-----ABOUT SignStream® is a software tool designed to facilitate the linguistic annotation of video language data. Copyright © 2017-2025 Trustees of Boston University; distributed by the American Sign Language Linguistic Research Project (ASLLRP). SignStream® is licensed under the MIT license. See LICENSE.txt in this directory. SignStream® users must be aware that all external files distributed by the American Sign Language Linguistic Project (ASLLRP) (including Collection, video, and Sign Bank files) may have their own distinct end-user license agreements, which may put additional restrictions on SignStream's usage. External Libraries Used: --- Java AdoptOpenJDK https://adoptopenjdk.net/index.html --- GStreamer - Erik Walthinsen https://gstreamer.freedesktop.org/ --- GStreamer-Java gst1-java-core https://github.com/gstreamer-java/gst1-java-core --- JTransforms (FFT) https://github.com/wendykierp/JTransforms --- Swingx - Sun Microsystems https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.swinglabs/swingx --- For more details, see LICENSES-3RD-PARTY, NOTICES and dep/ -----SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS Operating Systems: - macOS Sequoia (15), Sonoma (14), Ventura (13), Monterey (12), Big Sur (11), Catalina (10.15), or Mojave (10.14). - SignStream® 3.5.1 may also work on older versions of the MacOS. Hardware: - Mac computer with 64-bit Intel or ARM (Apple Silicon) processor - If you use SignStream® 3.5.1 with the ARM processor: When you double-click on SignStream® for the first time--after following all installation instructions very carefully--you will be asked to install Rosetta (which emulates the Intel instruction set) if it is not already installed. You can then double-click on SignStream again to launch it. - 2 GB of RAM - 250 MB of hard drive space -----INSTALL/USAGE Before launching the SignStream application from the SignStream folder: 1) You will need to allow the launch of the SignStream® 3 application, despite the fact that it is not provided by Apple or certified developers (to get around security features that have been implemented in Mac Operating Systems since OS 10.8). 2) You will also be offered the opportunity to download the latest Sign Bank, which consists of a repertoire of signs, with gloss labels and annotations of other properties, as well as images and video illustration of those signs, to assist in the process of annotating new video files. This Global Sign Bank is not required for use of SignStream®. If you download the Sign Bank, you are agreeing to the terms of use below (which will also be downloaded to your SignStream folder). Open a Finder window, and double-click on the SignStream folder (the folder you downloaded, which includes the application and related files). Do the following, in the order listed: 1) [Required] You will see a file called “DisableQuarantine.command”. Double-click on that. You may get a message asking if you want to open the file even though it is from an unidentified developer. If so, say YES. If you get a message that the file cannot be opened because it is from an unidentified developer: a. Go into System Preferences > Security & Privacy > General b. Under the section "Allow apps downloaded from" click "Open Anyway" for this file. This will open in the Terminal application and run immediately, then close itself when finished. 2) [Optional] If you wish to download the ASLLRP Global Sign Bank, double-click on "GetSignBank.command". You will be asked whether you wish to download the Sign Bank and agree to abide by the terms of use. If you click ‘yes’, the download of the ASLLRP Sign Bank materials (and of the Sign Bank terms of use) will commence. Close the Terminal window. You will then be ready to launch SignStream® by double-clicking on the "SignStream3.app" file. Do not move this file out of its enclosing folder. The first time you click on the SignStream® application on ARM hardware, you will be asked to install Rosetta (which emulates the Intel instruction set) if it is not already installed. Click "Install" if asked. Once that is done, double-click again on the SignStream® application to launch it. Opening files last saved with older versions of SignStream: SignStream files that were last saved in a version of SignStream 3 prior to 3.3.0 cannot be opened with the current version of SignStream. To open such files, you will need to first open them with SignStream version 3.3.0 and save them; those saved versions will then be able to be opened with the current version of SignStream. If you do not have SignStream version 3.3.0 installed and need a link to download that version of the software for this purpose, please email Carol Neidle (carol@bu.edu) for a download link. (System requirements for version 3.3.0 will be detailed in the email reply.) -----UPGRADING THE GLOBAL SIGN BANK FILE Upgrading the ASLLRP Global Sign Bank file: When a new version of the Sign Bank becomes available, the next time you open up SignStream, it will automatically begin the file update process for you. Be sure to follow the instructions and questions given. This will download the latest version of the Global Sign Bank (once you have reaffirmed that you agree to abide by the terms of use) and put it in the proper location within the folder from which the command had been launched. If you choose *not* to update the Global Sign Bank file, the previously installed Global Sign Bank file will be deleted. signbank/globalSignBank.xml Aside from these updates, please do not modify any of the files and folders that come with SignStream®. -----FILES/SUBDIRECTORIES The following folders are included with SignStream®. Please do not manipulate these folders or their contents as they will prevent SignStream® from running correctly. newXMLfiles/ This directory stores data about participants, annotators, as well as important information about the structure of utterances, glosses, and nonmanual entries. signbank/ This directory stores the sign banks that contain a large number of different signs used in American Sign Language. SignStreamDatabases/ This