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Music Media

Helix DNA Client Source On Oct 29 138

Posted by timothy from the early-hallowe'en-treat-perhaps dept.
nexex writes "Real's Helix DNA Client's source will be released on October 29. The Helix DNA client is available through both the RCSL and the RPSL licenses. More information on these licenses at their licensing page. Intial platform support is planned for Win32, OSX, and Linux. More technical details available here."
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Helix DNA Client Source On Oct 29 More

Helix DNA Client Source On Oct 29

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  • Grounbreaking (Score:1, Insightful)

    by ekrout ( 139379 )
    Finally, a multi-platform media player backed by a large (think $$$) corporation with quite a big market share.

    Of course, it's not entirely "free", but it's still quite a nice step forward for the OSS/FS crowd.
    • What the heck is wrong with mplayer ??
      ( www.mplayerhq.hu )
      It runs everything media file i have ever seen.
      • MPlayer is not multiplatform; it's only for Unix systems. Besides, it doesn't play Sorenson v.3 and some other closed formats. Nevertheless it's still my favourite movie player :-)
        • I wonder why I can find a screenshot of "MPlayer on Windows XP" then (http://www.mplayerhq.hu/homepage/screen.html 9th row, middle column)
          • It was a crude hack to prove they can do it.. not a part of the actual distribution. Of course, if you can tell me how to get MPlayer running on Windows, please let everyone know.
            • Thank you for your information; I looked around a bit on the mplayer website and couldn't find it there.
              Thanks again!
            • It's mentioned in their FAQ (and I'm in the process of trying it) that it can be compiled for win32 using cygwin.

              this doesn't mean I'll succeed though, the slightest of tweaking required and I'll fail. don't know anything about linux.
              • No luck. it's definitely not for the faint of heart.

                too bad, it showed a lot of promise.

    • Re:Grounbreaking (Score:3, Informative)

      by blowdart ( 31458 )

      Not entrirely free? Well it's not open either.

      The open formats it supports are already out there, they've kept the useful ones, Real Streaming support as binary only.

      It's also crippled, in that it doesn't support SMIL, so the fancy type of streaming done right now with real (pictures, and text with your video) aren't possible.

      • SMIL support (Score:3, Informative)

        by robla ( 4860 )
        The engine we're shipping is the same engine that supports SMIL playback, and does the bulk of the heavy lifting when it comes to handling SMIL. It's not "crippled" in any way.

        We're not shipping the actual SMIL file format just yet purely due to time constrants in getting the code released. Taking proprietary code public is not an easy task, and our engineers have been working around the clock to release what we are releasing. We'll hopefully follow up with the actual SMIL code in a later release.

        Rob Lanphier
        Helix Community Coordinator

        • But SMIL is a well defined, standard format. Considering that real has support it for ages, and Real One uses it extensively, especially with premium content like VidZone et al, the lack of SMIL support makes it a very crippled player. A lot of streams these days simple have the RAM file link to a SMIL file, as this is the only way to offer even simple meta data.
    • I would argue that that the RPSL is actually even more Free than the GPL in the sense that it attempts to close the ASP Loophole as explained in this Newsforge article [newsforge.com].

  • Good (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 27, 2002 @01:49PM (#4542097)

    I need a new DNA client, my DNA server is getting withered through under-use.
  • The slashdot head article gave me no idea what "Helix DNA" could possibly be, so I go the Helix Home page [helixcommunity.org] and find out that it claims to do everything for everybody on every platform.

    But there's nothing to download right now.

    What does it actually do right now? Sounds like vaporware [tuxedo.org] to me! To treat it as anything but pie-in-the-sky fantasy is a great disservice to all the things that actually exist right now...

  • YEA! (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 27, 2002 @01:53PM (#4542125)
    Ogg Vorbis Audio Support


    Through the assistance of the Xiph.org Foundation, the Helix DNA client will supportthe Ogg Vorbis audio codec, to provide a complete open source streaming audio playe framework.

  • Protected Content - Make the Switch (Score:5, Funny)

    by davidstrauss ( 544062 ) <david.davidstrauss@net> on Sunday October 27, 2002 @01:58PM (#4542149)

    Switch a Success - Convert Thrilled

    [Insert stock photo here]

    I used to use those "open" media players. Now I only use ones that protect my content. That's why I use Microsoft(R) Windows(R) Media(R) Player(R) 9(R) Beta(R). Without good Digital(R) Rights(R) Management(R), there just aren't any digital rights.*

    Now that we've talked about the why, here's the skinny on the how.

