The .qt.smil File is opening in Real

The .smil file is the “steering” file that instructs the player to link together the media file and the caption file. Both Real and QuickTime use this same basic idea.

In Real:

  • The media file is typically a .rm file
  • The caption file is a .rt file
  • The steering file is a .smil (CaptionSync returns this as a .rt.smil file)

In QuickTime:

  • The media file is typically a .mov file
  • The caption file is a .qt.txt file
  • The steering file is a .smil (CaptionSync returns this as a .qt.smil file)
 
So… you see that both Real and QuickTime compete for the .smil file type. If you installed Real after you installed QuickTime, it will commandeer the .smil file type. When you launch your .smil file Real will launch, even if it is a .qt.smil file.

While you can easily fix this by assigning the .smil file type to QuickTime on your computer, this does not help you if you want to put your content on a website and link to the .smil file – it may work on your computer, but you cannot predict if your viewers have the .smil type associated with QuickTime or Real.

The solution is to use a fourth file called a .qtl file – this file points to the .smil, but forces it to open in QuickTime. The .qtl file is a very simple file that simply refers the player to the .smil. Here is what it looks like:

<body>
   <?xml version="1.0"?>
   <?quicktime type="application/x-quicktime-media-link"?>
   <embed src="mymovie.smil" autoplay="true" /> 
</body>

Keep in mind that the webserver needs to push this .qtl file as the correct type to the browser (or it will simply be displayed as a plain XML file in the browser). For Apache webservers this can done by adding a line in /etc/mime.types or /etc/httpd/mime.types as follows:

application/quicktimeplayer     qtl

For IIS webservers use MIME Types pane to add the same information in the IIS Manager.

 

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