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FFmpeg Is Returning To Ubuntu With 15.04 Release

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  • #11
    FFmpeg is in Debian Sid (unstable) at this time, which means it probably won't hit the next version of Debian (Jessie). It will co-exist with (buggy, insecure) LibAV for a while until Debian decides to switch over. From the Debian bug, there's basically no reason to stay with LibAV. It'll be a few years yet, but the process is rolling.

    Ubuntu will probably be compiling better versions later on and submitting them to Debian for when Debian catches up with Ubuntu. Ubuntu iterates faster.

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    • #12
      1. purge libav
      2. install ffmpeg
      3. ???
      4. profit!

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      • #13
        Originally posted by xeekei View Post
        Most people seem to favour FFmpeg. The only minor concern I have is that the name includes "mpeg", and that group loves to sue things.
        Let it be it is easy to remember this name too, for those suers MPEG LA headquarters should be raided by people and destroyed.

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        • #14
          Context

          The libav-ffmpeg split was pretty messy. Here's some context for anyone who wasn't aware of it, based on a good summary by someone who was around during the split:
          • ffmpeg project leader is dictatorial and makes it hard to get anything done
          • other maintainers attempt to remove him (and anyone not allied with them) from the project
          • ffmpeg founder is allied with project leader and owns the infrastructure, so the other maintainers are forced to fork, creating libav
          • ffmpeg now merges libav patches back in, but libav pretends ffmpeg doesn't exist and ignores regressions they cause - this is likely why libav's popularity is fading
          • libav provides a compatibility binary for ffmpeg that claims that ffmpeg is deprecated, which misinforms users

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          • #15
            Originally posted by rdnetto View Post
            The libav-ffmpeg split was pretty messy. Here's some context for anyone who wasn't aware of it, based on a good summary by someone who was around during the split:
            • ffmpeg project leader is dictatorial and makes it hard to get anything done
            • other maintainers attempt to remove him (and anyone not allied with them) from the project
            • ffmpeg founder is allied with project leader and owns the infrastructure, so the other maintainers are forced to fork, creating libav
            • ffmpeg now merges libav patches back in, but libav pretends ffmpeg doesn't exist and ignores regressions they cause - this is likely why libav's popularity is fading
            • libav provides a compatibility binary for ffmpeg that claims that ffmpeg is deprecated, which misinforms users
            I dislike both, but of the two do I prefer libav as they take a more careful and conscious (although slower) approach to adopting new features. However, the nonsense both represent is best shown by ffmpeg's own web page: the page was designed to be readable on any device, small or large, and claims ffmpeg to be a complete solution, but then is followed by the most anachronistic symbolism in computing history: a command line example.

            Who in the world of video and multimedia still wants to enter a command line to get things done?! Seriously, nobody! And the command lines keep changing with nearly every release... I have some scripts for real-time screen grabbing and encoding under Linux, which make the command line to ffmpeg several hundreds of characters long. None of the GUI front-ends come close to covering all its features and they all fall back to making the users modify the command line call.

            So now I do not care which of the two has the latest features, because I cannot be bothered with learning the syntax to each new release when I could have a GUI button instead, but not getting one. I look at projects such as GIMP and darktables, and how these have overcome the command line and give their users a powerful user interface. The documentation to the two projects is massive, which is good and speaks of the volume of features they both support, but try to find out what has changed from one release to another and you get sick from having to study the documentation all over again just to find out what exactly it is that has changed or why your script is suddenly misbehaving.

            And then there are the fights... The leader of the ffmpeg project is said to be a dick. This sure is not the best reputation one can have. Whatever, I do not know him, but he must have done something bad to cause enough of his developers to leave and to create their own project. One strong enough to compete with his own project.

            Linux has come so far and its cutting edge multimedia software is an a messy state. It is no surprise that Linux still has not conquered the desktop when its developers first need to have their fights before anyone starts making a serious attempt of including a user-friendly GUI that is worthy of being called "a complete solution".

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            • #16
              That could actually happen

              Originally posted by tuuker View Post
              Let it be it is easy to remember this name too, for those suers MPEG LA headquarters should be raided by people and destroyed.
              I've been in a lot of building stormings with Occupy and pro-Earth protesters, though we've always left the buildings standing. I have only one thing to say to patent trolls: go ahead, make my day!

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              • #17
                Originally posted by Luke View Post
                I have had to locally compile ffmpeg and handload the resulting binaries into debian packages since early summer
                I have been building ffmpeg as a libav replacement, which has been working quite well with 2.3, though the recent 2.4 release has different binary names and messed up my system. If you want to cooperate on building ffmpeg as a replacement to Ubuntu's libav package, please look at my ppa.

