Audio to SRT Converter

Purpose & User Intent: This tool converts audio tracks into SRT subtitle files. Target users include video editors, content creators, podcasters, educators, and accessibility teams who need ready-to-publish subtitles with accurate timing. It solves the problem of producing timed transcripts from audio without manual typing, enabling faster workflows and broader audience reach. Assumptions: input audio is in supported formats and language is known.\n\nCore Logic & Features: Core capabilities include automatic speech recognition with timestamp alignment, punctuation restoration, and optional speaker diarization. Required features: audio ingestion, language selection, output as SRT with timestamped lines. Optional/advanced features: alternative subtitle formats (VTT), chunking for long files, confidence scoring, and denoising. The tool operates in a stateless manner, producing a complete SRT from the provided audio. Examples: converter_audio.mp3 to subtitles.srt, language en, output time 00:00:01,000 → 00:00:04,500.\n\nInputs & Outputs: Inputs include audio_source (string path or URL, required), language (ISO 639-1 code, optional, default en), use_timestamps (boolean, default true), subtitle_format (string, default srt), chunk_duration (integer seconds, optional). Outputs include srt_text (string, UTF-8, SRT format), summary (object with duration and language), and optional alternative formats. Validation: audio_source must be non-empty; language must be two letters; subtitle_format must be in allowed set; chunk_duration if provided must be positive.\n\nAlgorithms & Calculations: Transcription uses acoustic model with timestamp alignment. Segments are created by voice activity detection; each segment yields a subtitle block with index, start and end times. Punctuation restoration and line wrapping are applied. If use_timestamps is false, times are omitted and a single block may be produced. Edge cases: silent segments produce empty lines and should be suppressed; long files may require chunking; unsupported formats produce an error code.\n\nError & Edge Cases: Missing audio_source returns error; unsupported format returns error; very low-volume audio may have low confidence; outputs are best-effort; in multi-language input, language code guides ASR; partial transcripts may require manual review.\n\nIndustry/Region & Localization: Uses UTF-8; timestamps use HH:MM:SS,mmm; SRT standard; supports ISO language codes; handles time zones if present in metadata.\n\nAssumptions & Exclusions: Assumes access to the audio file; no guarantee of perfect accuracy; no human-in-the-loop review by default; does not perform video processing or metadata stripping.