Fragments

Fragments is a desktop app for building and exporting scripted playlists from video and audio fragments.

Documentation: https://ahunior.github.io/fragments/guide.html

What It Does

Fragments helps you build repeatable playlists from small pieces of video and audio.

• Trim exact ranges, reorder fragments, add delay, mute or keep audio, inspect fragment drafts, recover missing media, and play or export the final playlist.
• Use it when you need a fast fragment-based workflow instead of a full timeline editor.
• The original media files are not modified.

Quick Start

1. Add local video or audio files to create fragments.
2. Trim each fragment by setting the start and end points visually.
3. Add optional delay, labels, notes, audio settings, volume, speed, and delay color.
4. Use Play All to run the full playlist like one assembled video made of fragments.
5. Save the playlist JSON or export it to MP4 or GIF when you are ready.

The playlist format is JSON:

{
  "version": 1,
  "name": "playlist_one",
  "repeat": false,
  "createdAt": "2026-06-05T18:23:00.000Z",
  "updatedAt": "2026-06-05T18:23:00.000Z",
  "items": [
    {
      "file": "file:///path/to/video-a.mp4",
      "start": 1.0,
      "end": 12.0,
      "delayBefore": 0.0,
      "delayColor": "#000000",
      "audio": true,
      "volume": 1.0,
      "speed": 1.0,
      "label": "Opening",
      "notes": "Use the first clean take."
    }
  ]
}

The JSON Schema is available at docs/playlist.schema.json.

Build

Requirements:

• Qt 6.5 or newer
• CMake 3.24 or newer
• A C++17 compiler

cmake -S . -B build-desktop \
  -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=/home/jr/Qt/6.11.0/gcc_64 \
  -DCMAKE_CXX_COMPILER=/usr/bin/c++
cmake --build build-desktop
./build-desktop/fragments

Current Scope

• Add media fragments from local files
• Scrub source media and adjust start/end handles visually
• Edit start/end time, delay, delay background color, audio, volume, speed, label, and notes
• Undo and redo playlist edits
• Duplicate fragments
• Keyboard shortcuts for save/open, undo/redo, fragment preview, duplicate, delete, reorder, and setting start/end from the playhead
• Save and load playlist JSON files
  • Playlist files are validated against the documented JSON structure when opened
• Reopen recent playlists
• Recover missing local media by relinking individual files or scanning a folder
• Play the playlist sequentially with optional delay before each item, so it behaves like one assembled video made of fragments
• Export valid local playlists to a combined MP4 render with ffmpeg
  • Export normalizes mixed media to 1280x720, 30 fps, H.264 video and 48 kHz stereo AAC audio
  • Audio-only fragments render over the chosen delay color; muted or video-only fragments get silent audio
  • Fragment delays export as colored/silent gaps before the fragment starts
• Export valid local playlists to an animated GIF preview
  • GIF export has no audio, supports 15-60 fps, offers low/medium/high quality presets, and uses an ffmpeg palette pass

Package

See PACKAGING.md for platform-specific release steps.

Flatpak (Linux)

The recommended Linux distribution method. Installs Qt, GStreamer, and ffmpeg automatically:

flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://dl.flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
flatpak-builder --user --install --force-clean build-flatpak \
    packaging/io.github.ajunior.fragments.yml
flatpak run io.github.ajunior.fragments

Other platforms

Expected release downloads:

• Windows: fragments-0.44.6-windows-x86_64.zip
• macOS: fragments-0.44.6-macos-universal.dmg
• Linux (plain archive): fragments-0.44.6-Linux-x86_64.tar.gz

Build and run the test suite before packaging:

cmake --build build-desktop
ctest --test-dir build-desktop --output-on-failure

Create the current Linux install tarball from the build tree:

cpack --config build-desktop/CPackConfig.cmake

The generated CPack tarball contains the Fragments binary plus desktop, metainfo, and icon files. It expects compatible Qt runtime libraries on the target system.

Dependencies

Runtime

Fragments requires Qt 6.5 or newer at runtime (Core, Gui, Qml, Quick, QuickControls2, Multimedia). All fonts and icons are bundled inside the binary.

Video and audio playback depends on a platform multimedia backend:

• Linux — GStreamer. Install the base plugins plus codec support:

  Fedora / RPM-based:

  sudo dnf install gstreamer1-plugins-good gstreamer1-plugins-bad-free gstreamer1-libav

  Ubuntu / Debian-based:

  sudo apt install gstreamer1.0-plugins-good gstreamer1.0-plugins-bad gstreamer1.0-libav

  Without these, media files will not play.

• Windows — Windows Media Foundation is built in. No extra install needed.

• macOS — AVFoundation is built in. No extra install needed.

Export (optional)

Export to MP4 or GIF requires FFmpeg. The Linux Flatpak includes FFmpeg support automatically; other builds need ffmpeg and ffprobe on PATH.

Fedora / RPM-based (requires RPM Fusion):

sudo dnf install ffmpeg

Ubuntu / Debian-based:

sudo apt install ffmpeg

Verify the install:

ffmpeg -version
ffprobe -version

MP4 export requires a FFmpeg build with the libx264 H.264 encoder, AAC encoder, and the scale, pad, fps, format, setsar, tpad, atempo, adelay, and aformat filters.

GIF export requires the same as MP4, plus the palettegen and paletteuse filters.

The app checks for all of this at startup and shows a specific message in the Export dialog if something is missing.

License

Fragments is released under the GPL-3.0-or-later license. See LICENSE.