Review Mode
Status: Current Last updated: 2026-03-30 13:40 EDT
Review Mode helps you evaluate and correct alignment quality in CHAT files
produced by batchalign align. When align is uncertain about a timing
decision, it marks the utterance with a %xrev tier. Review Mode lets you
step through these flagged utterances, listen to the audio, and rate or
correct the timing — all without leaving VS Code.
When to use it
After running batchalign align --bullet-repair:
- Every utterance where align made a repair decision gets a
%xaligntier documenting what happened (e.g., “boundary averaged 155ms overlap”) - Low-confidence utterances also get a
%xrev: [?]tier — these are the ones that need your attention
Review Mode navigates directly to the [?] utterances, plays their audio,
and lets you rate them with a single keystroke.
What you’re rating
Each flagged utterance has a timing bullet (e.g., •12095_12335•) that
should correspond to where the words are in the audio. Your job is to
listen and answer: does this bullet point to the right place?
| Rating | Key | When to use |
|---|---|---|
| Good | 1 | Audio matches the text at this timestamp |
| Early | 2 | Bullet plays audio before the words start |
| Late | 3 | Bullet plays audio after the words start |
| Wrong | 4 | Hearing completely different content |
| Skip | 5 | Can’t tell, or don’t want to rate this one |
What the tiers mean
%xalign is machine-generated metadata. It records what the alignment
pipeline did and why. Never edit this tier — it’s the algorithm’s log.
%xalign: boundary_averaged overlap=155ms machine=12095_12335 adjacent=UEL:3
%xrev is your review. It starts as [?] (unreviewed). You change it
to your rating. You can also add notes after the rating.
%xrev: [?] ← before review
%xrev: [ok] ← after review (sounds right)
%xrev: [early] about 200ms before speech starts ← with a note
Visual indicators
Even without activating Review Mode, %xrev lines are color-coded in the
editor:
- Yellow left border —
[?]unreviewed (needs attention) - Green left border —
[ok],[corrected], or[stamped](confirmed) - Red left border —
[wrong],[early], or[late](problem found)
These decorations appear on any CHAT file with %xrev tiers, automatically.