Comments on Aegisub: Universal Subtitle Format: a post-mortem?

My overriding priority is to be able to deliver su...

2011-10-31T16:46:43.910Z

My overriding priority is to be able to deliver subs in a text format that my clients can import into the likes of Final Cut Pro etc., while moving through Word & SRT as those are the most common to my suppliers'/translators' platforms.

Invariably, this means .doc > .txt > .srt > ass, giving me some very happy subs... but getting from there to .xml is the big hurdle.

The USF specs are now hosted by TitleVision: http:...

2011-09-20T15:16:59.654+01:00

The USF specs are now hosted by TitleVision:
http://www.titlevision.dk/usf.htm

And it's not that hard to edit xml. And if you mak...

2009-03-29T16:13:00.000+01:00

And it's not that hard to edit xml. And if you make mistake, it can be easily identified by any xml engine. One can easily break ass too, but I'm not sure if parser will complain about errors and the bug will live in peace.

AS5's gibberish style format makes it nearly unedi...

2009-03-29T16:08:00.000+01:00

AS5's gibberish style format makes it nearly uneditable by anything but your "monstersub" thing. You even could make it binary. With ass one should only carefully locate those primary color, vmargin, bold style, border width and shadow width, and figure out whether rgba sequence direct or reverse. It was not ideal, but AS5 is worse. I don't think, abandoning ASS style syntax is a good idea, since one tipically will use all text attributes for root styles to get what one wants instead of leaving it to defaults(?)

As to USF, I agree subs don't require hierarchical structure, and the only benefit from XML format is its self-documenting feature. When writing ass parser, ReadLine made work for me. USF is obviously a bit verbose even for xml: there is no need for "styles", "subtitles", "fontstyle" and "text" tags... what are they for?

You did wrong thing removing the "Format:" lines.

I find little information about this USF format. T...

2009-01-29T06:13:00.000Z

I find little information about this USF format. That alone makes me hesitant to use it or expect any support for it in the long run. Virtually every site link I found takes me to either a 404 error page or a domain squatter site. What links do work are to sites that give a brief description with links that don't work. From the various subtitle formats I have tested (QuickTime Text, SRT, STL, ASS) I like ASS the best. I get the most control. QT text looks good, but its implentation leaves a lot to be desired. For something QT native, QT text rendering is extremely picky and haphazard. I have gotten the best results with a lot less work with ASS. I downloaded and reviewed the AS5 and have to say I like it alot. It has two things that put it ahead of ASS, more control and simpler formatting.

USF adds unneeded complexity, making it not just h...

2009-01-15T07:53:00.000Z

USF adds unneeded complexity, making it not just harder to hand-edit, but also adds several requirements to any editing GUI, many which could detract horribly from usability.

Firstly subtitles are not supposed to be hand edit...

2009-01-14T15:44:00.000Z

Firstly subtitles are not supposed to be hand edited, otherwise whta would be the idea of your program?
Secondly xml format is much simpler to maintain and build upon, than the oceans of text subtitle scripts that exists nowadays.

I dunno about you guys, but imho, I think that if ...

2008-08-16T05:45:00.000+01:00

I dunno about you guys, but imho, I think that if you were to take the first step by supporting USF, then that would inspire others to complete projects such as making a fully-functional renderer for it. I highly doubt you would make it top-priority, but in between bug-fixing and implementing more and more new features, it could be done. I'd like to see it done myself, so that's 1 vote so far. Whatever. Like I said, it's all your decision to make. Just call me curious. I wanna see the real differences between the formats and if USF could really be the future of subbing, compared with AS5, and SSF. =p

AS5 adds new functionality and tags (such as arbit...

2008-08-04T15:38:00.000+01:00

AS5 adds new functionality and tags (such as arbitrary distortions, gradients, blur, inherited styles, etc). It will most likely never be supported by libass. We have plans to make our own renderer.

What does AS5 bring to the table that isn't there ...

2008-07-30T19:02:00.000+01:00

What does AS5 bring to the table that isn't there for ASS? I'd read the spec, but the spec seems to be missing. I've been involved trying to make sure that the OS-X fork of XBMC gets proper ASS support (it has, as well as the linux version), but that's all based on libass - same for the mplayer ASS implementation. Will you be adding AS5 support to libass as well?

The problem with asa is that it's barely functiona...

2008-07-23T15:31:00.000+01:00

The problem with asa is that it's barely functional, and it's written in C. I don't know about jfs, but I don't want to contribute to a project written in C.

How about bribing jfs to forget about VSFilter and...

2008-07-23T13:54:00.000+01:00

How about bribing jfs to forget about VSFilter and hack ASA instead?