Is there a universal way to hide srt subtitles in the txt file?

[jimdagys]

I am looking for a way to hide specific subtitles in the srt file. I want something to work with all media players with no change of settings in the media player. I don't want to change subtitle timing or delete the subtitle text in the srt file. I'm thinking there is a way to add a symbol, delete or change a symbol in the specific subtitle text entry, but I haven't found a way that works.

[Baldrick]

No.

[jman98]

Your question is very badly worded, but I think it may actually be possible. Why don't you just use a text editor? SRT files are just text file, so you could change something like this

17
00:02:34,000-->00:02:37,500
He didn't see them for a year, so he's really excited.

to this

17
00:02:34,000-->00:02:37,500
He didn't see them for a year, so he's really excited. *

Note the * I put at the end. Depending on what the symbol is, it may not be supported. Anything that gets beyond the standard 128 or so ASCII characters may not work, symbols in other languages may not work, etc. This is not rocket science. I mean you could just barely change the timings by making one barely shorter and adding a new short subtitle with whatever you want to follow it. As far as guarantee it will work work in "all media players with no change of settings", nobody can guarantee that. We can't even guarantee that standard English SRT files with nothing weird in them will work.

[Ai Haibara]

jimdagys: What are you trying to do? 'Watermark' your subtitles so that you'll know if someone else tries to take or use them? Or just change certain characters in an attempt to get a line to appear properly, etc.?

[jimdagys]

OK, I have a workable solution. I have attached the video and srt file below. I don't want the subtitles to appear from 9:40 to 10:54 because the text on that segment is in the video. However, I want the subtitles in the srt file with ordinal numerical reference so that students can quickly locate (when looking at the srt text on a smartphone) any particular subtitle that I might want to focus on. I made the subtitles hidden by keeping the duration short (0.001 second).

[jagabo]

Why don't you just insert a different ending time in front of the real ending time. Ie change:

17
00:02:34,000 --> 00:02:37,500
He didn't see them for a year, so he's really excited.

to this:

17
00:02:34,000 --> 00:02:34,000 00:02:37,500
He didn't see them for a year, so he's really excited.

Then it's easy to go back to the original duration. Inserting and ending time of 0 also worked and is easier since you can just paste the same 0 ending time into every sub you want to disable.

17
00:02:34,000 --> 00:00:00,000 00:02:37,500
He didn't see them for a year, so he's really excited.

It's also easier to erase them all with a global search and replace.

Some players might choke on the malformed timing though.