FFmpeg Finally Releases Long-Awaited Version 0.5

An anonymous reader writes "After many years of release-free development, FFmpeg, the most widely used audio and video codec library, has finally returned to a regular release schedule with the long-awaited version 0.5. While the list of changes is far too long to list here, some high-profile improvements include the reverse-engineering of all Real video formats, WMV9/VC-1 support, AAC decoding, and of course vast performance improvements across the board. To commemorate the 'lively' discussions predating the release, 0.5 is codenamed 'half-way to world domination A.K.A. the belligerent blue bike shed.' The new version can be downloaded from the official website." As another reader points out, FFmpeg is what makes some open source multimedia apps (like MPlayer, Xine, VLC and Kdenlive) so versatile.

M!!

[xtracto]

the reverse-engineering of all Real video formats,

Sweet! does that mean that we are going to be able to play rmvb in the Wii soon?

easier blu-ray on linux?

[je ne sais quoi]

I noticed on the release notes that ffmpeg now supports TrueHD as well as the VC-1 for video, these are both commonly used on blu-ray discs. Maybe we'll get lucky and at least now we'll be able to play our blu-ray disc tracks on linux after we remove all the DRM, & HDCP nonsense. We could sort of do it before but it's a royal pain in the ass: just last night I had to go through about four different media players to blue-ray tracks in trueHD audio and some other weird video format before I found one that could actually play my disc without spewing out error messages every frame. Even then it seemed like the dolby 5.1 sound was messed up -- the voices were coming from behind us and the music from the front.

That was always the most confusing part too

[coryking]

There never was a real build for ffmpeg. Now that they've got a stable release, I wonder when they will start pushing out official builds for various platforms (say, Win32/64)?

That said, could they actually push out binaries? One of the strange things with ffmpeg is that pretty much everywhere you go, it is compiled different. One system's ffmpeg will have a bunch of codecs installed and another will not. You can never really count on having something like H.264. Hell, I've seen one installation that didn't even have libmp3lame on it! Reminds me of PHP in many ways--so many damn compiler flags that you are pretty much guaranteed every system will be different.

Is this a legal thing, or a "we dont have a good build process yet" thing?

FFmpeg in SUPER

[DynaSoar]

FFmpeg is extremely powerful and versatile. Those words are, for the newer user, synonymous with difficult and confusing when the program is based on command line or a very simplistic front end. FFmpeg is very fully implimented (along with MEncoder, ffmpeg2theora and RealProducer) in the free audio and video format and parameter conversion front end software SUPER, from erightsoft.com. Free to download and use but not FOSS: small loss since it is, after all, intended for the majority of users who'd have trouble running such as FFmpeg native, those users hardly likely to want the source anyway. There are very few functions of the internal programs not implemented (setting a max output file size is one of the few). SUPER is extremely powerful while having every available function made as obvious as possible (and all have float-over hints), making it also useful as a training device for learning audio and video compression and conversion. The authors of SUPER clearly and repeatedly insist that their program is simply a front end, and that all credit for the power inside their program go to the programs they've built their around, and the authors thereof.

A minor beef is they require you to use IE with security settings low in order to download it as well as participate in the (very well attended by the authors) chat area. The 5 year span since the last FFmpeg release is a complete surprise to me, a daily user of SUPER, because there's so much more of that program available through the front end than I ever use.

I purchased DivXPro so I could convert everything to DivX, in order to play it on my DivX capable home DVD player. I found SUPER (with which I run FFmpeg almost exclusively for video) to be so much more powerful, flexible and faster, that I made the comment in the chat area that "SUPER does for free what others can't do for money". They liked that phrase so much that they adopted it as a motto. This is the sole association I have with the folks from erightsoft's SUPER project, just so your sure this is a testimonial, not an advertisement. One other small beef, they won't let you put it up for download elsewhere, even with the best of intentions on the sites with the best reputations. You can only get it from them.

I'm quite confident that SUPER will make use of the greater power of the new FFmpeg. I'm less confident I and most of the other users who just want to make things go will learn all about them. For those that do want to learn about them, the SUPER front end provides an a priori description of what will happen if you select each.

Bring it on -- no doubt erightsoft is already working on the new impplementation. In the mean time, check out the current version to find out how powerful FFmpeg already is. I'll bet you'll be surprised.

Re:That was always the most confusing part too

[Anonymous Coward]

Hell, I've seen one installation that didn't even have libmp3lame on it!

You do realize, don't you, that thanks to software patents, it's probably illegal to distribute libmp3lame in the US?

Doesn't support Dirac

[Burz]

WTF? I am supposed to use Theora if I want an unencumbered codec??

At least VLC supports it directly.

Incidentally, VLC is not so hot on OS X these days. Instead of using FFmpeg for everything it can, it defers to Quicktime and its plugins for anything it can. Which means that most of the time you will not get an alternative method of decoding with the latest VLC versions; I can play many more files with earlier versions.

Re:easier blu-ray on linux?

[je ne sais quoi]

Thanks for the response. Yeah, I expect it will take a while for the changes to trickle down to the media players, i.e. some of them (VLC IIRC) use their own version of ffmpeg. I am compiling my mplayer from source, because of the VDPAU support. :) In any case, I find it's usually better to get the bleeding edge version with audio and video software since codecs, etc. seem to change much more rapidly than most software.

Re:FFmpeg in SUPER

[Anonymous Coward]

Last time I checked, SUPER still required admin privileges to run it, not just to install it, and they had some lameass excuse about how that was to prevent it being run on public machines and the like.

Granted, they can't even figure out the right way to determine whether they have admin privileges, so I suppose it's too much to think they could come up with some way for an admin to do something to allow the program to run without it requiring those privileges at runtime.

It may be overly paranoid of me to wonder what the real reason for the admin privileges might be, but I think it's still a valid concern.

Re:Patent Laws

[Anonymous Coward]

> I remember something about multimedia patents - open source developers were not allowed to release binaries.
> Could this be the case?

Nah, firstly MPlayer, VLC etc. do not really have problems, secondly FFmpeg is located in Switzerland.
If nobody does a release at all because it is considered too much effort, why do you think they should do binary releases, particularly when the most important parts are the libraries anyway?
And lastly, binaries for Linux are usually made by the distributions (or someone else providing distribution-specific packages) and for Windows everyone VLC, MPlayer, ... has had trouble finding developers, and thus also in general someone to do the build.