Re: Media Library, pt. 2

[Mo McKinlay <mmckinlay labs interopen org>]

# * Should we make some sort of Media Server CORBA Service that app's connect
# to, or should each app run in a vacuum ? What are the pros / cons ?

One of the problems that everybody's always had with multimedia
applications is stability - because of their nature, multimedia apps are
generally fairly 'heavy', even if they're quite simple.

I'm not exactly sure of what the solution is, but it's something to be
wary of when working out what the architecture of it all should be - like
whether a crash in a particular codec would bring the whole lot down, what
mechanisms there are to prevent this, that sort of thing.

I know this may sound like I'm stating the obvious, but it's often
something that's not considered until much later on.

# * Should distributed media processing be at the core of the system, or left
# for someone else to implement on top ?

My opinion (for what it's worth) is that it should be easy enough for
somebody to add it, but most "normal" multimedia apps aren't going to need
it. If it's just a case of downloading an extra library in addition to
GML then it's not going to be a huge hassle for users.

# * How much control should an app be able to take ?

Depends on how much the app wants :-)

One of the great things about Apple's API is that it lets you do stuff
simply (like the load & play movie code that was a whopping 4 lines long),
but conversely there are applications which will need lots of control
(GPremiere anybody? :).

# * What about device control ? (apparently Apple has this in Quicktime)

MS has it in their APIs, too. It's very useful, because it allows you to
access media streams on CDs, laserdiscs, and so on, just as easily as
accessing a local file.

I hope I haven't missed the point there :)

# * How should we balance felxibilty / simplicity ?

As much of both as possible :-)
 
-- 
Mo McKinlay                                T: +44 (0) 709 22 55 05  x1
Chief Software Architect                   F: +44 (0) 709 22 55 05  x3
inter/open                                 E: mmckinlay@labs.interopen.org
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