Timed Text
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Definition
“The Timed-Text specification should covers all necessary aspects of timed text on the Web. Typical applications of timed text are the real time subtitling of foreign-language movies on the Web, captioning for people lacking audio devices or having hearing impairments, karaoke, scrolling news items or teleprompter applications.” (Timed-Text, retrieved 13:02, 27 September 2007 (MEST)).
TT is quite a complex format, but in some contexts (e.g. Flash captioning) understanding of a small subset will do.
Typical applications
According to [1]:
- Subtitles of movies on the Web (foreign languages)
- Captions for people lacking audio devices or having hearing disabilities
- Karaoke
- Scrolling news, credits rolls
- TickerTape, marquee, "crawls"
- Text overlay
- TelePrompter
Related formats and software
Timed Text is supported to various degrees by various software, e.g.
- Flash
- Real Player
There is also an interaction with other formats, e.g.
TT in Flash CS3
Here is an example from the Using Timed Text captions in the Flash CS3 Documentation:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<tt xml:lang="en" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2006/04/ttaf1" xmlns:tts="http://www.w3.org/2006/04/ttaf1#styling">
<head>
<styling>
<style id="1" tts:textAlign="right"/>
<style id="2" tts:color="transparent"/>
<style id="3" style="2" tts:backgroundColor="white"/>
<style id="4" style="2 3" tts:fontSize="20"/>
</styling>
</head>
<body>
<div xml:lang="en">
<p begin="00:00:00.00" dur="00:00:03.07">I had just joined <span tts:fontFamily="monospaceSansSerif,proportionalSerif,TheOther"tts:fontSize="+2">Macromedia</span> in 1996,</p>
<p begin="00:00:03.07" dur="00:00:03.35">and we were trying to figure out what to do about the internet.</p>
<p begin="00:00:06.42" dur="00:00:03.15">And the company was in dire straights at the time.</p>
<p begin="00:00:09.57" dur="00:00:01.45">We were a CD-ROM authoring company,</p>
<p begin="00:00:11.42" dur="00:00:02.00">and the CD-ROM business was going away.</p>
<p begin="00:00:13.57" dur="00:00:02.50">One of the technologies I remember seeing was Flash.</p>
<p begin="00:00:16.47" dur="00:00:02.00">At the time, it was called <span tts:fontWeight="bold" tts:color="#ccc333">FutureSplash</span>.</p>
<p begin="00:00:18.50" dur="00:00:01.20">So this is where Flash got its start.</p>
<p begin="00:00:20.10" dur="00:00:03.00">This is smart sketch running on the <span tts:fontStyle="italic">EU-pin computer</span>,</p>
<p begin="00:00:23.52" dur="00:00:02.00">which was the first product that FutureWave did.</p>
<p begin="00:00:25.52" dur="00:00:02.00">So our vision for this product was to</p>
<p begin="00:00:27.52" dur="00:00:01.10">make drawing on the computer</p>
<p begin="00:00:29.02" dur="00:00:01.30" style="1">as <span tts:color="#ccc333">easy</span> as drawing on paper.</p>
</div>
</body>
</tt>
Links
- Timed-Text W3C Home Page
- What is Timed Text?, InDelv.com, Aug 2007.
- Timed Text Tags (List of supported tabs, Adobe Flash)