Igor Pro 6 and QuickTime for Windows

With the recently announced security vulnerabilities in QuickTime for Windows, some of our users have asked us to specify the Igor Pro 6 Windows features that require QuickTime for Windows to be installed. 

BACKGROUND

Two security vulnerabilities in QuickTime for Windows were recently discovered, and it is reported that Apple considers QuickTime for Windows to be deprecated and will no longer provide security updates for this product. The only mitigation to these newly discovered vulnerabilities available is to uninstall QuickTime for Windows. Apple provides instructions for doing so on its Uninstall QuickTime 7 for Windows page.

IMPACT

Igor Pro 6 on Windows optionally uses QuickTime to provide additional features related to loading and saving some types of sound, image, and video files. Specifically, QuickTime is required on Windows for the following features:

IMAGES

• Importing image files of the following types using the ImageLoad operation or the Load Image dialog: PICT, GIF, Photoshop, Silicon Graphics, BMP and Targa.
• The ImageFileInfo operation. Because this operation requires QuickTime, it will return an error if QuickTime is not installed.
• Saving image files using the ImageSave operation except for raw PNG and TIFF files without color tables. The /IGOR flag must be used in order to save TIFF files when QuickTime is not installed.
• Saving a picture file representing an Igor window using the SavePICT operation or Save Graphics dialog with the /T flag. SavePICT without the /T flag does not require QuickTime.

SOUND

• Loading and saving sound files using the SndLoadSaveWave XOP that ships with Igor Pro 6 requires QuickTime on Windows. This XOP provides the SndLoadWave, SndSaveAIFF, SndSaveWAV operations and LoadWAVfile and SaveWAVfile operations. If you uninstall QuickTime, you can load simple .WAV files into Igor 6 using the LoadWAVfile.xop. To use LoadWAVfile.xop you must first remove SndLoadSaveWave.xop.

MOVIES

• Creating QuickTime movies using NewMovie. NewMovie can create AVI movies on Windows if the /A flag is used. Creating AVI movies dos not require QuickTime.
• Playing any type of movie within Igor Pro using the PlayMovie operation requires QuickTime. However, the PlayMovie operation is able to open movie files outside of Igor Pro in your default movie viewing program, which is typically Windows Media Player.

The above information about Igor Pro 6 applies specifically to Igor Pro 6.37 and later. Prior versions of Igor Pro 6 may use QuickTime for Windows in slightly different ways. Igor Pro 6.37 is a free update to all Igor Pro 6 license holders. The latest version of Igor Pro can be downloaded from http://www.wavemetrics.net/.

RECOMMENDATIONS

The 64-bit version of Igor Pro 6 and all versions of Igor Pro 7 and 8 do not and have never used QuickTime for Windows to provide any functionality. Also, the QuickTime for Windows installer prevented installations on a machine running Windows 10. Therefore, if you are using Windows 10 or one of the versions of Igor Pro that does not use QuickTime for Windows at all, your use of Igor Pro should not be affected if you choose to uninstall QuickTime.

Igor Pro 7 and Igor Pro 8 provide built-in support for some of the features for which Igor Pro 6 requires QuickTime for Windows. Specifically, Igor Pro 7 and 8 support:

• Importing BMP image files using ImageLoad or the Load Image dialog
• Saving image files as JPEG, TIFF, PNG, and raw PNG using the ImageSave operation (the /IGOR flag is no longer required)
• Loading and saving sound files using the new built-in SoundLoadWave and SoundSaveWave operations

If you have further questions on this matter, please contact support@wavemetrics.com.