Indeed no special handling for videos. They’re just item links plus an additional parameter and therefore treated like any other item link (e.g. icons show in the main view whether a document has incoming/outgoing links).
Whatever macOS (actually the AVKit framework) supports can be handled, other or proprietary formats aren’t supported (especially those using auxiliary files).
thanks for clarifying the details @cgrunenberg !
I still would feel DT should develop an expressive, documented approach to working with videos.
while for you from a developer perspective timebased references might be like text references with ‘an additional parameter’ users / researchers will approach all this from the angle ‘how can I do my (knowledge)work in DT with videos?’. and indeed this feature is mentioned in the documentation (while video chapters are not).
I guess something similar goes for the AVKit. as a term it doesn´t yet seem very transparent to users what this allows in terms of working with vides as a type of document in DT. (I do not easily find a good general overview, beyond developer-pages in Apple for it.)
so, it really is a suggestion / encouragment to build a more explicit approach here as to videos. e.g. I wouldn´t have known the chapter TOC in the sidebar exists w/o stumbling across @sjivan s question here. so this is a feedback I wanted to give.
generally I think video deserves to be embraced as one of the central formats of information for modern research and I wanted to express my wish as a modern researcher that DT would generally have a proactive approach about working with videos, one easy to grasp / follow for general users.
after all, having such features as timed reference links and video chapters as TOCs in the sidebar is reason for celebration in principle. so I think this can be further elaborated, documented, discussed…
… but maybe all this would better belong in the Scenarios forum for now… hm…
again, thanks for the technical clarifications here!
How often are you running into videos with chapters - outside YouTube?
hey @Bluefrog,
I do very often. that is because my work is knowledge and media related (like maybe most research these days)
YouTube just included chapters as a factor into search results – because they know it´s informational gold. Vimeo, the other big platform for serious videos, I guess for the same reason, just introduced chapters for Pro-accounts. Lynda, one of the biggest players in learning videos, swallowed for that reason by mighty LinkedIn, also comes to mind… Microsoft Stream, Flowplayer, … …
then chapters are normal for a bigger part of – again knowledge / information heavy – podcasts. which further illustrates the principal meaning of timeline-related reference in mediated information contexts.
let me know if I should give more examples, resp. do a more thorough research. I am quite sure this would bring up many more interesting use contexts…
… and we haven´t even started talking about ‘AI’ and automated transcription and chapterization (at YouTube they call those Auto Chapters). something already taking off in different forms…
aside from that, to return the question: how often does one run into md- or latex-files when searching for text on the net? – not that often, I´d say too. that is related to the other side of the argument: I am also looking at the tools that knowledge workers use on their ‘private’, not-internet facing side for research. and there, in the very heart of the DT-demographics, I´d suppose you also find a lot of annotated video (and video tools) in different types of research. this is why there is a whole fleet of tools allowing for working with video markers and chapters or other such stuff – starting with FinalCut and the NLE-editors in general, to more specialized, but also very present software webDAV, Kyno, ELAN, ANVIL, Hive, Labelbox etc.
but maybe your question is related to a certain proposition. if so I would be interested to hear what that is.
Actually, our user base is much broader than ”knowledge workers”. 
You seem to be referring to sites supporting chapters. What about the video files themselves, i.e., you download a video and view it. Are the chapters embedded in it?
… depends on how you define it; or who does the defining
I am referring to people ‘collecting, organising, editing and annotating documents’ – in the broadest sense of all terms (including ‘documents’). to me it seems DT is geared to just that. and I take from the webpage its demography is “lawyers, teachers, journalists, researchers, students, and authors” – I´d have a hard time seeing a lot of difference to the way knowledge work is defined in current day sociology.
as to your second point (‘about the video files themselves’ and ‘embedded chapters’): good question. the question as question was part of my initial insertion. I am myself not sure / knowledgeable enough about how the chapter / marker logic is (coherently?) translated in technical file logics – after the demise of the MPEG-7 project. I think there are different technicals formats around, most not standardized yet. it seems to me to be a similar situation as to the one in which subtitles were before SRT really took the field. this is why my initial contribution asked for a knowledge exchange on this, rather than asserting anything specific here.
