[Ffmpeg-devel] How to retrieve audio or video stream at same timestamp using av_read_frame

[Martin Boehme]

Michel Bardiaux wrote:
> Martin Boehme wrote:
>> Michel Bardiaux wrote:
>>> av_seek_frame and av_read_frame should work independently on each 
>>> stream.
>>
>> Really? av_seek_frame() does have a "stream" parameter, but AFAICT 
>> that just specifies the stream you want to use as an timebase. 
> 
> Sorry, bad wording on my part. *should* in the sense that 'this is what 
> I would like', not 'would work if used correctly'.

OK, I'm with you now.

>> And even if av_seek_frame() did seek streams independently, that would 
>> just shift the burden of buffering frames to the disk cache or (worse) 
>> cause the disk to thrash... Keith seems to be doing the equivalent of 
>> seeking frames independently by using two different AVFormatContexts 
>> on the same file, which (for the above reason) is not a good idea IMO.
> 
> There are not that many alternatives. Either you buffer yourself and 
> thrash userspace memory, or you let some lowery level do it and you 
> thrash the buffer cache. To me the simplest API is the best, and things 
> are certainly simpler if you dont have to take side effects of one 
> stream on the other into account.

Agreed, if there's an offset in the video file, you're going to have to 
buffer at some point...

> Besides, I dont feel having 2 AVFormatContext (only way now to have 
> independently seekable streams) is going the thrash memory anyway 
> (strictly SOTP of course).

SOTP? Could you decode that for me...? ;-)

I wasn't that worried about thrashing memory... more worried about 
thrashing the disk. The OS's disk cache and/or the HD's built-in cache 
is probably going to catch that, but if not, the disk head is going to 
be going back and forth a lot. ;-) That's what I was referring to...

Martin

-- 
Martin B?hme
Inst. f. Neuro- and Bioinformatics
Ratzeburger Allee 160, D-23538 Luebeck
Phone: +49 451 500 5514
Fax:   +49 451 500 5502
boehme at inb.uni-luebeck.de