alexBy now, you may have heard about the security vulnerabilities posed by QuickTime for Windows. Given the security vulnerabilities, if you’re a Windows user, we highly recommend uninstalling QuickTime.
What does this mean for Windows InqScribe users?
- You will still be able to play and transcribe most media that Windows Media Player supports. For more about the types of files supported by Windows Media Player, head over to our media format guide here.
- Unfortunately, you will not be able to export a subtitled QuickTime movie using the QuickTime 7-exclusive “Save Subtitled QuickTime Movie” feature.
Currently, InqScribe requires either QuickTime or Windows Media Player to play back audio and video files. You do not need QuickTime to run InqScribe on Windows–you can still use Windows Media Player for most files. If you choose to uninstall QuickTime, InqScribe will automatically switch over to Windows Media Player. As long as your media files are supported by Windows Media Player, InqScribe will be able to play them as it normally does, and you may not notice any difference.
How Do I Make Subtitled Videos Without QuickTime?
Since you won’t be able to use InqScribe’s built-in subtitled QuickTime movie feature without QuickTime, you may need to find a new method of creating movies from your transcript. Luckily, there are a number of different subtitling options available to InqScribe users via Windows Media Player, VLC Player, YouTube, Final Cut Pro, etc. For more about these options, check out our “What are the different ways to create a subtitled video?” article.
Why Does InqScribe Still Use QuickTime?
When InqScribe debuted 10 years ago, QuickTime was arguably in its prime. QuickTime supports a range of media files, and through subtitle track support, giving our users a straightforward way to produce standalone subtitled movies. We’ve been very happy with the relationship between InqScribe and QuickTime, but the writing is on the wall: QuickTime is now over 20 years old, an eternity in software terms. With these vulnerabilities public, and Apple no longer supporting the software, it’s clear that QuickTime is no longer the way moving forward.
Taking all of this into account, we’ve decided that future versions of InqScribe will no longer use QuickTime.
What’s Next for InqScribe?
We are currently working on a major overhaul of InqScribe.
For OS X, InqScribe will use AV Foundation for media playback. AV Foundation is Apple’s official replacement for QuickTime and offers decent subtitle support. AV Foundation has the additional feature that it is also used for media playback on iPhones and iPads, so moving to AVFoundation should simplify the process of producing subtitled content for Apple’s mobile devices.
For Windows, InqScribe could probably get by continuing to rely on Windows Media Player, but we want to look closely at moving to either DirectShow or its modern successor, Media Foundation. Of these options we’d prefer to use DirectShow, because Media Foundation doesn’t yet have strong support for subtitles. (Unlike Apple and QuickTime, Microsoft continues to support DirectShow).
Beyond the native media engines for OS X and Windows, we are also looking at whether InqScribe can support alternative media engines that would enable playback of additional media formats or provide additional functionality that the native engines lack. Examples of engines in this class include VLC, GStreamer, and web-based solutions to play back online content like YouTube or Vimeo.
InqScribe will continue to export a wide range of subtitling formats, and we will make sure that it will continue to be easy to generate subtitled content that can be viewed with standard apps on OS X and Windows. It’s worth noting that moving to more modern media playback engines will mean that future versions of InqScribe will not run on some older systems. You can read more about future system requirements here.
We hope this helps to clarify our direction moving forward. In the meantime, InqScribe will continue to rely on QuickTime and Windows Media Player. If you have any questions InqScribe, feel free to contact us at support@inqscribe.com.
alex