the general motif was first asserting the importance and indeed ascendance of timeline based reference for modern knowledge work. and then turn to the technical side. and turn to the community here, and the distributed practices, knowledges, and familiarities. looking for real discourse.
what I can say (and have also dropped in the parallel conversation around Sanjivs concerns ), is that there seem to be tools by now that allow for working with chapterization of videos in a way that is also compatible with YouTube and Vimeo chapters (ChapterWorks SX). but thing is: I do not know what format / technology is behind that. which is why I ask the community and people who could know…
… I am also referring to the many tools that allow for offline work with video markers and chapters. that was what I was referring to as ‘the other side of my argument’. see the list of referred-to tools which are used for annotation, transcription and ‘mark-up’ of AV media; often related to different forms of research (resp. research documents). so, it´s not a web-centric argument. it´s a research-centric one, maybe…
hm.
ok.
I hope time-line related information / documents / knowledge will become a topic for the DT-universe/-discourse eventually. While I might be wrong in my take / focus, I think this is obviously (increasingly) fundamental in a world of hypermedia and hypermedia documents. And it seems, as often unfortunately, Google / YT are the ‘avant garde’ where they shouldn´t.
Meanwhile, as this doesn´t seem to be of systematic interest for DT-development/-discourse at the moment, I am happy for individuals here sharing:
a) ways in which they work with timeline-documents in and around DT (directly, or indirectly)
b) insights into from people working with timeline-based research (AV related research; annotation techniques etc.), what they can share about systematizing this kind of work in digital research ecologies – including share insights about the state/trajectory of technic formats / interoperability / standardizations stemming from their work
– thanks already for sharing anyting with me & the discourse community!
[ I will also post this under ‘Scenarios’ as it might be the better and more appropriate context for taking this further – so replies might be better placed there too ]
I’m not so sure. Personally, i never watch videos for information because it simply takes too much time compared to simply reading. Eg watching people clicking on UI buttons and talking while they do it is just too much stuff for simple information. Not to mention bandwidth or storage when saving the videos. But then I’m not using all these other wonderful things with a bad noise to data ratio like Twitter, FB, Instagram.
But then I’m not using all these other wonderful things with a bad noise to data ratio like Twitter, FB, Instagram.
Amen! Preach it, brother! 
From my perspective, you’re right that clearly text-based content does have many advantages. However, I would agree with the OP’s premise that an increasing percentage of great content is available (only) in audio or video form. This extends from podcasts to free academic lectures and other online courses, which often go into greater depth of demonstration than books do. Looking towards the future, I would therefore also broadly agree with the OP that more features to facilitate working with videos in DevonThink would be most welcome.
Look, I’m not arguing that DT should necessarily take away resources from other crucial areas of development to add more audio/video-related features. It may be the case that this is simply not a focus for DevonThink currently, or something the developers ever want to pursue (which is obviously legitimately in their domain to decide). But the argument against this can’t be that audio/video is simply irrelevant for people seriously consuming and working with information…or equating video-based content with the BS that is indeed all over social media… that is just not reflective of the current information landscape.
Personally, I rely heavily on MarginNote when it comes to consuming and consolidating video-based content. Might be worth taking a look @lerone
I take from the webpage its demography is “lawyers, teachers, journalists, researchers, students, and authors”
True but this is just a handful of the people that use DEVONthink. However, what about historians? What about genealogists? What about mothers or fathers? Chefs? Mechanics *(shadetree or professional)?, etc. Like I said, we have a broader user base than people think we do 
That was not my argument. I just pointed out that the obvious importance of video seen by the OP might be a not so obvious.
But the argument against this can’t be that audio/video is simply irrelevant for people seriously consuming and working with information…
What about those who aren’t serious about it?
We are aware of the needs and desires of our user base. We also have to consider the number of requests as well as the feasibility. (And trust me, I have had many ideas in my decade with DEVONtech that have not been implemented because their appeal was too limited, i.e., one-off solutions.)
that is just not reflective of the current information landscape.
Note, this constant terraforming of what people like to call “knowledge managment” doesn’t necessarily mean we should always be adapting to those changes.
