[Ffmpeg-devel] 4XM audio codec_tag

[Reimar Döffinger]

Hello,
On Sun, Nov 05, 2006 at 04:30:02PM +0000, M?ns Rullg?rd wrote:
> Baptiste Coudurier <baptiste.coudurier at smartjog.com> writes:
> > If mplayer cannot dectect CODEC_ID_ADPCM_4XM, use a conversation table
> > between CODEC_ID_ADPCM_4XM and whatever mplayer wants to use as internal
> > fourcc.
> >
> > This is becoming more and more problematic...
> 
> It's only a problem because mplayer is really an AVI player with
> support for other formats shoe-horned on as an afterthought.

This is obviously the case in some places, but in this case that's not
what creates the problems.
How would this be any better if e.g. MPlayer used arbitrarily long
strings to identify codecs? Of course, we would not meddle with riff.c
then, but instead we would have to have our own translation table for
_all_ codec ids, instead of those that do not have a fourcc/twocc
assigned.
And no, using codec ids directly is not a choice unless you decide that
you will never ever want to use any demuxers or decoders besides those
from libavformat/libavcodec.
I'd really be interested to hear a suggestion that is better with a
convincing explanation why it is better. And as said, hacking riff.c is
_not needed_ from the MPlayer side, it just seems preferable.

Greetings,
Reimar D?ffinger