[SCM] FFmpeg packaging branch, master.snapshot, updated. debian/0.6-2-13-ge783273

Thu Aug 26 19:18:58 UTC 2010

The following commit has been merged in the master.snapshot branch:
commit 903364855f7c2a19a06636b06e74c4ba48e265fc
Author: Reinhard Tartler <siretart at tauware.de>
Date:   Sun Aug 1 14:41:16 2010 -0400

    remove notes about stripping encoders, we ship uncrippled packages now in main

diff --git a/debian/README.Debian b/debian/README.Debian
index 03395f4..405e591 100644
--- a/debian/README.Debian
+++ b/debian/README.Debian
@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@ i386 architecture, as we know that the upstream build system will
 produce PIC libraries where necessary. Only architectures like i386 will
 be built non-PIC, mainly for performance reasons.
 
- -- Reinhard Tartler <siretart at tauware.de>, Mon, 27 Jul 2009 12:08:55 +0200
+ -- Reinhard Tartler <siretart at tauware.de>, Sun,  1 Aug 2010 14:39:10 -0400
 
 FFmpeg package names
 ====================
@@ -76,137 +76,6 @@ packages are:
 
  -- Reinhard Tartler <siretart at tauware.de>, Sun, 26 Jul 2009 10:38:10 +0200
 
-
-Disabled MPEG encoders
-======================
-
-On Debconf 7, the ffmpeg maintainers had a conversation with James Troup
-from the ftpteam about mpeg encoders in the ffmpeg package. The ftpteam
-was pretty surprised about the accepted encoders, and admitted that they
-were accepted by accident. We therefore had no choice but removing
-them. We agreed on a plan that rather disables than removes the
-encoders, for details see debian/strip.sh, rendering those encoders
-unusable.
-
-Currently the following video encoders are disabled in the ffmpeg
-package: H263, H264, MPEG2 video, MPEG4 and MS-MPEG4. No *decoders* are
-disabled in any of the ffmpeg packages!
-
-The plan is to provide a source package called 'ffmpeg-extra', which builds
-drop-in replacement binary package with the mpeg encoders enabled. Ideally, we
-would be allowed to include those mpeg encoders enabled in non-free, but we
-haven't heared back from the ftpteam about that idea.
-
-
- -- Reinhard Tartler <siretart at tauware.de>, Sun, 20 Apr 2008 08:43:23 +0200
-
-
-Further patent issues with ffmpeg
-=================================
-
-In addition to the aforementioned MPEG encoders, some patents related to
-ffmpeg which seem to be enforced against open source software cover the
-following codec technologies and file formats:
-
-   * MP3 encoding
-   * AAC encoding
-   * the ASF file format
-
-   I did not activate MP3 encoding (through LAME) in libavcodec, nor AAC
-encoding (through FAAC). However, since I have found no real enforcement
-of the mysterious ASF file format patents, I did not deactivate ASF support in
-libavformat. More details on these three issues are given in the following
-paragraphs:
-
-
-The MP3 audio coding format
-===========================
-
-   Much has already been said about MP3 and the huge patent portfolio of
-the MPEG members, especially the Fraunhofer institute. Eric Scheirer's
-MPEG, Patents, and Audio Coding FAQ [1.1] is an attempt to "inject
-some sanity in what is becoming an increasingly heated discussion
-about patent rights surrounding MPEG technology, especially for audio
-compression". It also has a few words about other patented products
-covered in this document.
-
-[1.1] http://web.media.mit.edu/~eds/mpeg-patents-faq
-
-
-The AAC audio coding format
-===========================
-
-   Dolby's AAC (Advanced Audio Coding) is covered by patents owned by
-Dolby Laboratories, AT&T Laboratories, Fraunhofer Institute and Sony
-Corp.
-
-   The FAAC project was threatened by the AAC license consortium. Press
-report about how "an opensource project was closed down due to pressures
-from the AAC license consortium which requires a lumpsum payment of
-10,000 USD plus a per-copy payment of 1.35 USD, thus effectively banning
-free software implementations. The policies surrounding AAC also harm
-interoperability [2.2]." This was related by Heise [2.3] and FFII has
-a page about the Dolby threat [2.1] as well as additional information
-about MPEG-related patents [2.4].
-
-   The author stopped distributing the FAAC binaries, but still provides
-full source code and CVS access. To my knowledge he has not been
-threatened again. I also read on a web forum [2.5] that Cisco's lawyers
-claim that their LGPL distribution of AAC software in MPEG4IP is
-completely legal and that Dolby cannot forbid such distribution.
-
-[2.1] http://swpat.ffii.org/patents/effects/dolby/index.en.html
-[2.2] http://www.xiph.org/archives/vorbis-dev/200011/0286.html
-[2.3] http://www.heise.de/newsticker/data/vza-20.11.00-000/
-[2.4] http://swpat.ffii.org/patents/effects/mpeg/index.en.html
-[2.5] http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?showtopic=310&
-
-
-The ASF file encapsulation format
-=================================
-
-   Microsoft obtained a patent on the ASF (Active Stream Format) audio
-file format on March 21, 2000:
-
-  | United States Patent 6,041,345 Levi , et al. March 21, 2000
-  |
-  | Active stream format for holding multiple media streams
-  |
-  |  Abstract An active stream format is defined and adopted for a
-  | logical structure that encapsulates multiple data streams. The data
-  | streams may be of different media. The data of the data streams
-  | is partitioned into packets that are suitable for transmission
-  | over a transport medium. The packets may include error correcting
-  | information. The packets may also include clock licenses for
-  | dictating the advancement of a clock when the data streams are
-  | rendered. The format of ASF facilitates flexibility and choice
-  | of packet size and in specifying maximum bit rate at which data
-  | may be rendered. Error concealment strategies may be employed in
-  | the packetization of data to distribute portions of samples to
-  | multiple packets. Property information may be replicated and stored
-  | in separate packets to enhance its error tolerance. The format
-  | facilitates dynamic definition of media types and the packetization
-  | of data in such dynamically defined data types within the format.
-
-   This patent is rumoured to have been enforced at least once, though
-only through what I'd call non-hostile intimidation. Avery Lee, the
-VirtualDub author, removed ASF support from his software after a phone
-call from a Microsoft employee that he relates in his 5/12/2000 news
-[3.1].
-
-   However I could not find evidence of an official threat: all I could
-find on the web seemed to be interpretations of the VirtualDub author's
-article, for instance on Advogato [3.2], CPT [3.3] or FFII [3.4]. Avery
-Lee states that the phone call was from a programmer, not from the
-legal department. There does not seem to be an official statement from
-Microsoft.
-
-[3.1] http://web.archive.org/web/20000817222620/http://www.geocities.com/virtualdub/virtualdub_news.html
-[3.2] http://www.advogato.com/article/101.html
-[3.3] http://www.cptech.org/ip/business/software/audio.html
-[3.4] http://swpat.ffii.org/patents/effects/asf/index.en.html
-
-
 License of the Debian ffmpeg packages
 =====================================
 