    [Pasted instructions from help]

    Now that we've gotten [fake name] to try Windows Media Player, we'll get her to try [other Microsoft product].

    *for the recoding industry.

  • their website is frelled.

    based on previous comments i'm guessing its some sort of media player.

    why should i care about it versus all the other ones out there?

    and how do posts like this get through without describing what it is they're selling? i mean, we all know that the minute we post a URL its gonna get slashdotted, so a concise summary of the article would be nice.

  • Hmm (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Masami Eiri ( 617825 )
    Forgive me if I'm wrong, but isn't Winamp doing this already? I know the program doesn't run on UNIX or Linux based systems, and unto itself isn't Open-Source, but it is expandible.
    • Nullsoft does have a Linux release of WinAmp out. Of course, I don't know why you'd use it when you have xmms...

  • Good Client Name (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 27, 2002 @02:09PM (#4542203)
    I think if you're going to have a DNA client, you should call it "Sperm 1.0".
    • Artificial Insemination 8.0.0.0.0.0, so easy to do, you'll never have sex again!
    • wouldn't that be a transport protocol?
    • formally this attempt at humor (though successful) is wrong. sperm serves DNA to the egg. if we would follow the reasoning of the author of the parent comment, sperm could be considered a server when single, and a client when fused to the egg. (errmmmm.....)

      let's ignore the complication that the sperm cell merges with the egg cell. a more accurate description of sperm is that it's comparable to an ethernet package in an overcrowded, badly configured, collision plagued ethernet network, where millions of packages try to reach a host and only one finally reaches its destination.

      brrr, how horribly inefficient nature is compared to computers ;-)

      lemme guess: (Score:-5, Ridiculous)
    • That's the protocol, but have a look at our latest version of SeX (R), with full client/server architecture.

      From the FAQ:

      Q: What is it?
      A: Simply put, SeX(R) is an implementation of the Bee, Pollen & Flower concept.

      Q: Why would I need a client/server architecture?
      A: In fact you don't , but we highly recommend it for stability purposes. There are standalone versions, but only SeX will give full satisfaction and process functionality.

      Q: Is it secure?
      A: That depends. Microsoft (TM) alternatives are very prone to virus infections. In a promiscuous, multi-user client/server structure proper safeguards (e.g. firewalls) are recommended although the functionality of Sperm 1.0 might be adversely affected.

      Q: Is it free?
      A: That depends: Although we advocate the Open Sauce approach, we can not garantee you free (as in beer) access to SeX. However, modifications can be distributed freely.

  • According to the specs:
    https://www.helixcommunity.org/content/tec h/client .html

    the RealVideo and RealAudio parts won't be opensourced. This really sucks, I'll stay with MPlayer.
    • So rather than switch to an open-source player that uses proprietary codecs, you'll use a buggy, nearly-impossible-to-configure-and-install open-source player that uses proprietary codecs. Sounds like a great plan to me...

      • So rather than switch to an open-source player that uses proprietary codecs

        If you visited the Helix DNA website, you'll note that there's nothing to switch to.

        buggy

        I used an MPlayer beta release almost daily for a year with no showstopping bugs. The only reason I upgraded to a stable release (recently) was because the beta didn't properly support the divx 5 codec. That's better stability than almost every single other piece of software developed for Linux can account for. (To include Linux itself.)

        nearly-impossible-to-configure-and-install

        What's so difficult about doing "./configure --help" and choosing the flags you want? It's the exact same process as everything else that comes in a tarball.

        MPlayer has 16 different video output drivers and 6 audio output drivers with more in the works. It supports playing of local, remote, and streaming media. It has no crappy GUI to get in the way by default. If flexibility isn't what you're looking for, well, Microsoft Media Player seems to be popular these days.

        Meanwhile this Helix client is 100% vapour and destined to be little more than an avenue for Real to try and get in bed with open-source video and audio codec devlopers. Sounds like a great plan to me...
        • Ah, the vaporware charge. Someone else already pointed out further up the page that it's being a little rough to call something vaporware when the announcement is that it will be released within the next two days; give them a break on that one maybe?

