next line, deleting all white spaces from the beginning of the next line. See https://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/api/java/util/Properties.html for more details. 
 Technically 
 fruits = apple, banana, pear, \
 cantaloupe, watermelon, \
 kiwi, mango 
 is a Java string "apple, banana, pear, cantaloupe, watermelon, kiwi, mango" 
 Passolo correctly imports the string without the \ and the white spaces from the next line. It exports the translation without these non-characters. According to Oracle this is a valid a correct representation of the string. The number of lines in the properties file is irrelevant. It is a key/value pair file and the compilation should not through and errors.

Passolo > 1. General

"\" is not parsed in Java Properties file

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