Very Computer

Not necessarily the best technically, but the best practically.

The context for this question is that here on our corporate network,
Windows 2000 is standard, as is Windows media for streaming video.  I
once configured xine on this Linux box to play a WMV stream, which was a
major ordeal, and mplayer to do it as well, which was a moderate ordeal
and never did get working right except on the command line.

The point being, I have just been asked by someone in the educational
department what media format would be a good one for compatibility with
both Windows and Linux machines, and perhaps other UNIXes and even Apples.

I figured that might be Real media.  Note, I am *not* inclined for
against open-source vs. proprietary formats, my only desire is for
cross-platform compatibility, as well as something that is presentable
to corporate IT types who are unlikely to take something seriously
unless it works not only well, but without tremendous fuss.

Any recommendations would be appreciated.  I'm not much of a media user,
so I'm out of my league here which is why I'm asking.

Also, what is the situation with Real media?  I noticed on their web
site a new player that can play Windows media.  I would prefer to
encourage my company to use something other than Windows media in
general, but backward compatibility might be a selling point.

But of greater interest is that in the past I had read some articles
about Real Networks moving to open-source some of their products, and
I'm wondering what the status or implications of this is/are?

Thanks for comments.

Good day!
--
____________________________________
Christopher R. Carlen
Principal Laser/Optical Technologist
Sandia National Laboratories CA USA

Error log for Wed, 28 May 2003 15:49:08 -0700: segfault in module
Christopher R. Carlen - dump details are as follows...

Quote:> The point being, I have just been asked by someone in the educational
> department what media format would be a good one for compatibility with
> both Windows and Linux machines, and perhaps other UNIXes and even
> Apples.

> I figured that might be Real media.  Note, I am *not* inclined for
> against open-source vs. proprietary formats, my only desire is for
> cross-platform compatibility, as well as something that is presentable
> to corporate IT types who are unlikely to take something seriously
> unless it works not only well, but without tremendous fuss.

It sounds as if you are asking two questions:

1.  What media format will play equally well between players on both
platforms?

While the media players available for Linux can now handle just about
every media format in use today, if I had to choose a format off of the
top of my head I would go with ASF format.  Some would question why I
would choose a decidely proprietary format like this, and the answer is
because of Windows.

An out of the box installation of Windows can play select few media
formats without the need for additional codecs, ASF is one of these.  Also
ASF files, while they do not have the best quality, are highly compressed
and stream very well even over limited bandwidth.

If pressed, my second choice would be MPEG1, but they can get pretty
chunky really quickly and they suck at streaming, especially over a
low-bandwidth connection.

On a related note, the formats I would stay away from for something like
this would be Quicktime (mov, mp4) and OnTo's formats (vp3, vp4, vp5).

2. Which media player would you recommend for Linux?

Players for Linux such as Mplayer and Xine can play a very wide range of
media files with no problems.

There are many other players available of course, but these seem to be the
most mature of them all.

--
rapskat -  21:27:50 up 1 day,  7:25,  4 users,  load average: 1.66, 1.16, 0.95
Gentoo Base System version 1.4.3.8p1 kernel 2.5.70 on a Pentium III (Coppermine)
Between infinite and short there is a big difference.
                -- G.H. Gonnet

Thanks for the input, BTW.

What exactly *is* ASF?  I thought it was just a wrapper file for
streaming Windows media.  But I would be happy to learn a more proper
explanation.

Quote:> An out of the box installation of Windows can play select few media
> formats without the need for additional codecs, ASF is one of these.  Also
> ASF files, while they do not have the best quality, are highly compressed
> and stream very well even over limited bandwidth.

There is no need to worry about out of the box Windows in this case,
since the copr. has a "common operating environment" which can include
whatever extra software in the installation onto each workstation that
they desire to include.  W2k is site licensed.

Quote:> If pressed, my second choice would be MPEG1, but they can get pretty
> chunky really quickly and they suck at streaming, especially over a
> low-bandwidth connection.

> On a related note, the formats I would stay away from for something like
> this would be Quicktime (mov, mp4) and OnTo's formats (vp3, vp4, vp5).

Hmm, what about Real media?

Quote:> 2. Which media player would you recommend for Linux?

> Players for Linux such as Mplayer and Xine can play a very wide range of
> media files with no problems.

Perhaps if we had a common operating env. for Linux, then this wouldn't
be a problem, since the player could be optimized in the installation.
I haven't had *any* success with Suse Linux's included media players.
Suse breaks just about everything in their distro, and I always have to
compile the good stuff myself to make it work.

Good day!

--
_____________________
Christopher R. Carlen

Suse 8.1 Linux 2.4.19

I like just about everything else about SuSE, apart from the multimedia
packages.  Noatun/Aktion and the other KDE visual media stuff has never
worked for me (on at least two separate machines with different A/V
hardware) and neither have SuSE's builds of Ogle, Avifile or Mplayer. The
latter I always compile from source.

I've taken to using apt4rpm and have blocked out Mplayer in my apt.config
file to stop the SuSE rpm from hosing my perfectly-functional self-built
version.  I'd uninstall the *y rpm if I could, but for some reason the
SuSE kdebase rpm depends on it.

The annoying thing is that whenever I try Knoppix or one of its variants,
Xine runs straight "off the CD" and plays all my multimedia files, as far
as I can tell.  I wish SuSE, who generally do such an excellent job of
everything else, would follow suit ;-\

--
Regards,
Gareth Williams