As with any such shift, the foundation is often unstable. Building on a small hill that suddenly appears, a hill that may erode into a valley in a few months or a year (e.g., Notion, Agenda, Roam, etc.) is not the wisest idea. With the few builders we have and the limited working hours each day, the domiciles we build must be carefully planned to stand for longer than that.
Apologies if I didn’t reiterate your argument as you intended it. In any case, my point was that the obvious non-importance of video seen by you might not be so obvious
Agreed! That’s why I never understand when people get mad in cases where their requests don’t get taken up. It’s one thing to state individual needs with conviction, but something else to take it personally if they are not taken up for development. It’s fully understood that DT needs to prioritize creating the greatest amount of value for the greatest number of users.
Agreed regarding Notion, Roam and the likes.
But is this reasoning really applicable to audio/video-based content? After all, it has been around for a long time and only grown in importance and uptake, with no indication that this will stop anytime soon. Again, fully understood if there are other priorities regarding resource allocation. All I’m saying is that audio/video is not going away and will likely keep growing.
thx for pointing to that and also relating to the deeper question at hand @AW2307!
yes, I am aware of MarginNote. and was deeper into it until recently. then it just became to cumbersome and byzanthine for my overall workflow because of it being a rather closed of file-garden (e.g. the PDF annotations don´t carry over to DT and the OS system) and it´s too unique and demanding UI-philosophy. but it was quite unique in it´s integration of PDF, Website annotation and Video!
also the link between PDF annotation and a very advanced / versatile concept map is something that still makes me look back with a tear / temptation regularly…
@BLUEFROG – with all due respect: I do not really see the argument here yet in your reply about the ‘user base’.
Ok, let´s assume the self-descritpion that DT gives does neither reflect the real user base, nor does it reflect the intended user culture – which leads to other question as to what the website represents…
why would the fact that other user groups enter the picture say anything about the relevance of audio- / video-documents and their informational relevance? I think this all could be taken deep into a media culture and sociology debate… but to keep it simple: I am a father myself – still this interests me obviously (also because of the family videos I produce, but that leads to other territories…); Also: what about ‘oral hisotry’, or film historians then? Aren´t they historians? Chefs these days is a good example, take a look at myrecipes.com, videoculinary.com, tasty.co – just to get some more illustrations yet for the argument that we see a general ‘videofication’ of vernacular culture – not just knowledge culture. (And if there is interest / need I can also provide the seed list for extensive literature on that continental role of video and audio in our digital culture).
Then, I think your point on ‘terraforming’ and ‘short lived trends’ etc. rather reflects what your real argument / sentiment here might be, has been all along. And so I am grateful you spelled it out in your answer to @AW2307.
But I also totally agree with AW2307´s reaction as to that:
So, while I also totally sympathize / empathize with such lines of argument pointing out every ‘new idea’ is running against ‘existing resources’, every dev team has to call priorities but also make ‘individualistic choices’ etc., I would at the same time underline @AW2307´s other point and put an exclamation mark to it: audio and video are modalities of media, and they are at the core of multi-/hyper-, documentary and broadcast-media now (to name just some aspects). so this is not about the vogues of this or that app or even platform / framework, and I think you conflate two very different pots of fruits here.
– just take the fact that 80% of internet traffic nowadays is video; or the fact that some label YouTube as 2nd largest search engine (even if that is a digital mytheme in some respects)… these are just some outer signs of that centrality of time-based media for modern media (and document) culture.
Or in the end maybe the self-description (definition?) of DT – again taken from the website – as tool for ‘intelligent collection, organizing, editing and annotation’ for ‘documents of any kind’ to ‘automatically analyse, connect und archive’ them should really be written and spelled out as ‘text-based documents’?!
