— iIT-Services

noScribe is an AI-based software designed for transcribing audio, particularly useful for qualitative social research and journalistic interviews. The software is free, open-source (licensed under GPL-3.0), and operates entirely offline, meaning no data is sent to the cloud, ensuring privacy. It can recognize up to 99 languages and distinguish between different speakers, which is particularly helpful for interviews with multiple participants.

The software includes an editor that allows users to review, verify, and correct the transcriptions manually. It utilizes advanced AI models, such as OpenAI’s Whisper, faster-whisper by Guillaume Klein, and pyannote by Hervé Bredin, for the transcription process.

It requires a relatively up-to-date computer to function efficiently, slower systems may result in long transcription times. The software is around 3.7 GB, poor audio quality may lead to transcription errors.

noScribe aims to reduce the difficulty of transcription for researchers and journalists, offering a reliable, private, and easy-to-use tool for processing interviews.

Find a review of noScribe (in German) here: https://sozmethode.hypotheses.org/2315.

Source: https://github.com/kaixxx/noScribe

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In collaboration with the Public Prosecutor’s Office of the Canton of Zurich, the Zurich Cantonal Police, the Zurich City Police and the Winterthur City Police, a team from the Statistical Office of the Canton of Zurich has developed a prototype app that automatically transcribes confidential audio and video files. Also in Swiss German.

The app is open-source and based on the Whisper v3 Large model, which enables transcriptions up to 15 times faster than in real time – without license or usage costs. The app offers a wide range of functions such as automatic speaker recognition, multi-file upload, predefined vocabulary and various export options. Transcripts can be edited directly in the application and linked synchronously with the source file.

Hardware requirements: recommend using a CUDA-compatible graphics card with at least 8GB VRAM, as transcription on a CPU is extremely slow.

Source: https://github.com/machinelearningZH/audio-transcription.

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As written a while ago already, password-protected Excel worksheets can be unlocked through a VBA script:

Even simpler is the approach through editing the XML source of the Excel file, as described by paracon.ca/…:

  1. Rename your file by adding *.zip to its extension.
  2. Open the zip file.
  3. Browse to the path ‘xl > worksheets’ folder.
  4. Extract the protected sheet xml file to local drive.
  5. Open the xml and delete the markup text <sheetProtection …>.
  6. Save and close the xml file.
  7. Overwrite the original xml in the zip folder with the file from local drive.
  8. Close the zip file and rename the file by removing the .zip extension.
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Links being in the following format: https://cfvod.kaltura.com/hls/p/<other link text>/name/a.mp4/seg-1-v1-a1.ts

Here is my full method for Chrome:

  1. open developer tools F12, go to network tab
  2. reload page
  3. play video, look for ts entries in left pane, e.g. seg-11-v1-a1.ts, click on name
  4. copy request URL in right pane e.g. https://cfvod.kaltura.com/hls/p/<link text>/name/a.mp4/seg-11-v1-a1.ts
  5. paste this in new browser window
  6. remove “hls” at beginning of link and the final subdirectory, e.g.
    https://cfvod.kaltura.com/hls/p/<link text>/name/a.mp4/seg-11-v1-a1.ts
    becomes
    https://cfvod.kaltura.com/p/<more link text>/name/a.mp4
  7. load page
  8. MP4 can now be downloaded by clicking Download on HTML player controls (three dots menu)

Source: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/56366523/obtaining-direct-download-link-for-an-embedded-kaltura-video.

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Full integration, editable calendar with two-way synchronisation – more complicated than it could be: https://frightanic.com/apple-mac/thunderbird-icloud-calendar-sync/.

For the sync of contacts, the URL is: https://<serverID>-contacts.icloud.com/<user>/carddavhome/card/. See: https://support.mozilla.org/bm/questions/1384897.

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Simple online service to let people pay to send you emails/service requests: ningo.me. – though, it remains unclear who the service provider of ningo.me is, since the company behind the product hast been renamed and rebranded in June 2021 without disclosing so on the product page. –> Deprecated, service discontinued (14.6.2024)

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Automatische Transkription, mit Schweizer Mundart-Erkennung und Branchenfokus: recapp.ch.

Der Dienst töggl ist ein KI-getriebenes Spracherkennungsprogramm mit Fokus auf Schweizer Sprachen, insbesondere Schweizerdeutsch. Satzzeichen werden von selbst gesetzt. Segmentierung nach Sprechern erfolgt ebenfalls automatisch. Nach dem Transkribieren kann der Text manuell überarbeitet und anschliessend exportiert werden: xn--tggl-5qa.ch, töggl.ch.

Review by Digitec “Schwiizertüütsch transkribieren – Töggl im Test”: digitec.ch/de/page/schwiizertueuetsch-transkribieren-toeggl-im-test-22436.

Trint’s AI turns audio & video files to text in 30+ languages. Tell stories faster by transcribing, translating, editing and collaborating in a single workflow: trint.com.

Weitere Reviews: blog.clickomania.ch/2023/02/03/transkriptions-tools-im-vergleich/#4-3, blog.clickomania.ch/2021/12/08/toeggl-ch/.

Weiteres Tool: iit-services.ch/stt4sg.

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