feat:get timestamp for each command with flag --with-timestamp or -t

[Exar04]

Adds feature #584

[raphamorim]

I think is ok to leave as timestamp instead of with-timestamp

[raphamorim]

Hey @Exar04 thank you for the PR, it's indeed a nice feature to add. Two things though, could you add tests about this functionality? and second would be nice --timestamp if it actually receive an unix POSIX for retrieve timestamp like '%d/%m/%Y_%H:%M:%S:%N' would return 20/04/2025_11:47:43:32. It would allow people configure their timestamp in the way they would want to.

[Soviut]

One issue with this is that there isn't a separate timecode for each typed letter. One use case for the timecode is being able to add audio and this wouldn't be enough to add audio to each keystroke.

[Exar04]

I see @Soviut
seems hard to implement but I will give it a try.

@raphamorim yeah I will add tests at the end, after the complete feature is implemented.

[raphamorim]

Perfect, please lemme know if need help with anything. Feel free to ping on my discord

[Soviut]

I see @Soviut seems hard to implement but I will give it a try.

@raphamorim yeah I will add tests at the end, after the complete feature is implemented.

You could infer the current typing speed which is how frequently the Type command types a character. Then multiply that by the number of characters.

https://github.com/charmbracelet/vhs?tab=readme-ov-file#set-typing-speed

The TypingSpeed changes the speed globally. While, you can also change the speed of a single Type command.

To handle timecodes with milliseconds it's usually HH:MM:SS,mmm. There's also HH:MM:SS:FF that will capture the current frame, assuming we know the framerate.

[Exar04]

Does something like this works for you @Soviut ?

Also what should be the names for the the tags @Soviut @raphamorim

[Exar04]

20/04/2025_11:47:43:32

I mean its just a stopwatch. should it have dates and stuff?

[raphamorim]

Hey @Exar04 timestamp term isn't just about dates when comes to unix, but sure just allow formating time (hour, minute, second, millisecond) would be ok imho

[Soviut]

Does something like this works for you @Soviut ?

That's definitely more useful.

I think the : should be changed to something that does not appear in the timecode. Perhaps | or >

Also what should be the names for the the tags @Soviut @raphamorim

Do you mean the flags in the CLI?
I would go with:

--timing=timecode
--timing=timestamp

Where timecode produces 00:00:00.000 and timestamp produces milliseconds since the epoch.

[Soviut]

@Exar04 Here's a really good resource about timecode.

https://editingtools.io/timecode/

[Exar04]

Hey sorry, but I think I have not implemented the feature correctly. Theres a inconsistency in timecodes. I will have to take a deeper look into it later. Sry this might take longer for me to implement it

[raphamorim]

No stress/rush @Exar04 please take your time

[dzuelke]

Just a thought here: making the timecodes compatible with the FFmpeg metadata format (https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-formats.html#Metadata-2) would allow for relatively easy tagging of videos with chapter markers (http://ikyle.me/blog/2020/add-mp4-chapters-ffmpeg or https://medium.com/@dathanbennett/adding-chapters-to-an-mp4-file-using-ffmpeg-5e43df269687 for details).

In fact, imagine -t=chapters, and a new .tape command like Chapter, that accepts a chapter name as the argument - the entire FFmpeg file could be auto-generated, and then the resulting .mp4 has chapter markers!

[dzuelke]

@Exar04 this "inconsistency" seems normal to me - computers don't always perfectly execute everything at the same speed. The sleep commands are pretty spot on (+/- 2 milliseconds), so I think it's fine?!

[pkazmier]

I don’t think wall clock is sufficient as drift becomes large. Instead, I used the captured frame to derive the timestamp as I describe in discussion #702.