Hello. I want to thank the OP for introducing this interesting use-case to the forum. I am a historian and have been using DT for my entire career now, and I have found it to be an excellent application for dealing with every type of media I use, including videos. Personally, time-referenced video data is not something I have used in the past or plan to use in the future, but it was nice to hear about how some users benefit from it.
feature requests
Speaking in general terms about how to deal with feature requests, not specifically about this one or the conversation so far, I think it’s a good idea to keep a few things in mind. (1) A feature request is a “request,” not a demand. (2) Any app developer has to balance each request against a number of factors–as users, we usually know the needs of a single person (ourselves) and what is an “essential” feature for one user may not: be of interest to others, be worth the time or money to implement, fit their roadmap, or be technically feasible. (3) What might seem simple to us is almost certainly more complex to implement–this is probably true of just about any request we make of anyone
productive directions
In this case, I think speculating about the future growth of video as a resource for knowledge workers, the composition of the DT user base, or the number of people who would benefit from new video-related features isn’t a terribly productive direction for us to take the conversation. Even for the DT staff, it’s probably difficult to speak with any certainty about any of these factors. As Bluefrog mentioned, the user base is quite broad, and probably not something easily encapsulated in one sentence on a website, no matter how detailed the explanation. To be honest, I don’t even know if I am a “knowledge worker,” at least in the sense that Drucker meant it when he coined the term over half a century ago, unless you characterize my research and teaching as products and services. If Drucker were alive today, he might pigeonhole me that way, but I hope the knowledge I’ve created (am I a knowledge creator?) is a lot more than a mere commodity in a capitalist economy, just as we users are (I hope) something more than simply consumers of DT’s product.
use cases
It might be more interesting (at least for me) to hear more about how someone is using the existing DT features to integrate video content into their databases, and through that discussion we might tease out some more concrete issues / solutions DT could consider for future improvements. It could also help other users discover new possibilities with the app.
my example
By the way, I haven’t got any videos in my main DT database at the moment (I like that I “can” put them in any time, and I have had them in my database in the past). Even though I literally use videos on a daily basis in my teaching and research–I have a lot of videos on my computer’s hard drive and even more in my external drives–one reason I don’t have any videos in my database is that they take up a huge amount of space and this leads to problems with syncing. I tend to consider the bulk of my data (about four terabytes) as a kind of “library” or “repository” that I reference from my “curated” DT database of essential files for research projects (a text file might contain a mention of the file name of the video, for example). DT is one of several specialized applications I use to do things with my repository of data-. I could imagine using MarginNote to deal with some of the files I have, but the return on investment (time and money) would not be very appealing for me–my current “zettelkasten” database of text files connected by wikilinks seems to cover most of the stuff MarginNote would do for me. Still, I’ll experiment with it.
my wishes and fishes
Ideally, I’d have all of my data in one place with one app (it’s really frustrating when I am looking for a file on my iPad during a business trip only to discover that it is on my external drive back in the office and totally inaccessible to me), and if I were going to hijack this thread and make a feature request, it would be to build an app that could manage four terabytes of data, but I am aware that there isn’t much out there for the average user that can deal with amounts of data that go beyond gigabytes (usually in the double digits at most), so even if DT was an enthusiastic supporter of my request, it is unlikely to get implemented anytime soon. I’d settle for just having my DT wikilinks that work so well in OSX available in iOS as well. If wishes were fishes, we’d all swim in riches!
Thanks again for the interesting discussion so far. Perhaps, like the wikilink example, there is something you can do, but a tweak here or there, an extension or adaptation of an existing design, might make it better. I look forward to reading more.
thx @FROGOBLIN, especially for approaching and reacting to the proposition / stimulus on it´s intended grounds and in the spirit(s) it was raised.
– just my reaction:
I agree to (1), (2), and (3)
I agree at large.
I agree the discussion of factual user base (esp. if unknown), future speculative directions etc. might lead astray. so in a way it might be better to boil it down to
a) the centrality of my personal uses of audio/video (e.g. I now use to mark loads of documentaries besides screening a lot of podcasts because they simply are troves of research; research often not to be found in writing in the same concise way, but also information that is denser because of the text/visual combination);
and b) pointing to the massive presence of AV documents, which – I think – is already a reality –… in all kinds of use cases / scenarios (see above)
– then, in contrast to (assumed) ‘user base’, I do think it´s productive to try to discuss an app on it´s intended territorial base / purpose / vision (– i.e. as proclaimed tool for ‘intelligent collection, organizing, editing and annotation’ for ‘documents of any kind’ for the purpose of ‘analysing, connecting and archiving’); also because there needs to be a shared understanding of that btw. developers and community of this (or rather: of what it means, entails etc.)