                Originally posted by Luke View Post
                I wonder what else doesn't like libav? It has diverged enough from ffmpeg that MPV has to be built for whichever one you are using in order to function. Mplayer2 right now is broken in my install, suspect it does not like ffmpeg on ground of having been built against libav.
                I believe most things out there will prefer ffmpeg or won't care any. The main problem with going back to ffmpeg as the main multimedia processing SDK is gstreamer-libav: most of the multimedia apps people use on the desktop daily are powered by gstreamer, and the current development of gstreamer favors libav and while I haven't talked with them directly, it doesn't look to me like they are interested in switching back.

                At work I'm maintaining the company's external software dependencies and currently my plan is to continue to use libav under gstreamer, and ffmpeg installed along side it for anything that uses the CLI interface or can be easily set up to use the ffmpeg libraries directly.

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                • #18
                  I don't think my debs would pass standards for redistribution

                  Originally posted by Oded View Post
                  I have been building ffmpeg as a libav replacement, which has been working quite well with 2.3, though the recent 2.4 release has different binary names and messed up my system. If you want to cooperate on building ffmpeg as a replacement to Ubuntu's libav package, please look at my ppa.



                  I believe most things out there will prefer ffmpeg or won't care any. The main problem with going back to ffmpeg as the main multimedia processing SDK is gstreamer-libav: most of the multimedia apps people use on the desktop daily are powered by gstreamer, and the current development of gstreamer favors libav and while I haven't talked with them directly, it doesn't look to me like they are interested in switching back.

                  At work I'm maintaining the company's external software dependencies and currently my plan is to continue to use libav under gstreamer, and ffmpeg installed along side it for anything that uses the CLI interface or can be easily set up to use the ffmpeg libraries directly.
                  Thanks for the info on the PPA you are running. You are building for trusty and precise, my handbuilds are going into Vivid right now but are known to work in Utopic, as I've updated some friend's machines that orginally got them during the Utopic cycle. That was when Kdelive from the Sunab PPA began to have trouble with the libav/AVCHD combination.

                  My packages are handloaded (not automatically built as I don't know how) from the initial compile/build job, and version numbered to match libav versions so they drop into Ubuntu and APT does not complain about missing dependencies. My ffmpeg package "provides" libav outright for this reason. Also, since I don't permit my legal name to cross the Internet (due to privacy/security concerns given my activist life) there might be trust issues for any PPA in which I was listed as a maintainer (no last name, etc). Since I doin't have accounts with the big NSA-complient cloud servers like Dropbox I also don't have any other place to upload files larger than than I can email (<10MB or so) other than the video files that go to Archive and Liveleak. Otherwise I'd offer the packages simply as downloadable .deb files with no gurantees as drop-in libav replacements for whatever Ubuntu's alpha of the day is.

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                  • #19
                    Right now gstreamer works OK with ffmpeg

                    Originally posted by Oded View Post
                    I have been building ffmpeg as a libav replacement, which has been working quite well with 2.3, though the recent 2.4 release has different binary names and messed up my system. If you want to cooperate on building ffmpeg as a replacement to Ubuntu's libav package, please look at my ppa.


                    I believe most things out there will prefer ffmpeg or won't care any. The main problem with going back to ffmpeg as the main multimedia processing SDK is gstreamer-libav: most of the multimedia apps people use on the desktop daily are powered by gstreamer, and the current development of gstreamer favors libav and while I haven't talked with them directly, it doesn't look to me like they are interested in switching back.

                    At work I'm maintaining the company's external software dependencies and currently my plan is to continue to use libav under gstreamer, and ffmpeg installed along side it for anything that uses the CLI interface or can be easily set up to use the ffmpeg libraries directly.
                    At the moment gstreamer works fine with ffmpeg, if that changes in the future I would roll back/pin all of gstreamer, or see if it accepted being compiled against ffmpeg. If it will not, than someone might bring back the gstreamer-fffmpeg package by forking and modifying gstreamer-libav to deal with any changes. What will NOT work is a mixed install! I have found that I must change pin priorities for every ffmpeg package I install to -1 to keep synaptic from "updating" them to the latest Ubuntu libav packages. Miss one and the resulting broken install won't work well, immediate symptoms are no thumbnails and no Firefox video. Reinstalling my full ffmpeg package set, then finding the "updatable" package, pinning it, and manually setting its pin priority to -1 fix that and keep it fixed.

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