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Topic: What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall) (Read 91525 times) previous topic - next topic
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What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #50
>This sadly means that there's apparently little time to e.g. review the AoTuV changes.

Then the reigns should be passed on to a suitale replacement (advertise for one), having someone who is effectively a spanner in the works (nothing against monty, but that is how it appears) is counter productive.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #51
maikmerten
I absolutely agree with everything you wrote. There are really great and free formats developed by Xiph.org, but you missed one point. Xiph.org badly failed in distributing those technologies to end users. Now many people might say: "I don't care about others and what they are using. I'm happy with Vorbis, I know how to create and play my files, so what's wrong." It's easy. We need end users and we need a lot of them. Why are there DVD players with MP3 and AVI/MPEG-4 (AKA DivX) support? Why almost all portable players, cellphones or car radios support MP3? Because many people are using these formats and if the device supports it, it is a big advantage in the market. So we need a lot of end users to gain support in as many devices as possible. But we won't have many users as long as there is a poor support for the format. So it is a vicious spiral. And we need to get out of it, soon! It's very similar to Linux - great operating system, which is to difficult for end users. And it also lacks support from most SW and HW makers.

I would never buy a player without Ogg Vorbis support, but how many people like me are out there? I'm afraid only a few. So Ogg Vorbis doesn't give a company much bigger advantage in the market. If we can change it, it will bring much more Ogg Vorbis users and therefore also much more support in HW players.

I think there really is a need for a simple to use tools to create and play Ogg files. One application, which would take whatever input (AC3, DTS, DVD, CD, AAC, MP3 etc.) and convert it to Ogg Vorbis. Then a video converter would be needed - convert AVI, DVD, WMV, MP4, MOV to Ogg Theora/Vorbis. People will also prefer an official player. VLC would be a good choice for video and maybe Winamp for audio. Then there should be links to add support to other players - Illiminable's filters for WMP, plugin for iTunes, Real Player etc. Ithink most of the tools are already out there, but it is difficult to find them or they don't have a user friendly GUI.

I think Xiph.org should now concentrate on the task to deliver the formats to end users. Else all the great ideas and many ours of programming and testing would run to waste.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #52

Vorbis II is just a bunch of ideas and graphs but nothing funcional (vapourware too) or in active development, note that the name of Vorbis II will probably not be used because Monty dont like it, it will be know as "Ghost", so the correct name for Vorbis II is Ghost...

I thought Ghost was Speex II, with the Vorbis I psymodel.


No, there was a seperate thing where JM borrowed some parts of the Vorbis psymodel to add to Speex, and we presented a paper about it.  Ghost has nothing to do with that.

Ghost is at the same point right now that Vorbis was in late 1998, early 1999.  There will be nothing anyone outside the org will see [well, care about] for the most optimistic minimum of a year.  Vorbis's failures in hardware adoption was not because the industry hated us.  There were several technical reasons Vorbis was hard to adopt for low end hardware manufacturers, and that's something we have to fix in time for Ghost.  The other reason for Ghost is that I don't want to keep tweaking the same old, I want to make a very big tech leap... the difference between replaying old levels over and over to squeeze out an extra second on the timer, and actually levelling up...

The primary reason it will not be named Vorbis II is because the codecs have virtually nothing in common.  I know that doesn't stop MPEG, I don't really care.

And for those who care, Sushivision is a visualization tool I built as part of the Ghost dev effort.  It's not meant for external consumption, at least not yet.  It's still cumbersome to set up.

(Oh hi, I'm back.  And it's nice to see you're still around Emmett.)

>This sadly means that there's apparently little time to e.g. review the AoTuV changes.

Then the reigns should be passed on to a suitale replacement (advertise for one), having someone who is effectively a spanner in the works (nothing against monty, but that is how it appears) is counter productive.


Well, in terms of Vorbis, that is what Aoyumi has done.  I offered making AoTuV an official Xiph project (or an officially sanctioned external project, or some sort of official status) and he balked at that.  I don't blame him.  He's doing his own thing, doing it well, and enjoying himself.  Why screw it up?

I've told anyone who's asked that AoTuV is the best of the Vorbis encoders out there that I know of.  There is nothing dodgy or unofficial about it.  I'm enjoying having a healthy third-party project advance the encoder.

As for me, I'm going to continue doing what I enjoy, and that's the codec research.  I have no interest in being an executive.  It doesn't make me happy.  Being an R&D engineer makes me happy.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #53
>AoTuV an official Xiph...balked at that

You just need a maintainer, take any stable releases from AoTuV and push them directly onto Xiph, with the correct compiles. Roberto practically does all that on rarewares, just needs doing on Xiph.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #54
The primary reason it will not be named Vorbis II is because the codecs have virtually nothing in common.  I know that doesn't stop MPEG, I don't really care.