          As for MPlayer, I've tried repeatedly to use it. I can even get it installed. Unfortunately, after that it simply refuses to play things. Never mind that I have plenty of open-source codecs available and even a resonably up-to-date set of DLLs ripped straight out of a Win98 partition - MPlayer won't play things, and when it does they're screwed up (i.e., RM and MOV tend to play at 2-3 times normal speed). I want a player that actually works, doesn't take sixty obscure command-line configuration flags, and supports the formats I want to play. MPLayer doesn't do that - they're probably still too busy accusing Red Hat of sabotaging them by using GCC 2.96 to care about improving their software.

  • Helix DNA sounds great but is the code healthy? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Subcarrier ( 262294 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @02:18PM (#4542239)
    This DNA comes from a heavily inbred population and may contain high concentrations of recessive traits. You might to take note of this fact if you intend to splice and combine this DNA with some of our own.
  • The only thing they have open source in this is MP3, and we've had that for quite a while with xmms. All the Realplayer stuff is closed source binary only. Sure, it's still a welcome release, just not too exciting.

    • Why this is significant (Score:5, Informative)

      by robla ( 4860 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @03:19PM (#4542576) Homepage Journal
      Hi all,

      I'm the Helix Community Coordinator (though I'm getting many complaints for my self-chosen wimpy title...suggestions appreciated).

      Basically, what's interesting about this is that it's a generalized architecture for any datatype. So, while it's true that there are many MP3 players out there, there's few which are able to handle multiple streams, mixing them with other audio sources, adding in multiple video sources, and hey, throw in some JPEGs, GIFs and Flash while you're at it.

      What we're releasing on October 29th won't look very sexy from an end-user perspective. We're basically putting out an engine that'll do all of that stuff with the right plugins. However, it's a down payment on much more. We hope to soon ship support for SMIL, JPEG, GIF, etc.

      In the meantime, the technology we're releasing is nothing to sneeze at. I think a lot of the stereotypes about the RealOne Player will be dispelled with the code that we ship. Please take a look, we think you'll like what you see!

      Rob
      (who's now realizing that he's declared open season on himself for soliciting title suggestions)

      • Basically, what's interesting about this is that it's a generalized architecture for any datatype. So, while it's true that there are many MP3 players out there, there's few which are able to handle multiple streams, mixing them with other audio sources, adding in multiple video sources, and hey, throw in some JPEGs, GIFs and Flash while you're at it.

        Blah blah blah, another media player. With a name like that I was expecting an Open Source-based Folding@Home or something like that - which would be great, because I have machines with spare CPU cycles that there aren't Stanford binaries for.

        So you can handle multiple codecs. So can a dozen other players. Move along people, nothing to see here.

        • Re:Why this is significant (Score:4, Informative)

          by robla ( 4860 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @05:33PM (#4543306) Homepage Journal
          So you can handle multiple codecs. So can a dozen other players. Move along people, nothing to see here

          It can handle multiple codecs simultaneously, doing real-time mixing of sources and maintaining synchronization defined at the application layer (thus making it capable of supporting SMIL [w3.org]). That narrows the field significantly.

          Rob Lanphier
          Helix Community Coordinator

      • Hi Rob,

        I was wondering - in the issue of stand alone player, will we, the Linux users, will see something soon? (in terms of end user product).

        Real Player 9 for Linux was ditched by Real Networks, and wasn't updated from their "beta" for quite a while. I can use today some open source tools like mplayer and Xine to play most of the codecs, but not RV20, RV30 codecs, or QMV3 stuff (where's the guy who said he reversed engineer it?), and much less streaming support with the mention codecs...

        • Re:Why this is significant (Score:4, Informative)

          by robla ( 4860 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @05:56PM (#4543412) Homepage Journal
          Great question. I can't give you a great answer just yet, but I think we've got a pretty good answer.

          We continue to work on the RealOne Player for Linux and for other platforms. However, as you can tell, progress on this hasn't been as fast as we would like.

          The great news here, though, is that there is this media engine that we're putting out. We're hoping that GNOME, KDE, Motif/Lesstif and other toolkit-specific GUIs emerge for these (similarly to what has happened with Galeon and Netscape's Gecko engine). We'd love to help facilitate that type of an effort.

          Rob Lanphier
          Helix Community Coordinator

          • The great news here, though, is that there is this media engine that we're putting out. We're hoping that GNOME, KDE, Motif/Lesstif and other toolkit-specific GUIs emerge for these (similarly to what has happened with Galeon and Netscape's Gecko engine). We'd love to help facilitate that type of an effort.

            So this translates to "No. Write one yourself."

