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• Launchpad entry: none yet

• Packages affected:

Summary

Ubuntu Media Center should provide a huge codec support in order to be able to play most (all!) of the existing media formats.

Implementation

Ubuntu Feisty will come with a package called ubuntu-restricted-extras which installs main non-free codecs (multiverse repository). This package should be included by default in Ubuntu Media Center.

Codecs

The following table shows the audio and video codecs that are expected to be supported by the UMC.

It is based upon the assumption that the UMC will rely upon the Elisa software, so will be using the gstreamer framework.

• Audio Codecs
  Codec name	Free	Proprietary	Commercial
  Xiph/Ogg Flac	X (flacdec/ffdec_flac)
  Xiph/Ogg Vorbis	X (vorbisdec)
  MPEG-1 Layer 2 (DVD/DVB/MP2)	X (ffenc_mp2)		X
  MPEG-1 Layer 3 (MP3)	X (mad/ffdec_mp3)		X (flump3dec)
  MPEG-4/AAC (MP4)	X (faad)		X
  Dolby Digital AC3	X (a52dec/ac3parse)		X (gst-fluendo-ac3dec)
  Microsoft WMA	X (ffdec_wmav1,2)		X (gst-fluendo-wmadec)
  Apple Lossless ALAC (m4a)	X (ffdec_alac)
  Musepack MPC	X (musepackdec)
  AIF	X (ffdemux_aiff)
  Monkey Audio	(1)
  Sony ATRAC 3	?
  RealAudio (2)	?		X (gst-fluendo-realdec)

1 : Gstreamer MonkeyAudio plugin has never been ported to 0.10 . MAC isn't even packaged in Ubuntu/MediBuntu due to licencing problems : see https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/119412

2 : RealAudio codecs are a mess with at least 9 variants : (dnet, atrc, raac and racp are the only 'standard' ones)

• Code	Name	Minimum Version	Codec
  lpcJ	IS-54 VSELP	1
  28_8	G.728 LD-CELP	2	ffdec_real_288
  dnet	Dolby AC3	3	a52dec/ac3parse
  sipr	Sipro Lab Telecom ACELP-NET	4/5
  cook	G2/Cook Codec	6	ffdec_cook
  atrc	Sony ATRAC3	8
  raac	MPEG-4 LC-AAC	9	faad
  racp	MPEG-4 HE-AAC	10	faad
  ralf	RealAudio Lossless Format	10

  Video Codecs
  Codec name	Free	Proprietary	Commercial
  Xiph/Ogg Theora	X (theoradec/ffdec_theora)
  Xiph/Ogg Dirac (3)	X (schrodec)
  Microsoft WMV	X (ffdec_wmv1,2,3)		X (gst-fluendo-wmvdec)
  MPEG2	X (mpeg2dec)		X (gst-fluendo-mpeg2video)
  MPEG4-ASP (DivX/Xvid)	X (ffdec_mpeg4)		X
  MPEG4-AVC/H264 (MP4)	X (ffdec_h264)		X

3 : Dirac plugin is still in the works but is available in Ubuntu repositories.

• Container formats (Demuxers)
  Container	Free	Proprietary	Commercial
  Microsoft RIFF (WAV/AVI)	X (avidemux/wavparse)
  Microsoft ASF (WMA/WMV)	X (asfdemux/ffdemux_asf)		X (gst-fluendo-asf)
  MPEG ES/Elementary Stream	X
  MPEG SS/System Stream	X (mpegparse)
  MPEG2 PS/Program Stream	X (ffdemux_mpeg)		X (flupsdemux)
  MPEG2 TS/Transport Stream	X (ffdemux_mpegts)		X (flutsdemux)
  MPEG4-ISO/QT/MOV/3GP/MP4	X (qtdemux)		X (gst-fluendo-isofile)
  Xiph/Ogg	X (oggdemux)
  Ogm	X (ogm_audio/video/text_parse)
  Matroska (MKV/MKA)	X (matroskademux/ffdemux_matroska)
  Real Media (RM/RMA/RMVB)	X (rmdemux)
  MXF	X (ffdemux_mxf)
  DivX Media Format (DMF)	?

  Network protocols
  Protocol	Free	Proprietary	Commercial
  Microsoft MMS	X (mmssrc)		X (?)
  RTCP+RTP
  RTSP+RTP	X (rtspsrc/rtpdec)
  RTSP+RDT (Real Data Transport)	X (rtspsrc/rdtdepay)

Packages

Here is the list of packages providing codecs:

• free: gst-plugins-base-0.10, gstreamer0.10-plugins-good, gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad(-multiverse), gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly(-multiverse), gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg, gstreamer0.10-schroedinger (Dirac)
• proprietary:

• commercial :

  (De)muxers	gst-fluendo-mpegdemux (4), gst-fluendo-mpegmux (4), gst-fluendo-isofile, gst-fluendo-asf, gst-fluendo-asfmux
  Audio Codecs	gst-fluendo-mp3 (4), gst-fluendo-ac3dec, gst-fluendo-wmadec/enc, gst-fluendo-realdec, gst-fluendo-alsaspdif
  Video Codecs	gst-fluendo-wmvdec, gst-fluendo-mpeg2video

4 : available in Ubuntu repositories. Others could be bought from Fluendo site or builded from their source repository.

CategorySpec UbuntuMediaCenterTeam