I’ve been taking my electronic presentation files that I use in the classroom and turning them into podcasts using audio and video. I go through the slides as if I were explaining my way through them in the classroom. Whenever I refer to an “M4V" file, it’s actually a video encoded in the H.264 format. However, I’ll refer to it as an “M4V" file since that’s how it’s been wrapped.
If you'd like to subscribe to my YouTube channel, here's a link: 
There are different podcast versions available:
This indicates that the video file has been captioned. This is a long-term project for me since it is very time-intensive.
This links to the video file on YouTube.
This video will be displayed using Flash. If it is captioned, a “cc" button on the controls will allow you to toggle the captions on and off.
This will be a video in either M4V or Ogg format if your browser is HTML5 compatible. If your browser uses the M4V format for HTML5 video, then it will be captioned but the captions cannot be toggled off. If your browser uses the Ogg format instead, then the video will not be captioned. Hey, it's not my fault that everyone's still fighting about video formats. The HTML5 specifications don't say anything about captions/subtitles yet although it is being discussed.
This is a download link to a video in the M4V format.
Some comments about each type of video file:
- I like how it looks in a web browser and YouTube. However, I do not like the mobile version because neither captions nor annotations are displayed. Scrubbing back-and-forth using the YouTube player isn’t as nice as any of the local options on my page, also.
- This is a good option if you have Flash installed. If available, the captioning looks nice, too.
- Not all browsers are HTML5 video compatible and if yours is compatible, then you will see a video as described in the previous section. If your browser is not HTML5 compatible, then it will fallback to using QuickTime to show the M4V video file. If your web browser doesn’t fallback properly and the video doesn’t appear or is not displayed properly, there will be a direct link to a QuickTime page for showing the video file.
- This links to an M4V video file that you can download and view offline. See the section below for any issues with captions.
Confused? Yeah, me too. If you want more information about HTML5 video, then this link is for you.
There are a few issues depending on which platform you use to watch one of my podcasts.
On a Mac (OS X 10.6.8):
- There is no way to toggle off the MV4 video captions if you watch one in your web browser. If you want to turn off the captions, then either watch the Flash version or download the M4V video and watch it in either QuickTime Player or iTunes.
- Wait! The above doesn’t apply if you are viewing one on an iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad and you can toggle on and off the captions. I don’t have any idea about other mobile devices.
On Windows (Windows 7) as of 12/23/2011:
- iTunes versions prior to v10.5.1 will not play captions. 10.5.1 is not quite there, however, since it appears to detect some spurious end-of-line character and often places an open box at the end of a subtitle. One step at a time and I’m thankful that Windows iTunes will now display my podcast captions.
- Previous versions of Media Player before the version included with Windows 7 will not play m4v files.
- The current version of Media Player will not display these captions.
- QuickTime Player as of 7.7.1 still chops off the bottom of the captions when you go full-screen.
- Internet Explorer 9.whatever still chokes and will not play my M4V videos properly. It does detect it using HTML5 video/audio but it only plays the audio properly and garbles the video. The problem is that since it detects it under HTML5, it will not degrade.
Does anyone have an aspirin? Ibuprofen? Acetaminophen? A large mallet I can use to repeatedly smack myself in the face with since I think it would be less painful than dealing with these different file formats?
If you aren’t sure which format to try, then try each one and see what works best for you.
Image credits:
- YouTube button from YouTube.
- by Andy Gongea, obtained from IconsPedia.
- by Pierocksmysocks, obtained from IconsPedia.
- by Oxygen Team, obtained from IconsPedia.
- US public domain, obtained from Wikimedia Commons.