            Or am I missing something here?
            • No, this translates to here, have a framework (look, no reverse engineering codecs) and write a simple frontend for your multitude of gui libraries. I think that's a pretty fair deal (eg. mplayer can't write interfaces to the code rather than reverse engineer binary interfaces).
        • "where's the guy who said he reversed engineer it"

          hiding from the DMCA :o)

      • It seems to me that Helix is somewhat akin to GStreamer. GStreamer is licensed under the GPL, while Helix is licensed under some other license I've never heard of. Furthermore, I have no love for RealNetworks due to their annoying, in-your-face, ad-happy RealPlayer product, and I don't trust them to have my best interests in mind. What are the differences between Helix and GStreamer, and if I was looking for a media framework, why would I choose Helix over GStreamer? How can I be sure that Helix development won't be taken in a direction I don't like (DRM, Palladium, proprietary closed-source codecs, patents, etc)? GStreamer, being developed by volunteers who love open source, is unlikely to ever have these things integrated.

        • Re:Why this is significant (Score:5, Informative)

          by robla ( 4860 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @08:02PM (#4543983) Homepage Journal
          This question has a couple of dimensions to it: "why should I trust RealNetworks when there are alternatives I trust?", and "how does this relate to GStreamer?". As it turns out, these are very different questions, and I'll answer them both

          So, "why should I trust RealNetworks when there are alternatives I trust?" The answer is manyfold. RealNetworks is going to spend a lot of effort building trust in the community. That said, we hope the license is structured such that you don't have to trust us; we intend to have an OSI-certified Open Source license, and go through all of the scrutiny required in getting that mark.

          The big benefits for taking a look at RealNetworks is that we are a significant force in the digital media delivery space, and so we offer development resources and investment capability that the open source community can leverage to get a great media player faster than otherwise possible.

          Now, "how does this relate to GStreamer?". Well, GStreamer is actually LGPL. As such, I think they are very complementary. GStreamer is working on a different architecture that supports different types of applications than our architecture supports. There's a lot of overlap, but there's also a lot of differing functionality. Over time, with the right effort, I could see there being a nice relationship between the two projects (similar to the relationship between Galeon and Mozilla).

          Rob Lanphier
          Helix Community Coordinator

          • >
            GStreamer is actually LGPL. As such, I think they are very complementary. GStreamer is working on a different architecture that supports different types of applications than our architecture supports. There's a lot of overlap, but there's also a lot of differing functionality. Over time, with the right effort, I could see there being a nice relationship between the two projects (similar to the relationship between Galeon and Mozilla).

            Nice intentions. But is your code GPL-compatible? Mozilla had to be relicensed under GPL to be compatible, and now is a dual-license system.

            I really have a problem with people creating yet another license. I never saw valid points to anything other than the small set of public domain, MIT and BSD-like, GPL and LGPL. Mostly everything else is either misunderstanding these or trying to give the people as little as possible.

            • There's a lot of different issues in this comment, so I'm going to attempt to extract the discrete issues, and respond to each:

              Is the RPSL compatible with the GPL? - In most cases, probably not. We have it on the list of "compatible licenses" to make it clear that we have no beef with other people using the license with their code and combining it with ours. Moreover, there are cases where people place exceptions on top of the GPL that may make it compatible with the RPSL. However, standard GPL software probably can't be combined with RPSL software, due to restrictions in the GPL.

              Is Helix license compatible with GStreamer? - Yes, when used correctly. GStreamer is under the LGPL, and the RPSL is compatible with the LGPL when used carefully. There are multiple ways of complying with both licenses; the simplest way is to make sure that there's no mixing of licenses within a particular executable file or dynamic library.

              Why did RealNetworks create another license - This is addressed in our posting to the license-discuss [crynwr.com] alias, as well as my response on Linux Weekly News [lwn.net]. In short, we're putting out software that we've invested millions of dollars and seven years developing with dozens of engineers. We've carefully studied all OSI-certified licenses, and understand them completely, but we didn't find one that struck the balance we're trying to achieve.

              Rob Lanphier
              Helix Community Coordinator

              • >
                Is the RPSL compatible with the GPL? - In most cases, probably not.
                [...]
                > standard GPL software probably can't be combined with RPSL software, due to restrictions in the GPL.

                That makes it for me. These GPL restrictions are there to protect users; your license can be better than nothing, but not only it doesn't cover the most important thing, namely the codecs, but it isn't a good enough citizen.

                Sorry for being so blunt.

      • So as far as Joe SixPack is concerned, what does this give us, feature/functionality wise that QuickTime doesn't already.

