[ogg-dev] Re: [Vorbis-dev] "Any who has ever written an Ogg (de)muxer curses it's name frequently" (sic)

[Ivo Emanuel Gonçalves]

On 2/28/07, Ralph Giles <giles at xiph.org> wrote:
> specification you mean? Yes, those can go as appendicies to the vorbis
> spec, along with the ogg and rtp embeddings.

That seems a reasonable approach.

> Are you talking about tobias' directshow filters? They've not been
> maintained in years, and we've been recommending illi's instead because
> they were and seem to work better.

What I gathered about OGM was from the Wp article on it.  It says, OGM
is a hack of Ogg to get other codecs (MPEG 4, etc.) inside.

> We've got roadmaps a plenty. What we need is people doing things. :)

Word.


On 2/28/07, Michael Smith <msmith at xiph.org> wrote:
> But to suggest AVI is just unreasonable - AVI is more or less
> obsolete, and for good reasons.

I don't think anyone suggested AVI as a replacement for Ogg (good
heavens!).  That guy on Slashdot was making a comparison between them
both, in a reply to someone else.

> We're not opposed, in principle, to standardising an embedding of
> vorbis into _other_ more capable container formats. But the core
> developers don't really use those very much - after all, they're most
> commonly seen in use for using non-free video codecs with vorbis, so
> we'd need a proposal from the community - brought to us, for reasoned
> debate and discussion. Nobody's done that.

I haven't looked into the proposal of the MPlayer guys yet (linked in
a message after yours), but maybe it suffices our needs.  If not, I
think it's better that Xiph proposes its own Vorbis hack for AVI.  I
guess we have to take in attention Matroska and MP4 as well.

On 2/28/07, Eric Dantan Rzewnicki <eric at zhevny.com> wrote:
> Where would a person wanting to be doing things find these roadmaps?

Theora ToDo list on which anyone can contribute to get things done:
http://wiki.xiph.org/index.php/TheoraTodo

Google Summer of Code projects:
http://wiki.xiph.org/index.php/Summer_of_Code

On 2/28/07, Ralph Giles <giles at xiph.org> wrote:

> Well, there are todo pages at wiki.xiph.org, but I meant more in the
> community folklore sense. My point is a roadmap doesn't help much unless
> there are people committed to making things happen. That's been the
> problem with a lot of this stuff, and why it's been so nice to see the
> ambisonics work happening.

The situation on Ambisonics is tricky, because it depends on someone
coding a whole API for the different Xiph projects AND Monty being
available to apply whatever changes are need in Vorbis.

> If you're one of those people, ask on irc or the mailing lists if you
> want an orientation.

For those who don't know:
irc://irc.freenode.net
#xiph
#theora
#vorbis
...a few more channels

A list of all of our mailing lists may be found at:
http://lists.xiph.org/mailman/listinfo/

Infodump post.

On 2/28/07, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
> Official Xiph endorsement of patented codecs inside Ogg will cause
> problems for those who accept Ogg because it doesn't contain patented
> codecs. (Well there is xvid, but at least they call their files OGM).

It's not an endorsement.  Ogg is a container.  People are free to
throw whatever they want inside, and we should make sure that there's
some kind of standartization for this.  After all, if Ogg can only use
Xiph's formats, it's no better than proprietary containers.

> ... I fail to see the attraction from an adoption perspective. If
> someone is handing out oggs already then they are expecting the user
> to have special software to play them.

We dont want people to have special software.  Xiph's formats are
supposed to be built-in on operating systems.

> If the user has special
> software it's not unreasonable to expect that software to support the
> codecs that we offer.

The argument is about compatibility between that kind of software.
Imagine VLC and MPlayer render Ogg MPEG 4 Video differently.  They
will end up doing the same thing that guy on Slashdot was doing: blame
Xiph, because it didn't specify how they should interact with Ogg.

> Frankly, I see being non-encumbered a primary aspect of the Xiph brand
> identity. It would be foolish to step away from that just to remove a
> bullet point from the list of someone who is determined to complain.
> :)

Xiph will never step away from that goal.  That's the whole point of
why we are here.

Out of curiosity, are you the same GMaxwell from
Wikipedia/Commons/etc?  I salute you, then.  I follow your/his work
(occasionally), and you/he are/is really active there.



-Ivo