diff --git a/debian/README.source b/debian/README.source
index 664932a..2a93e9f 100644
--- a/debian/README.source
+++ b/debian/README.source
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-1) Usage of the quilt patch tracking system
+Usage of the quilt patch tracking system
 
 This package uses quilt to manage all modifications to the upstream
 source.  Changes are stored in the source package as diffs in
@@ -6,52 +6,4 @@ debian/patches and applied during the build.
 
 For more information about quilt, see /usr/share/doc/quilt/README.source
 
-2) Former stripping of the source code
-
-In the past, Debian used to ship "stripped" ffmpeg packages, i.e. the
-source code of the ffmpeg-debian package has been modified to disable
-specific codecs (mostly encoders like H263, H264, MPEG2 video, MPEG4 and
-MS-MPEG4) whose usage may represent patent infringement in certain
-jurisdictions. To serve the purpose to remain free of patented encoding
-technologies, the modifications to the ffmpeg source code have been done
-in a "non-reversible" way by removing several lines from the source code
-before packaging the release tarball. To reflect this divergence from
-upstream ffmpeg, the Debian package has been renamed to ffmpeg-debian.
-However, please note that only the code calling the affected codecs was
-removed in previous versions to make them unavailable to the resulting
-ffmpeg libraries. No encoder code was actually ever removed from the
-Debian packages!
-
-Several complications have come along with the aforementioned measures:
-* Further packaging hacks (e.g. debian/fixup-config.sh) have become
-  necessary in order to build the source code without the stripped
-  encoders.
-* It was impossible to rebuild unstripped packages for private usage
-  from the ffmpeg-debian source code
-* Ffmpeg upstream was not very happy about Debian redistributing a
-  stripped fork of their code, to say the least.
-
-Nowadays, while the situation remains pretty unchanged with regard to
-the patent threat, the ffmpeg build system has seen a lot of
-improvements. It now provides the possibility to explicitly disable
-specific codecs from the libraries at configure time, allowing disabling
-some patent encumbered codecs without the need to strip the source code.
-The effect on the resulting binary packages would remain the same as
-before.
-
-Regarding the source code, however, this would mean some significant
-improvements:
-* There is no more need to strip the source code in order to disable the
-  codecs and to apply further Debian-specific hacks to still make it
-  compile cleanly.
-* In order to rebuild unstripped ffmpeg libraries for private usage, it
-  would be sufficient to comment out a few configure flags.
-* Debian would not need to fork the ffmpeg source code anymore and call
-  their packages by a different name.
-
-Therefore, the pkg-multimedia-maintainers (the maintainers of the ffmpeg
-packages in Debian) decided to not strip the ffmpeg source code in
-further releases anymore but disable the patent encumbered codecs during
-the configure phase of the packages as intended upstream. We are sure
-this is the right thing to do with regard to the aforementioned
-advantages for both our users and ourselves as maintainers.
+ -- Reinhard Tartler <siretart at tauware.de>, Sun,  1 Aug 2010 14:39:46 -0400

-- 
FFmpeg packaging