        (Note, I am not talking about morality, freedom, access to source code etc..etc... I want to know what will this let me do that I can't already do with QuickTime.)
        • quicktime is only available on Mac and windows as far as I know. so if Joe is using linux, he's SOL. From what Rob has said this seems to be an emerging technology. So if Joe needs SMIL support, this is a place he can get it, potentially.

          If Real gets this licensed under an OSI license that is GPL compatible, I think it will be a very good thing for all of us. If Real truly is going to take an approach with helping the software community as the goal, then I hope they thrive and create an opportunity to produce software that makes them money as well. (I'm assuming their intention is to make money off the server software.)

  • Banner Ad (Score:2, Insightful)

    by stevejsmith ( 614145 )
    Pt...the banner ad on Slashdot told me that days before this story broke on Slashdot. ;-)

  • realplayer (Score:3, Interesting)

    by minus_273 ( 174041 ) <{aaaaa} {at} {SPAM.yahoo.com}> on Sunday October 27, 2002 @02:23PM (#4542261) Journal
    has been very good for linux.
    WE DO NOT have any other streaming media player. Goto CBSnews and try to play a video without real.
    It is even better that it is open source. The last client (Realone ) for linux was permanently beta and it seems work is progressing at a snails pace. This just injects some new life into real .
    Real 9 is a very nice format MUCH better than the crap the previous format was. Lets see how helix worksout.
    I wonder if KDE or GNOME will have a client out first :)
    • As I posted above... They didn't open their codecs.. just the player. The codecs are binary-only, and it does sound like they will be for linux though. But hey, you get a free MP3 codec open source!! WOOHOO!!
    • What about mpeg4ip? It's a complete set of MPEG-4 encoding, streaming, and player tools.

      http://sourceforge.net/projects/mpeg4ip/

      95% activity on SourceForge!

      And it can tune into MPEG-4 streams hosted from Darwin Streaming Server, Envivio, Helix Server, and its own server. Good stuff.

      Now if I could only get it to compile on MacOS X for interoperability testing, and so I could get Advanced Simple to work (QuickTime only does Simple).
      • 95% activity on SourceForge!

        Dunno what metric SF uses to calculate activity, but I'm certain a few of the highly "active" projects have two people working on the source, one of whom likes tab indentation and the other of whom likes space indentation. Both of them busily generate deltas...
    • "WE DO NOT have any other streaming media player"

      Not quite true. MPlayer now has support for RTSP/RTP streaming [live.com].

  • Time to make the *switch* to Helix (Score:3, Funny)

    by ekrout ( 139379 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @02:26PM (#4542270) Journal
    I was listening to a song on the PC and it was like 'beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep'
    And then, like, half of my audio collection was gone
    And I was like, 'Hmmm?!'
    It devoured my mp3s
    I had some really good albums
    And then I had to download them all again and I had to do it fast so I couldn't get 'em all
    It's kind of... a... bummer
    My name is Eric Krout, and I'm definitely going to compile the Helix DNA client source on October 29th!

  • Comment removed (Score:3, Informative)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @02:27PM (#4542274)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • OT: What is so "DNA" about this? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Fastolfe ( 1470 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @02:32PM (#4542295)
    At first I thought this was some sort of "client" for munging DNA data. Then I went to their site, saw the "Helix" name and the double-stranded DNA logo, and thought for sure this was some sort of DNA data client of some kind, maybe for keeping track of genes and identifying mutations and disease-causing traits or something. That'd be cool, if only I could get data into it. Then I read a bit further and see that it's a media player of some kind?

    Am I the only one that thinks they've taken the whole "DNA" bit a little too far? That's like me going out, plastering up billboards with pictures of a computer, circuit boards, naming my company "SensorTronic" and my product "128-bit Heuristic Data Sampler 1.0", which is actually ketchup.

  • I'll wait... (Score:2, Informative)

    by SoSueMe ( 263478 )
    ... for the rest of their plans to be completed.

    From the site:

    Standards-Based A/V Data Type Support
    The Helix DNA client will contain support in source code form for the following data types:
    MP3
    Narrowband AMR
    H.263
    In addition, binary-only support will be provided for:
    RealAudio G2
    RealAudio 8
    RealVideo G2
    RealVideo 7
    RealVideo 8
    RealVideo 9
    In the future, RealNetworks may be able to release support for:
    SMIL
    JPEG
    GIF
    PNG
    PCM
    AVI
    WAV
    AU
    Rea lText
    RealPix

    Right now, I'll stick with my media "toolbox" and see what the "Swiss Army Knife" looks like when it's done.