directory is where collections created by the user are saved to by default. As SignStream® is a macOS Application, it can be opened like a directory through the terminal or by right-clicking on it and clicking "Show Package Contents". Again, we highly recommend against manipulating the contents of these files and directories, as it will prevent SignStream® from running correctly. -----VIDEO CODECS Video codecs and containers that work with the application; if your video is in a different format, you should first convert it to one of these: * MPEG-4 (.mp4, .mov) * H.264 (.mp4, .mov) * AVC1 (.mp4, .mov) -----KNOWN ISSUES --- Installation: 1) Issues can arise when any directory on the path to your SignStream installation contains a quote character ( ' ) or a double quote character ( " ), so remove these characters from your directories to avoid any problems. --- Macro-Unit Settings: 2) There is an inconsistency in how edits or additions to the local participant list are treated. --- Database and Utterance Windows: 3) In the Utterance View, the up/down arrow keys may not correctly move to the previous/next utterance. To activate the arrow key functionality in the left-most utterance index area, click once within the utterance display on the right. 4) The utterance index on the left side of the Utterance View is inconsistent in its text highlighting, sometimes black text on blue background and sometimes white text on blue background. 5) In the Utterance View, editing a nonmanual field value by double-clicking it to open the field value selection list and selecting a value will result in the left-most utterance index incorrectly highlighting only the selected utterance (in blue) while not highlighting the visible utterances (in gray). 6) If you hide the Utterance Window (how you do this depends on your Mac OS, e.g., by clicking on the title bar, in older OSs, or by clicking on the red button at the upper left of the window), the hidden window is not recoverable. You will need to Quit SignStream and reopen the utterance. Although you will not have access to Save File through the menus (because the Utterance Window is hidden), when you quit the program, you will be given the option to save the file. Be sure to save if you want to. Workaround: Don’t hide the Utterance Window. 7) Note that closing the Utterance Window will quit the program. That also means that during a search, closing the window displaying an utterance from the search results will quit the program, with no option to open a new search result. Closing the main SignStream window at any point will also quit the program. 8) The icons for zoom locking/unlocking may be duplicated momentarily upon opening a new collection. 9) The green bar location is remembered when opening or creating a collection. When switching collections, the video will start at time zero, but the green line will remain in the middle where it was for a previously opened collection. The position of the green bar is also remembered when a video file is replaced within a SignStream collection and re-displayed. --- Having more than 1 Temporal Partition and/or Segment Tier visible in the Utterance Window: 10) Utterance highlighting is not consistent when multiple segment tiers are showing in Utterance View. --- Morph-Phon and Sign Bank Windows: 11) Morph-Phon settings for a gloss can visually linger on the dialog window when opening up the Morph-Phon dialog again for a different gloss. 12) Morph Phon window "Enter" button behavior is not consistent in when it is enabled or disabled. 13) Currently, when you “insert all data” from the Sign Bank: a) Only the start and end handshapes of the sign will be inserted into the Morph-Phon window. In case there are additional handshapes, e.g., for a loan sign, you will need to add them manually. b) There may be errors in the insertion of information about sign properties when entered automatically from the Sign Bank (especially in regard to sign type for name signs that have a prefix before the ns- marking, e.g., “(M)ns-text” or “(2h)ns-text)”). Please be sure to verify that all information about sign properties displayed in the Morph-Phon window is correct before entering that information into the Utterance Window. --- Other: 14) Launching SignStream® causes the Terminal window to be activated. You should be aware of this, although it should not cause any issues. -----RELEASE NOTES FOR VERSION 3.5.1 Issues which have been fixed or newly implemented include: * This release is confirmed to work on MacOS 15. * The functionality to change the search domain within the search window has been restored. * On initiating a search within one collection, it possible to switch to another collection without closing the search window, retaining the existing search query and settings. * It is possible to switch between any number of collections while searching, but the user can search only one at a time. * When opening a new file from the search window, the file must be fully functional, including having video files selected (since it is not possible to re-select videos with the Search Window open). * While searching, the ability to manually open and close collections from the menus is disallowed, as is returning to the Database View. * The ability to save searches has been added, as well. You may save a search query that you have defined to a file on your system, and then re-open that same query later by opening the saved search file. * The Ctrl and Option keyboard keys now perform different functions when manipulating all types of entities. The Option key is now exclusively used for creating new Nonmanual/Gloss/Gesture entities, while the Ctrl key is now exclusively used for clicking on existing entities to bring up the context menu. * A bug related to entering the text for multiple glosses at the same time has been fixed. * When saving signs to the local sign bank, plus signs (+) at the end of a gloss indicating repetition are now stripped out before adding. * A bug which caused the utterance view to crash after creating a new nonmanual field has been fixed.