InqScribe News

Handbrake 0.9.3 released

2008-11-24T13:00:00-05:00

A new version of Handbrake is out. One of the more significant aspects of this release is that you can now use Handbrake to convert video in a variety of formats, not just DVDs. We recommend Handbrake for our users who need to transcribe DVDs. Since InqScribe does not control DVDs directly, you can use Handbrake to “rip” the DVD to an MPEG-4 file. As a bonus, the digital file is much more responsive to playback control.

Handbrake is compatible with OS X and Windows (and Linux, but InqScribe isn’t there yet).

Make a feature suggestion on UserVoice

2008-11-06T15:11:00-05:00

We’re always happy to take feature requests for InqScribe, but one of the limits of our current form-based approach is that it doesn’t let you see who else might be interested in the same features that you are.

A site called UserVoice lets users suggest and vote for new features, and we’ve created an InqScribe UserVoice page. If you have new feature suggestions, please use this page to add them and vote for what’s important to you.

We’re excited about this approach for several reasons:

It makes it easy for you to see what other features users are requesting.
You can vote for what’s important to you, which helps us to prioritize development.
We can provide feedback about new ideas so you know where we stand.

Head on over to the InqScribe UserVoice page to make your opinions known!

OS X 10.5.3 fixes what 10.5.2 broke

2008-06-04T16:05:00-05:00

Just a quick note to OS X users. If you’re using 10.5.2, please upgrade to 10.5.3, which fixes the issue in InqScribe where floating windows could block mouse clicks in a sheet dialog.

New InqScribe Resources web page

2008-04-07T15:43:00-05:00

We’ve just added a new InqScribe resources page with useful links to a number of products and services to improve your InqScribe experience. You’ll find recommendations for digitizing services for converting your videotapes or media files, USB footpedals that provide convenient control of your media, and digital media recorders that record directly to InqScribe-friendly formats. (And if you use our referral links, you’ll be supporting future InqScribe feature development.)

OS X 10.5.2 breaks a few dialogs

2008-03-07T02:19:00-05:00

We’ve discovered that the OS X 10.5.2 update has caused a couple problems for InqScribe users.

Here’s the issue. If one or more floating windows are open (e.g. the Shortcuts window), then when a sheet dialog opens, the floating window gets sent all the mouse clicks that should be going to the sheet dialog.

(Sheet dialogs are dialog boxes that zoom out of the main document window. Other kinds of modal dialogs, like the Find dialog, are not affected.)

This is most noticeably a problem with the “Missing Media” dialog, where InqScribe asks you to click one of three buttons. But clicking doesn’t do anything. Argh!

The workaround is to close the floating windows. Once you do that, you’ll be able to click things in the sheet dialog again.

This bug seems to be OS X 10.5.2-specific. We’re quite curious whether 10.5.3 will fix what 10.5.2 broke, but we don’t intend to wait that long. We’ll get a new release out soon that resolves the problem.

Update: 10.5.3 does indeed fix the problem.

InqScribe 2.0.5

2008-02-11T16:30:00-05:00

InqScribe 2.0.5 is primarily a bugfix release. Users with foot pedals will be happy to note that this version properly loads their foot pedal settings again. We’ve also made a few changes to the foot pedal wizard to make it smarter about clearing out old settings when you set up a foot pedal.

If you’ve been having trouble with foot pedal-based shortcuts, install this version and you should be set. If you have multiple shortcuts mapped onto the same foot pedal button (this may have happened if you ran the foot pedal setup wizard more than once) then you should run the foot pedal setup wizard one more time. In 2.0.5, the wizard will delete the duplicate settings for you.

Also of note: we’ve added support for 23.976 (or 23.98) and 59.94 fps time code formats. Here’s a complete list of what’s new.

Bug: Footpedal settings getting corrupted

2008-01-29T03:46:00-05:00

Platforms affected: Macintosh + Windows
InqScribe Versions: 2.0.4 only

We've recently come across a bug in the latest version of InqScribe (v 2.0.4) where footpedals appear to suddenly stop working.

A typical problem: You've set up your footpedal, everything seems to be working fine. You quit InqScribe for the day, return later, start InqScribe, and all of a sudden your footpedal is no longer working. So you run the footpedal setup wizard again, and things seem to work...for a while, but soon it's corrupted again. You do this a few more times and the footpedals stop working altogether.

There are two problems here:

i. You have multiple footpedal assignments conflicting with each other as you run the wizard repeatedly.

ii. All of this is being caused by a bug we've just discovered where the saved footpedal settings get corrupted. This affects both the Macintosh and Windows versions.

We are actively working on an update that will fix this problem. Look for a new version soon.

In the meantime, here's what you can do to work around it. We know it's not ideal, but it'll get you working.

How to work around it:

Recommended method

The easiest way to work around this problem is to revert back to a previous version of InqScribe. Version 2.0.3 does not have this problem, so you can download and install that. Your license should work fine with it.

Mac Version 2.0.3
Win Version 2.0.3

Alternative method

If you have to use 2.0.4, then here's what you can do:

1. Reset your shortcuts

This will clear the corrupted settings.

(Note that this will delete all of your shortcuts, so you should write down any that you want to save first.)
a. Select "Edit->Edit Shortcuts..." from the menubar.
b. Click on the "Reset to Defaults" button.
c. When asked "Are you sure..." click "Reset".

(Alternatively, if you have a lot of shortcuts you've already defined, you can go through and delete every footpedal shortcut on the list in step b.)

2. Re-run the footpedal wizard

Reassign your footpedal with clean shortcuts.

3. Leave InqScribe open

The bug occurs when you quit InqScribe and the settings are saved. You can safely hibernate/sleep your computer and the settings will be retained, so long as you don't quit.

If you *have* to quit, then just reset the shortcuts and re-assign them again when you start up.

InqScribe 2.0.4

2007-11-18T04:01:00-05:00

Hot on the heels of the last point release, here’s InqScribe 2.0.4. This version fixes a couple more bugs for Windows users and also updates the built-in bug reporter to send us a bit more information about your current preferences and keyboard shortcuts. This saves us having to ask you for that information, and saves you from having to tell us, when you submit bug reports or feature requests. A win all around.

(You knew you could submit reports and requests from within InqScribe, right? Check the Help menu.)