  • important codecs (Score:2, Interesting)

    by zdzichu ( 100333 )
    They would better work on support of Ogg Vorbis and Ogg Speex [slashdot.org] codecs. Those are open source and mp3 is obsolete.
  • When I go to https://www.helixcommunity.org/content/client.html , I get a warning from my browser that the site's security certificate was issued by a company that it's nto configured to trust. Anyone heard of "Como Class Security Services CA" before?
  • This is a trick. Don't fall for it. Seriously, all "content" producers are starting to introduce new "tools" that promise great new stuff, but are really Trojan horses for DRM. I say no.
    • That's an interesting point actually (I was afraid I'd have to be the one to point out the DRM aspect) - how does this relate to DRM? I mean, if the core app that holds it all together is open source, and proprietary formats are supported by plug-ins, how do you 'protect' (control?) content? To be 'secure', the RealAudio plugin, to use that as an example, would have to decode the stuff and pass it directly to the soundcard, as you can't 'trust' the open-source core. But plugins outputting stuff directly sort of negates the purpose of having a core framework thingy, doesn't it? Maybe I'm just ignorant, but this seems strange.
      If, however, it provides a way to convert RealMedia files into other formats, I'm all for it...

  • ibangmyheadandsayhellyeahtothemotherfuckinghelix (Score:3, Informative)

    by t0qer ( 230538 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @02:56PM (#4542433) Homepage Journal
    I've dealt with handling different media types over the years on my website [zeromag.com]
    over the years. The worst and I mean the worst part about it is you always have to triplicate or quadricate your work because if you leave any kind of browser or platform out whines will be a calling from the peanut gallery.

    Years ago we used real, but then real started bloating the crap outta their player with nagging popups and BSOD, so people started wanting windows media more, since it was installed in the OS and didn't require a seperate download. Problem is, most people in the publishing industry use macs, so we had to do quicktime too. Right now anytime the boss says "Do some digital video" I go "Ugggh!" because I have to do work to deliver to 4 different platform.

    Which is why this statement caught my eye..

    The Helix platform will provide a single solution for all your digital media delivery. Currently, three disparate digital media architectures power 90% of media consumption. To maximize audience potential, enterprises and service providers are often forced to support all three platforms, including separate operating as well as development costs for each platform. This wastes time, money, and resources that could be better spent elsewhere. The Helix platform services all three of those architectures, today!

    So no more jumpin hoops between 6 different applications to make content? Thats fucking bitchin as hell!!! I've been using linux lately for both firewire and BT878 capture, and although the editing tools don't compare to premiere or virtual dub, the reliability of the capture is so much better than it was in windows, I can't look back. Helix looks to be an alternative to getting a lot of work done all at once, instead of application hopping. (Which sucks)

    I see Helix doing well, i'm going to fuck around with it today if I can. Anything that gives me more time for pr0n and counterstrike is priceless.
    • Not quite as good as your thinking. The Helix Producer is only capable of producing only Real codec content. Helix Server can however serve/work with encoders for real, windows media, and quicktime. This will help consolidate your servers (good thing) but you will still need multiple encoding platforms. bart
    • Helix, groovy as it is, won't solve these problems for you anytime soon.

      People will still want Windows Media since it is installed, and Mac people will still want QuickTime. Apple might incorporate Helix playback in QuickTime (unlikely, but possible), but it is very unlikely Microsoft would build .rm playback into the OS.

      The only format that works for good fire-and-forget universal playback today is MPEG-1. But that means no real-time streaming, and huge files. There is hope for MPEG-4, which is already supported by both Real and (in a more limited subset) QuickTime, but there isn't any default Windows Media support no or promised.

      MPEG-4 is also fragmenting somewhat, between Simple (a baseline) and Advanced Simple (much better, but not supported in QuickTime) today, and MPEG-4 Part 10/H.264 (much better yet, and in products 2003).

      Unfortunately, just having a ".mp4" file doesn't tell you what player specs are requried to play it back.

  • ...they reverse engineer the format of Windows Media itself, and make an open-source codec for it.

    I wanna play WMA streams on my Unix box, without having to use M$ binary only windoze codecs.


    • MPlayer [sf.net] plays WMA on Unix. You need the Windoze DLLs though, but the MPlayer page can probably point you to the sources if you don't have the pleasure of Windows already.