"Common folks" will still call Ghost "teh .ogg" anyway, just like it is with Vorbis at the moment (although that has changed a bit over the last couple of years).

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #55
An interesting new initiative: Play Ogg.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #56
That's good news! Thanks for the link. I'll incorporate the nifty image into my sigs (in other forums, that is )

Edit:

Bleh, their link: http://www.fsf.org/resources/formats/playogg consumes a lot of BBsig chara's.

I've shortened it to: http://tinyurl.com/2b7l5e


What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #58
On the http://playogg.org/ page I see no links to Xiph.org under "What is Ogg?" at least Xiph.org should have been mentioned there. It solely links to the Videolan site... that's odd. Only under "resources" there's a small hint at the "inventors" and the press release has a link to the Xiph.org, too, saying that it's the place to get "technical details", gosh! Technical Details!  Besides I only see "donate buttons" for FSF at the playogg site...

Well, this is typical for the FSF, while I agree with their agenda in general, I doubt their publicity powers. Again it's "FSF here and FSF there and FSF everywhere. And oh, please use Ogg Vorbis, it's great."

IMHO http://vorbis.com/ is better for someone new to Ogg Vorbis than http://playogg.org/... ...and there's a donate button for Xiph.org at the Vorbis.com site, too.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #59
[..] IMHO http://vorbis.com/ is better for someone new to Ogg Vorbis [...]

The FSF presentation seems good to me, but VLC may not be the best option, or maybe it should not be the only one mentioned...

So, I’ll be using the xiph fish with a link to vorbis.com :-) but there is something that I find confusing there:

http://vorbis.com/setup_windows/

DirectShow based players only need the Illiminable filters from above.

I think it should read:

Only DirectShow based players need the Illiminable filters from above.

Am I right, or is it my English?

Also, VLC is not listed on the above page (while it is listed on the Linux and OS X pages) :-|

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #60
So, I’ll be using the xiph fish with a link to vorbis.com :-) but there is something that I find confusing there:

http://vorbis.com/setup_windows/

DirectShow based players only need the Illiminable filters from above.

I think it should read:

Only DirectShow based players need the Illiminable filters from above.

Am I right, or is it my English?

Yeah, you are right about that sentence. They are also a bit focused on their special DS-filter. While I generally like it when people advocate Window's own Direct Show system for video playback instead of all-in-one players like VLC, I think it's a bit too far fetched for just an audio codec. But the DS-filter they're advocating here also supports the other Ogg-* multimedia codecs, maybe that's the motivation for promoting it there?

Also, VLC is not listed on the above page (while it is listed on the Linux and OS X pages) :-|
VLC really is not needed for Ogg Vorbis playback on Windows at all... there are better standalone players for that, like good old foobar2000. I'm sure that's the reason why it wasn't mentioned.

Still it's the misleading to say "DirectShow based players only need the Illiminable filters from above.", and then list non-Direct-Show players in the list below that sentence... 


Well, at least the Vorbis.com page does show you choices, although it is not free from flaws... which leads us to one of the very subjects of this topic again.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #61
Demetris> IMO both sentences are correct. It depends on what you want to say. But the original one makes more sense to me. It says in other words: "If you want to play Ogg files in a DirectShow based player, all you have to do is install Illiminable filters". But your sentence says: "Other then DS players don't need Illiminable filters to play Ogg files." This is not really true. English is not my native language, but this is how I feel the meaning of the 2 sentences. I hope I'm right.

According to VLC and why they chose it: VLC plays Ogg Vorbis/Theora/flac/Speex without the need to install anything else. And it has a plugin for Firefox. MPC can't even play Ogg Vorbis without a DS decoder (OggDS, Illiminable, ffdshow, CoreVorbis etc.) foobar2000 is my favorite player, but it is not a player for an average Joe. I would suggest him Winamp, but it is not opensource. AmaroK is great, but so far only available on Linux (might change with KDE 4 this autumn). So on Windows I would probably suggest MusikCube as the best opensource audio player. Later maybe SongBird might become interesting.

But Ogg is not just audio. Don't forget about Theora. If you want a rock solid player with complete Ogg support out of the box, I think VLC is the only choice.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #62
But leaving out Winamp, which is the de facto most widely used media player in the Windows world, don't really push the popularity of Ogg Vorbis. IMO people will think, "Gosh, why must I install something else?" Just merely pointing out that Winamp supports Ogg Vorbis will make people think, "Oh? Winamp supports Ogg Vorbis? Gee, I should check this out."

