It’s Time For Time Based Data – Part 1

At Kaltura, adding to and extracting additional data from visual media has always been a priority. In previous Kaltura releases we introduced multiple custom data schemas and beefed up the data assigned to entries. In our recent Eagle release  we added a whole new dimension: adding data to a particular point in time for video and audio entries.

With Eagle, we launched four new features related to time-based data:

• Multi-lingual and searchable captions (the caption asset can be parsed and indexed).
• Ad cue points: allows users to assign particular ads to an exact frame in a specific media item. These ads can be displayed in conjunction to generic ad rules (as part of the player configuration).
• Clipping and trimming: assign in and out times to either (1) create a new entry from original media (aka clipping) or (2) save the entry with new in and out times (e.g., if you want to get rid of the obligatory “Can I get your attention…” at the beginning of a lecture).

We chose to actually re-edit the media files themselves so that you won’t encounter device-specific problems (e.g., iphone) or delivery issues (since they are entries like all others the delivery method rules stay the same). Virtual clipping (defining playback to begin and end at certain points can be achieved via our API as well).
Want to read more about Clipping and Trimming? Check out: Server Side Clipping and Trimming, Kaltura New Clipping application.

• Code cue points: here is where things get interesting. Say you want to pause the playback and display a survey at a certain point of the video, add a popup or make some changes to the surrounding HTML. All of the above can be done with the code cue point object – the player listens and when the point is reached, any action can be triggered. See our documentation here.

Cue points can also be ingested via xml. See our XSD’s here: Serving cue points, Ingesting cue points.
You can search for cuePoints using our API list action and given the right filter you can find a cuePoint by it’s text, time and many more options.
Want to read more? go to: Cue Point Service., Cue Point Filter.
*Please note that for other objects other filters may apply.
We’ll be rolling out additional features based on time-based data in the upcoming months.
To help you along we’re now finishing up creating demo applications based on the above: captions search, trimming & clipping and code cue points that display related files links. The demos will also include documented code that you can grab and use.
Once it’s up, we’ll be sure to let you know.