      • yeah, I know. avifile works well, too.

        But I want an open source codec.

        And besides, surely the windows binary codecs will only work on x86 machines?

  • This is Real (Score:5, Informative)

    by mcc ( 14761 ) <amcclure@purdue.edu> on Sunday October 27, 2002 @03:08PM (#4542512) Homepage
    Why did you not mention that this is RealMedia/RealNetworks? (Whatever their name is this month.) That's a pretty big deal. This little paragraph here [helixcommunity.org] seems like an even bigger deal, if they actually mean it and aren't just engaging in demagogery to win our hearts over or something-- that seems like a complete 180 from RealNetworks' previous violently-propeitary stance :)

    I was about to post a comment saying "Okay, this is interesting, there's some project that is going to try to make a cross-platform media player, that's a nice goal, and great for linux users, but Quicktime already does anything i want it to. What can this do Quicktime can't?" ... and then I read the FAQ [helixcommunity.org] and realized, wait, this actually has an existing codebase that RealNetworks is going to put in. Hm. Wait, that potentially means that i could embed RealOne's decoder/display component into a Quicktime plugin, and never have to use that horrifically ugly RealOne program again :)

    Anyway, i'm really curious how much they'll commit themselves to this. I can at least tell they are still going to keep their crown jewels-- the RealAudio/Realvideo codecs-- to themselves-- from the faq:
    What parts of your platform are not being licensed?

    Almost every part of our system is available for licensing. Some parts of the system, such as the RealAudio and RealVideo codecs, require commercial licenses that are different than community licensing. We are streamlining the licensing of our codecs to spread their ubiquity. Also, the Media Commerce Suite, the Broadcast Management System (BMS) and the subscription system leveraged by RealOne SuperPass are not part of our community source or open source initiatives at this time.
    Meh. Still, though, even if the codecs are going to be black boxes in this Helix system, how close to them can you get? In the past, as far as i can tell, Real has always licensed its realmedia-embedding APIs such that anyone who gets to use them has to agree they will never use those APIs to create a program that will convert from Real into some other format. But if they're open-sourcing a media system that plugs into the realmedia codecs, then that would imply that it would be relatively easy to create something like a RealVideo streamripper, or a RealAudio-to-mp3 converter. Are they going to try to prevent this? How? Does the license give them the ability to do this? (I'm really sorry, but i haven't even attempted to read those licenses yet. As you can tell from my frightful spelling, i just woke up, and there's no way i will be able to parse legalese right now.) The FAQ says [helixcommunity.org] their license is "like" the GPL, but says it has different patent language (unsurprisingly) and says something confusing about "folding back" code that sounds vaguely NPLish.. I will be VERY interested to see what RMS' comments on it are.

    Anyway, this should go somewhere interesting. It would be nice if MPEG4 over RTSP could become the worldwide streaming media standard, but RealVideo with an open-source media platform wrapped around it wouldn't be *too* bad. At the least y'all linux people might finally get a *REAL* generic media layer API :) And apple is probably going to just go frantic over this, which is always fun to watch. This will all be neat to watch unfold, really. Let's see what happens.

    • Re:This is Real (Score:3, Insightful)

      by benwaggoner ( 513209 )
      Well, RealNetworks has always had involvement in the standards process, and adopting standards-based technologies. Among high points:

      Major force behind creation of RTSP, and adopted it, replacing their former propritary streaming codec. This includes things like SDP (Session Description Protocol). A LOT of what QuickTime Streaming does is based on the standards RealNetworks pushed, and even Windows Media 9 is emphasizing RTSP over MMS.

      Early adopter and force behind SMIL, and first adopter of SMIL 2.0 in a streaming product (QuickTime Player is still using 1.0).

      First player bundled with MPEG-4 playback (via Envivio plugin).

      In talking with lots of RealNetworks employees, I think they understand that they can't monitize file formats anymore, and instead are focusing on building competitive products that can play outside their walled garden. I'm sure they hope that lots of commercial products will be based on Helix, ala MP3 encoders and players.

    • Re:This is Real (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ahfoo ( 223186 )
      I thought the same thing. Real?
      I was just compaining to NPR about using Real and making it tough on Linux users while calling themselves community based radio and now here's Real saying they're all Linux friendly now. It sounds mighty suspicious since it's only been a few months since they took some website to court offering a Real stream ripper.
      But hey, maybe they just want to kick MS in the nuts. It is had to believe they would make such an abrupt change when there's nothing in the news about new management, but perhaps it has something to do with Windows Media Player 9 screwing with them. That's possible.