I am also aware and understand this is somewhat more complex and delicate in the case of an app like DT which proposes a more general 'document cultivation, as opposed to propositions like MarginNote, which allows for different things but – in principle – is based rather around one specific file format (PDF) and one use dimension (annotation / excerpting) and further ‘downstream’ processes…
… as to ‘knowledge worker’ as sociological category: yeah, let´s drop that. in a theoretical direction I´d rather bring up Lyotard, Lévy, Castells… but certainly am with you on not being boxed by Drucker and such. again to ‘boil down’ and simply put, my suggestion was this: a) ‘intelligent collecting, archiving, editing and organizing’, even more ‘analysing, connecting and annotating’… all that simply is ‘knowledge work’ – and that is certainly what we are all doing with DT; and b) documents are now in substantial scope non-textual (or rather para-textual) timeline-based, and this brings its own demands, structures as to all categories of a).
– one of the questions / directions to look at here is in what ways DT help or could help with ‘analysing, connecting and annotating’ video; and see in what ways it can tie in with other programs doing this (which brings us back to questions of technical standards; as currently YT-chapters seem the only example where an exchange w/ external systems really works as to timelines)
AW2307 systematized this question of internal affordances vs. third-party-apps alongside DT quite succintly:
(I´d also be interested in how you use video; and why there is no need for adressing the internal structures, even though you seem to use it extensively. in other words: if you use it extensively and intensively – why is there no need for something akin to headings, underlinings, chapters, index etc.?)
4.& 5) I am not sure I understand 100%, resp. I am not sure it is still the same issue. but I can somehow relate to this question of how a) to deal with the sheer size of AV-files and b) how to imagine an intelligent catch-all, all-in-one bucket app that deals with all my data-demands in one place – and across the network of devices
as to a) I am in the indexing faction, which in principal solves the concerns you seem to raise.
as to b) I am still marveling about DTs ability to have on-demand / managed downloads – and still index all items…! given that the real bottleneck in your 4TB scenario seems the network/intermittent server, this is as close as it gets to full data availability in a single app!
thanks again for your nunanced input / feedback / thoughts!
I just realised that the ‘like’ function really has more value than just karma insights 
Looking at the comments and the distribution of ‘likes’ in this thread, it is clear that there is a certain mood (culture) in the active forum demographic when it comes to media.
This is quite simply put ‘video’ / visual / audio information = ‘noise’ (– in the end it seems Shannon & Weaver are quite well these days… :-D). And it reinforces the impression that the DT culture is indeed based on a preference (bias) for (certain types of) text and textual documents.
… maybe it’s just good to register that thematising AV-media as a type and format of media does lead here to rather cultural objections like ‘Twitter noise’ or ‘video-equals-YT-equals-binching+equals-time-waste’. I do think such personal cultural and cognitive preferences are of course to be respected and no deeper evaluation of these opinions is meant. Every app has it´s culture. And it is good to be aware.
– But I do also think the discussion at this point never reached the topic – for some reason. Instead of AV-media as a general media mode and instead of things like MPEG-7, meta-data standards etc, we find discussed Twitter (an epitome of short-texting-culture), Youtube (as a general noise culture), personal time-coping strategies and preferences, takes on start-up app culture etc. pp.
I obviously come from a different culture where trans- and paratextual media documents (images, audio, video) have a greater value for my (knowledge/information) work. And as I said before, I also think that if one makes an alignment with the current state of media culture, ultimately there is no way around considering AV-media (and some other formats) as fundamental elements of the new ‘periodic system’ of 'documents; or around working with them and their (own) logics for that matter.
– And that was the point / spirit of bringing this topic / proposal / impulse to the forum.
But it is obvious that such a view on non-textual media is not really widespread here (check the likes).
Overall, I think it is good to understand what the cultural horizon (or bias) of DT is as a vision on a larger scale. This may help to adjust what you want to put forward (here) - and what you should not expect. … Besides annotated / metadata videos, this probably concerns people looking in directions like DT as an image bank; but it should also be important for all those new GenZ people living of podcasts etc…
Again, this could be a particular preference of the active user forum, but given some of the evidence of user requests as cited from DEVON-staff, it could also be that this is ingrained in the whole traditional user base of DT.
So for me, this discussion was not useless. Even if it did not really go in the direction I intended.
So, thanks to all 