[Libav-user] How to add proprietary encoder like x264 to the FFmpeg

[Michael Chisholm]

On 6/21/2014 8:00 PM, Bradley O'Hearne wrote:
>
> On Jun 21, 2014, at 7:21 AM, wm4 <nfxjfg at googlemail.com> wrote:
>
>>> I also top posted once and I was also told that this is rude.
>>>
>>> This must be an FFmpeg thing. I have  never heard of this being
>>> "rude" before (no offense guys).
>>
>> So far I've only seen cehoyos complaining about it being rude. I
>> find his pedantry about this quite rude in return.
>
> It isn’t rude. It never has been rude.

Maybe the word "rude" is too strong.  How about "bad form"?  I think 
most first time posters have never heard the phrase "top post", and 
surely Carl realizes this, so I've thought of it as more of an 
informative statement.  As opposed to the firing of verbal weaponry. 
Perhaps "bad form" has a gentler sound to it :)

> Sometime after the first fifty
> times I saw the issue of “top-posting” being made an issue above the
> actual questions being asked I decided to go out to Wikipedia and
> read the rationale for this “rude” business so I could be a good
> citizen, to find that it isn’t any kind of Internet standard, it is
> an artifact from old Usenet days, and that while still the tradition
> on some mailing lists (like FFmpeg) that will get you flamed, it is
> not by any means the most common approach for replying on mailing
> lists or forums.

I think you will agree that many forums do have rules/guidelines for 
posting though, and it's a reasonable thing to have.  Not everyone will 
agree with them.

> If anything, it ignores the behavior of the most
> commonly used mail clients

Probably true, but to me, it's a simple matter to jump the cursor to the 
bottom of the mail and start typing there.

 > and also ignores what mobile devices do
> for purposes of efficiency, where users are encouraged to top-post.

This one is a mystery to me, to be honest.  I don't use mobile devices, 
so it leaves me curious...

> But it makes for a great way to be unkind to complete strangers, and
> make them feel stupid in front of everyone else if you can’t come up
> with an answer, don’t agree with their thoughts, are just generally
> annoyed by their questions, or derive some kind of satisfaction by
> putting others down.

This may be overstating things a bit.  I don't think most mailing list 
participants are like this.  But I can't help but feel like I know where 
you're coming from--I remember some of your older threads becoming 
unusually contentious.

In my personal opinion, bottom posting is much more natural, and I 
prefer it.  In fact, I didn't know what top-posting was either when I 
first posted, but I never ran afoul of that guideline because I 
coincidentally already did it the "right" way.  I think when you're 
reading previous pieces of a thread to gain background and context on 
the immediate post you're looking at, it's natural to read from the top 
down.  That's how books are written, in English anyway, so it just makes 
sense to me to do it that way.

So there may be legitimate arguments that the posted guidelines need 
changing.  But does it also make sense that giving newcomers a *gentle* 
poke when they don't follow the guidelines, whatever they may be, is 
okay to do?

Andy