[vorbis-dev] Re: I'd like to join the OVD project

[Monty]

> > Here are my main points I want to get across as to WHY we want to do
> > OVD:
> [...] 

Hm, seems this is getting farther along...

> > In terms of format style, there are four basic general formats I'd like
> > to consider for OVD:
> > 
> > A) MPEG data format style (with a unique byte code header that never
> > shows up in data).  This is robust and proven.
> 
> This is fine.  I think Ogg is the bitstream format we should use.
> 
> > B) PNG data format style (contains basic headers to blocks of data, with
> > testing block available.)  This isn't quite as robust for streaming data
> > where the integrity is suspect, and resyncing after a garbled frame can
> > cause some problems.  There are some good features to this, however.
> 
> This (along with MNG) would make a good subpicture format as well.
> Multiple layers of subpictures with transparency and animation should
> accomodate a lot of things that have been done with DVD plus a bit more.
> 
> > C) XML data format style (plain text editable)  This has the added
> > advantage that we can create content with a simple text editor (as
> > opposed to a more complex hex-editor) and some debugging can be done
> > simply by examining the file content.  Post-script is another example of
> > something like this where the output is seldom actually looked at with a
> > text editor, although it is possible.  The primary drawback to this
> > format is that it isn't efficient with data storage, and has some access
> > requirement that may be unacceptable in a multi-media environment.
> 
> This is already incorporated into Ogg, and I think it would be good for
> metadata.

Incorporated in concept.  Ogg is intended for all these things, but we
only have the transport-layer code at the moment.  We are yet to code
the XML stream type to be built on top of Ogg transport or the
meta-transport header (that serves as a table of contents for the
transport stream structure).

These things are major and important aspects of what we want to do,
but it seemed wise to warn you that parts of it are still vapor.

> > D) Object hierarchy style (A list of object in a hierarchy where details
> > are listed with properties and child objects nested in the description)
> > This is used in Visual Basic as well as Borland's Delphi compiler to
> > store form information in the GUI description.  Both compilers also
> > "tokenize" this information as a binary format, so the verbose edit
> > screens aren't necessarily stored in that fashion.  It should be telling
> > that Borland is going to a format more like XML, however, because of
> > their recent move to Linux.
> 
> I believe this is something that has been mentioned for MPEG-7.  We should
> definitely try to learn as much as we can from the MPEG group, taking stuff
> where it makes sense and is free to take.

...And Ogg intends to use heirarchical, structured relationships
between individual logical streams as well. We'll be speccing this (as
part of meta-transport) in the next month or so; a good time to
leverage that foot you have in the door :-)

Monty

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