[FFmpeg-devel] [PATCH] Default to using libraries when enabled

[David Conrad]

On Jun 11, 2009, at 5:43 AM, Ivan Kalvachev wrote:

> On 6/11/09, David Conrad <lessen42 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On May 31, 2009, at 9:20 PM, David Conrad wrote:
>>
>>> On May 28, 2009, at 6:50 AM, M?ns Rullg?rd wrote:
>>>
>>>> Diego Biurrun <diego at biurrun.de> writes:
>>>>
>>>>> On Thu, May 28, 2009 at 11:33:44AM +0100, M?ns Rullg?rd wrote:
>>>>>> Diego Biurrun <diego at biurrun.de> writes:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Wed, May 20, 2009 at 08:20:36PM -0400, David Conrad wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> This changes the order of initialization so that external
>>>>>>>> libraries
>>>>>>>> that are enabled are used by default over native codecs.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I did this on purpose, native implementations should be  
>>>>>>> preferred.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Even when the native implementations are worse than using /dev/
>>>>>> random?
>>>>>
>>>>> Then that native implementation should be removed or treated
>>>>> separately.
>>>>
>>>> So, who's in favour of removing/disabling the native vorbis  
>>>> bitstream
>>>> writer?
>>>
>>> Well I haven't heard anyone object, so I'll disable it in a week if
>>> noone pipes up. The code will still be in svn for anyone that wants
>>> to revive it.
>>
>> I went ahead and disabled the encoder with Diego's suggestions;  
>> it's a
>> one line change if anyone wants to revive it in the future, but for
>> now noone should be confused as to why they get so low quality with
>> Vorbis.
>
> Sorry for coming late.
>
> I don't like that trend. The vorbis encoder is not the only encoder
> that produces
> worse quality than alternative tools. This applies to mp2, ac3, and  
> probably
> any other audio and video encoder.
>
> I thought it is ffmpeg policy to don't babysit users.

The difference is that the other encoders in svn produce acceptably  
good output, even if other tools produce better output. The vorbis  
encoder produced rather awful output (I've heard reports that it  
introduced crackling and pops in some cases in addition to sounding  
awful), and I'm not aware of anyone that used the native vorbis  
encoder on purpose, nor anyone who would want to use it over  
libvorbis. Plus, the only other native encoder for which there is also  
a competing --enable-lib is mpeg4.

IMO, the vorbis encoder was a special case due to how bad it was (thus  
its disabling), and is a good argument for not accepting other  
encoders until they produce about as good (ideally better) output as  
other widely used open source encoders (e.g. the old h264 patch, aac  
encoder, etc.)