Just my $0.02.

Edit: Soooo... what site should I link my sig-button to? playogg.org? or vorbis.com?

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #63
I think that they choose VLC for various reasons... and all are perfectly valid for me...

1) It's free software... <-- Is promoted by the FSF...
2) It's GPL. <-- Again a plus for the FSF.
3) It's cross-platform. <--Very important, its where many players fail.
4) It support Ogg/Vorbis/Theora out-of-box. <-- No need additional codecs for lazy users, no configuration only open and play.
5) It's a rock solid player. <-- like vlada said.
6) It have a Firefox -and IE- plug in (how many players have this). <-- Not critical but a plus...

Well these are just a few... and probably this is the only player that have all this requirements.

Maybe in MS Windows we have better choices like illiminable oggcodecs (or HaaliSplitter + ffdshow), using your favorite DS player... in MacOS X there is XiphQT (I'm not sure how stable/good is)... in GNU/Linux there is support out-of-the box in all mayor distributions...

Don't start to criticize, why they don't put Winamp, foobar2000, WMP, AmaroK, X, Y, Z player!!!! they only put the only player that have all the requirements above. Winamp need additional codecs if you want to play Theora (and is not free software), foobar2000 don't even play video (and is not free software), WMP needs ALL the necessary codecs installed (and is not free software)... Every other player fails at least in one point of the above... I mean an audio-only player is not the best option, there is theora...

It's a Free Software Foundation campaign... it have a few days released and it's not perfect... they don't promote Theora or even mention it, but I'm sure that they want to promote Theora too (in the test use an Ogg Theora+Vorbis)... maybe they need a little more (professional) help to get the campaign fully working.

Quote
...MPC can't even play Ogg Vorbis without a DS decoder...
MPC (Media Player Classic) can play Ogg Vorbis out-of-box in the latest version (probably a few months ago)...
JorSol
aoTuVb5 -q4

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #64
Okay, you have a point there, jorsol.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #65
I still remember this one too...

In my opinion vorbis.com needs a good CMS !!!

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #66
Okay, you have a point there, jorsol.

Very good one actually. Of course, they won't mention software that is not "free". How could I forget that... 

Still a few more hints at Xiph.org (they need money from donation, too) would have been polite.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #67
Quote
...MPC can't even play Ogg Vorbis without a DS decoder...
MPC (Media Player Classic) can play Ogg Vorbis out-of-box in the latest version (probably a few months ago)...


I'm not 100% sure, but I think the last official version (6.4.9.0) doesn't support Vorbis. You're of course right, the latest builds support Vorbis.


What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #69
Ogg community it says. Although I know little Japanese, Chinese character it is.

 

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #70
What do they say? Is this Japanese? I think I’m going to use them anyway. :-)

It says Ogg Village and it's the logo of www3.to/oggv, which is supposed to link that site.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #71
Enig123 and haregoo, thanks for the answers! :-)

I wish xiph offered some 88x31 buttons to link to their site. These Japanese buttons are the only ones I liked after a quick search, but maybe it is not perfectly right to use them for linking to vorbis.com...

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #72
That's good news! Thanks for the link. I'll incorporate the nifty image into my sigs (in other forums, that is )

Edit:

Bleh, their link: http://www.fsf.org/resources/formats/playogg consumes a lot of BBsig chara's.

I've shortened it to: http://tinyurl.com/2b7l5e


*Sigh*

What a pig's ear of a page! I've no right to complain, since I don't use the format (although I have in the past), and was only reading all the current HA threads out of curiosity. But not only does the page look horrible it invokes horizontal scrolling - which is a big no-no in web design. Or at any rate it does in my browser, perhaps not in all. Perhaps it's a coding error - the page doesn't validate.

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #73
What a pig's ear of a page! I've no right to complain, since I don't use the format (although I have in the past), and was only reading all the current HA threads out of curiosity. But not only does the page look horrible it invokes horizontal scrolling - which is a big no-no in web design. Or at any rate it does in my browser, perhaps not in all. Perhaps it's a coding error - the page doesn't validate.
Eh? It doesn't scroll horizontally on me (FX 2.0.0.3, 1024x68).

What is going on with Vorbis? (or Xiph overall)

Reply #74
Nick E
There are some IE compatibility hacks in the page. But it probably doesn't work. But I think the suolution is to use a proper browser.