[vorbis] The OGG Extension...

[Bjarke Hammersholt Roune]

I've been lurking on this list for a while, but this issue just annoys
me too much to keep my mouth shut.

I don't see any benefits what so ever to having a common .ogg extension
for all vorbis files. That vorbis audio and video files happen to have
an identical format is irrelevant to this point.

It seems to me that the arguments supporting having only one extension
all go along the lines of "well, that's not really a problem; you just
need to add a little bit of complexity to application X".

Several people have pointed out numerous unnessecary inconviniences to
having a single extension. These inconviniences are not show-stopping
problems, but in most cases, the solutions that have been proposed to
alliviate are non-standard, aswell as being inconviniences by
themselves.

All problems I am aware of evaporate with the introduction of different
extensions for different content types. Or, more truthfully, the hardest
problem left is finding out what the extensions should be.

This leads me to the below reply.

(reading my own reply, I would like to say that I'm not really trying to
sound hostile, rather, I'm trying to be concise in presenting my points.
Please have this in mind.)

> Come on...  the launcher is an addon.  And it's only needed IF you want
> your video files going here, your audio files going there, and your
> animations going way over there.  For typical users, .ogg will bring up
> their favorite media player and all will be well.
>
I am reasonably sure that Joe Average Windows User uses Winamp to play
audio files in most of cases, and that he uses MS Media Player to view
video, if he feels so inclined. The reason for this is that Joe Average
really likes Winamp, and now that he has learned the interface, knows
how to start it up, might even have learned the hotkeys, you're going to
have a hell of a time telling him that he's been doing things wrong and
that he should use MS Media Player for everything, because Winamp
doesn't do video, and therefore is not suitable for playing .ogg files.

Saying that Winamp in fact should play video files is wrong. Winamp is a
program that plays sounds. It might have some plugin capabilities that
allows it to do other things, but unless Joe Average has requested
otherwise, he will expect Winamp to do what it was made for: play audio.
When his computer doesn't do what Joe Average expects it to do, Joe
Average is, to say the least, not pleased.

This exact same argument can be used for any audio-only player.

> > The only other point that stands on it's own is the fact
> > that OGG is the format for all of the specifications.
> 
> Ok, name me one media plyaer that supports video that doens't also do
> pretty well with audio by itself.
>
I fail to see how this question refutes the point made.

> As for the audio only players, why are they audio only?
>
Possibly because the people who made it thougth that they would like to
make an audio player. Kind of like when I want to go for a walk, but
don't feel like going for a run. I could, but that's beside the point,
because that's not what I have in mind.

> Because they can't play proprietary video.
>
An audio-only player can't play video of any type, not even
non-proprietary video.

(I am aware that most or all widely used video formats currently are
proprietary)

> Well if they could they probably would don't you think?
>
If the makers of a audio-only player incorporated into their program
video support to such a degree that the player really could play video,
I doubt they would just leave at that. Noticing the keyword
"audio-only", I have my doubts as to whether they would want to do this.
Some will, but certainly some will not.

> Especially if the decoding was done for them in
> libtarkin (or whatever it gets called).
>
Not if what they want to create is an audio-only player.

> This argument is silly.  A typical user will click on an ogg file and it
> will just work.  Case closed.
>
Things will indeed not just work if an audio-only player is asked to
play a vorbis file that includes video.

> How will hte player know if it's audio or video?  easy.  THe plugin can
> tell it.
>
If the player is audio-only, it follows by definition that it will not
ask for, and certainly not play, the video part of a vorbis file that
includes video.

> We actually have quite a good relationship with most of the creators of
> these players, and I know that Sonique at least will be doing video as
> soon as they can.  I can't speak for Rob, but I'm sure Freeamp would
> too.  Xmms already does for MPEG i think, so the argumnet about audio
> players vs. video plyaers doesn't have any weight.
>
Your conclusion does not follow from your premise, since there in the
future still will be audio-only players, even if the players you mention
will no longer be audio-only players.

> For power users, who want really customized systems, well, they can use
> a launcher, hack it to work, or whatever.
>
I don't see a reason to require the power user to make himself familiar
with a new tool, when this is not nessecary. That he might very well be
capable of working your proposed solution doesn't mean that he would not
prefer a standard solution.

> For the average joe, clicking
> on a file and knowing it will play is a big plus.
>
I wholeheartedly agree, but I fail to see how having only one extension
as opposed to having more helps towards achieving this goal.

> Windows usually hides
> the extensions anyway, so differentiating based on them is just silly.
>
It would seem you do not spend alot of time using Windows, or there is
something I have seriously misunderstod.

Windows uses different icons to represent different kinds of files.
Executable files have one icon, Word documents have another, and so on.
The benefit of this is that a user can at a glance see what type of data
a file contains, even if they may not be familiar with the extension.
That windows does this is also the reason that it hides the extensions
(a feature that can be turned off), since they no longer are needed to
identify the type of a file.

Thus, if a vorbis file containing only audio have a different extension
from a vorbis file that contains video, Windows will be able to give a
clear visiual indication of this through the icon used to represent that
file. If all vorbis files have the same extension, there is within the
bounds of my limited knowledge not a workable way for Windows to do
this. So, it's not silly.

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