[FFmpeg-devel] AMD external header

[Mironov, Mikhail]

> 
> Pavel Koshevoy (2017-11-27):
> > That is unnecessarily un-diplomatic and will likely offend the
> > contributors from nvidia and amd.
> 
> Well, I find offensive that they benefit from my work yet make extra efforts
> to make sure I cannot benefit from theirs. Maybe I should start putting my
> contributions under GPL and not LGPL, what do you think?
> 
> > Personally, I would prefer if the bundled external headers were
> > installed together with ffmpeg public headers (so nvenc/cuda/etc...
> > weren't simply private headers within ffmpeg).  There are some nvenc
> > APIs I need to query hardware capabilities to avoid setting nvenc
> > codec parameters that would cause the codec to fail to initialize via
> > ffmpeg apis.  Given that ffmpeg already includes the headers that
> > declare those APIs I've been able to use them without installing nvenc
> > SDK separately, but since they are private headers in the ffmpeg
> > source tree it feels dirty to do that.
> 
> I understand it is more convenient for you than what the vendors provide,
> but why should the effort of making things more convenient be carried by
> the FFmpeg developers?
> 
> It has a non-negligible cost: more testing required, git grep pollution, all the
> while giving these companies an unfair advantage against the companies that
> play by the rules of Libre software and inciting them to continue in that
> direction.
> 
> I think the whole compat directory is misguided, but these headers for
> external libraries are the worse of it.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> --
>   Nicolas George

I wanted to stay out of license issues and this forum is oriented more towards 
technical discussion but I can't resist putting my two cents: Yes, HW manufactures
 live out of HW sell. And yes, integration with products like ffmpeg should benefit them (us).
But they(us) do not sell software. The enablement of HW acceleration adds features to ffmpeg project.  
And we do it ourselves. We also intend to contribute more. So it is mutually beneficial.  Isn't it?
Thanks,
Mikhail