[FFmpeg-devel] [RFC] the future of libamr

[Robert Swain]

Diego Biurrun wrote:
> On Sat, Jun 06, 2009 at 07:20:09PM +0100, Robert Swain wrote:
>> Diego Biurrun wrote:
>>> On Fri, Jun 05, 2009 at 02:21:23PM +0100, Robert Swain wrote:
>>>> OK, then I guess the only issue is a feature regression in that 
>>>> libopencore-amrwb doesn't do encoding. As Diego points out, there's 
>>>> nothing stopping people from using FFmpeg 0.5 or a version of svn from 
>>>> before the libamr reference wrapper gets removed, but I'm not really 
>>>> fond of feature regressions. Is there any good reason not to keep the 
>>>> libamr-wb reference encoder wrapper?
>>> May I suggest that you read the 25+ messages in this thread before
>>> restarting the discussion at square one?  Pros and cons have already
>>> been hashed out extensively and a consensus seemed to have been reached.
>>> If you have anything new to add, reply to the relevant subthread.  Just
>>> raising the same concerns over and over again is inconstructive and
>>> leads nowhere.
>> I had actually read them but had forgotten about them as I was out of 
>> the country so, I apologise for this. However, I didn't see a deadline 
>> set for consensus to be reached.
>>
>> Benoit had some reservations about feature regression then decided it 
>> was OK, though I don't see him mention any compelling reason why he 
>> changed his mind other than that removing non-free components is good. 
>> Benoit?
>>
>> Then Baptiste commented that he wasn't too keen on a feature regression 
>> and you stated that it seemed a consensus had been reached. Then 3 days 
>> after Baptiste's comment, you committed the OpenCORE support and said 
>> you were going to remove libamr. A consensus has not been reached if not 
>> everyone has accepted the same idea and it seems not everyone has.
>>
>> I'm not sure how many people actually use AMR-WB encoding. I would guess 
>> the parties interested would be mostly commercial.
>>
>> I don't really know what option is best. It's non-free but removing it 
>> would be a feature regression. Why did we have the AMR reference 
>> implementation wrapped in the first place if not having non-free stuff 
>> in FFmpeg was a major concern versus not having the feature?
> 
> Quoting myself:
> 
>   Pros and cons have already been hashed out extensively and a consensus
>   seemed to have been reached.  If you have anything new to add, reply
>   to the relevant subthread.  Just raising the same concerns over and
>   over again is inconstructive and leads nowhere.
> 
> Of course it's a feature regression.  But luckily there is no law
> against it.  All you need are good reasons.  We have done it before.
> There are good reasons now, so we can do it again.

No solid consensus was reached and there _was_ opposition to a 
consensus. I replied to the most appropriate e-mail because I would like 
a response from you.

"Efforts should be made to remove non-free components from FFmpeg. 
Feature regressions are an acceptable cost for removal of said 
components." - Should this be a new FFmpeg policy?

Regards,
Rob