    • Re:This is Real (Score:5, Informative)

      by robla ( 4860 ) on Sunday October 27, 2002 @05:27PM (#4543278) Homepage Journal
      Many great observations by mcc. A few notes here:
      • Be careful what you wish for with MPEG-4 [salon.com], however...
      • I share your desire for RTSP world domination [ietf.org] :)
      • We will be announcing new terms for RealAudio and RealVideo in our October 29 webcast [helixcommunity.org]. However, I wouldn't get too excited about some of the possible applications you mention (sorry, I can't be any more specific than that for now). The bottom line is that RealAudio and RealVideo will not be available under the RPSL. I know from talking to Richard Stallman about that that he's not pleased with that. However, he was pleased to hear about our support for Ogg Vorbis [realnetworks.com] (which is progressing nicely).
      • There are benefits to us not giving away everything. The biggest benefit is that RealNetworks stays motivated to invest heavily in this technology. Because we've got a clear commercial motivation to stay ahead on the technology curve, we're not going to merely lob this over to the open source community and say "here, you deal with it". We absolutely intend to ensure the Helix media engine remains state-of-the-art. (Of course, don't take this to mean that we don't need the community; we do.)
      In short, I think there's a lot to be excited about. This is our first big overture to the open source community, but it's not our intention for it to be the last.

      Rob Lanphier
      Helix Community Coordinator

    • Read wired this month. Real is moving to rent you a TV like subscription that you can use over your broadband internet connection. Broadcast tv will be streamed into your computer. Now in order to do this you need a play which doesn't suck on as many platforms as possible, so why not open the source up? This is very cool for us, however there is still sound business behind it. (Or maybe last months Wired)

      Either way, pretty cool. Now remind me again why RealOne EXPIRED on me? After reading that article in Wired i thought Real had become Hip to whats out there. Then RealOne suddenly stopped playing content? Hello? I'm on a modem and am *not* going to wait for a 6 meg download to happen so i can watch my own content.

  • Don't really know what to think (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    It looks like another of those "code our product for nothing, and then we'll make money out of it" licenses. I don't like that... not one bit.

    I wish they would get it, you show all the cards and play it right, or you don't play.

  • I was trying to add RTSP/RTP support to wget, but it turns out that Real uses a "secret handshake" to validate clients before xmiting data.

    I am simply not smart enough (or at least not knowledgeable enough about debuggers and asm) to reverse engineer the protocol. I tried to check the Helix source a few weeks ago . . . but obviously it wasn't there.

    Does anyone know if they are opening the handshake code up?

    -Peter
  • This seems similar to Microsoft's attempt at "shared source"--a reaction to a very real threat from open source projects, although the Helix license is a little more liberal. Ogg Vorbis and similar projects must really be scaring RealNetworks.

    Overall, I suppose it's good: a documented media format is better than an undocumented one even if the documented media format comes with strings attached. But I'll still stick with completely open formats.
  • The Helix DNA Client web page (https://www.helixcommunity.org/content/tech/clien t.html [helixcommunity.org]) says that the client will include "TurboPlay":

    The Helix DNA client will include TurboPlay(TM) technology. Through TurboPlay, broadband PC users get near-instant playback of streaming audio and video. TurboPlay dramatically reduces the time it takes to load or "buffer" a clip prior to playback by intelligently utilizing available bandwidth on a broadband connection, typically achieving more than five times the speed of previous streaming systems.


    Does anyone have any idea what bandwidth maximizing strategy they are actually using? What are they doing here that is actually original?

  • ...this release date was chosen just to steal some of Rockstar's thunder dealing with the release of Grand Theft Auto Three: Vice City on the 29th.
  • Proposed Additions to the PDP-11 Instruction Set:

    BBW Branch Both Ways
    BEW Branch Either Way
    BBBF Branch on Bit Bucket Full
    BH Branch and Hang
    BMR Branch Multiple Registers
    BOB Branch On Bug
    BPO Branch on Power Off
    BST Backspace and Stretch Tape
    CDS Condense and Destroy System
    CLBR Clobber Register
    CLBRI Clobber Register Immediately
    CM Circulate Memory
    CMFRM Come From -- essential for truly structured programming
    CPPR Crumple Printer Paper and Rip
    CRN Convert to Roman Numerals

    - this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...

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