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Poll

Which codecs will be around for the long haul?

Apple Lossless
[ 8 ] (7.5%)
FLAC
[ 76 ] (71.7%)
La
[ 0 ] (0%)
LPAC
[ 0 ] (0%)
Monkey's Audio
[ 1 ] (0.9%)
OptimFROG
[ 1 ] (0.9%)
Shorten, Shorten
[ 1 ] (0.9%)
TTA
[ 0 ] (0%)
WavPack
[ 9 ] (8.5%)
Windows Media Encoder 9 Series
[ 10 ] (9.4%)

Total Members Voted: 158

Topic: Which has best chance at development longevity? (Read 9502 times) previous topic - next topic
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Which has best chance at development longevity?

I'm sure you all hate to archive an entire collection, just to be dismayed years later that your codec of choice has been dropped from development, and you'd have to re-archive your collection once again with a more relevant codec. I'm currently trying to decide on a codec that has the highest chance of survival (I'd hate to have been someone that archived with RKAU years ago, just to see how it's considered dead now).  please vote for your choice and explain why you think it has a good chance of development longevity.

Currently, I think everyone will agree FLAC is the wisest choice for longevity, since it's the most supported. However, proprietary codecs by large corporations like Apple and Microsoft might not be as impressive performance wise and development slow as hell, but these companies are not going to disappear on us, and we can almost rest assured they'll be around for years to come. Relatively newer codecs like Wavpack is gaining popularity fast and development is aggressive, but as we all know from history, a promising start isn't insurance of a bright future. So, what's your choice and why?

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #1
Ooo, I put in the second vote.  Here's to avoiding schoolwork and checking in here every ten mintues.

I chose FLAC.  I am still learning a lot about digital audio, but I see it as being around for a long time simply because the audio libraries made using it are meant to last the longest.  You might trash your MP3s when a new lossy codec comes around, but when you made that FLAC archive of yours, it was meant to last for a long time.  Hence, interest in the format remains high, and because it is open source, there will be development as long as there is interest. 

Mind you, the people who are serious enough to make a FLAC archive of their music represent a small minority of all digital audio users...so FLAC may not be the brightest flame of the bunch, but I do see it burning the longest.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #2
i selected apple lossless and i would have also chosen the windows format aswell (if i could choose two). I don't think they will let there lossless formats disappear that easy.

Is there much more compression that can be made from the lossless codecs?
Who are you and how did you get in here ?
I'm a locksmith, I'm a locksmith.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #3
I agree with "the man eating Duck"

I checked WMA....The 2nd would be Apple, They are both backed by big companies!!

I would choose Apple lossless over WMA coz its much faster!!!

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #4
MPEG format could be the one. But it's not included in this poll...

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #5
Any MPEG codec from mpeg 4 family has the best chanses IMHO.
EDIT: corrections.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #6
Apple Lossless, since its backed up by a big company.
Since Apple produce hardware that supports this audio format they sure gonna keep it alive for a long time!

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #7
I think it's Windows Media xxx. Because it's in the Microsoft hell of dlls and they will ship it as long as they sell Windos. I don't use it, but that wasn't the question.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #8
Quote
I agree with "the man eating Duck"

I checked WMA....The 2nd would be Apple, They are both backed by big companies!!

I would choose Apple lossless over WMA coz its much faster!!!
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=281988"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


How come everyone keeps getting my name wrong 
Who are you and how did you get in here ?
I'm a locksmith, I'm a locksmith.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #9
Everyone who is voting for WMA or Apple Lossless has got their reasoning completely backwards. The fact that it is a proprietary format backed by a big company makes it less likely to survive for long term. FLAC, WavPack, and TTA have open source, which means no matter what happens in the future you will still be able to playback your audio files.

Thought experiment: What if, five years from now, the PC market gets eaten by some sort of PS4/PC hybrid powered by the Cell2? Further assume that the the OS that powers it is some new, totally proprieraty thing designed by IBM. Will you be able to play a WMA on this hypothetical computer? Probably not. But it takes just one person a bit of time to port the FLAC code to the new platform and compile it, and everybody can still play their FLACs.

I'm not trying to sound like an open source zealot, but propoietary code means you can never be sure what will happen in the future. Open source means the soure will always be there. Whatever platform or system we are using ten years from now, I'm certian it will be possible to play one of the open source codecs on it.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #10
Generally speaking it does not matter which, they are all lossless and all can be converted without loss to any future current standard. Just as long as you have a bridge between old and new, which there should always be.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #11
Quote
How come everyone keeps getting my name wrong 
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282014"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Are you "A man that is in the process of eating a meal of duck meat", or "a large, agressive duck that eats humans"?

Sorry.  Had to ask.

As for the codecs...  I'd like to agree with Klyith, except that I'm more of an open source zealot.  I think in an ideal world, stardards and code woud be open and that would be the main determining factor for widespread adoption, because proprietary code results in people being subservient to and dependent upon a single corporation, so there is less option.

On the other hand, with something like codecs, there are way too many market forces and sociological factors to consider that can't really be predicted.  Sadly, the main determining factor will probably have little or nothing to do with quality of implementation or compression factors, or even the elegance of the tagging functionality.  It'll probably just have more to do with who has the best marketing.

AAC isn't really all that widely supported, but it's had it's own special and very well executed marketing thanks to apple.  WMA is generally not a better codec than anything else (maybe even MP3) but it's widely used and many *think* it's better because Microsoft says so, and few people have taken the time to consider the validity of their statements.  (They also claim that Linux costs more than Windows, so go figure).  Yet WMA support is everywhere, virtually, but you can't find the open source solutions (imho the best solutions) like ogg vorbis in nearly as many places.

So what's going to actually last the longest?  I honestly don't give a damn, because that's the whole point of lossless.  If flacs go out of style, I just dust off my old AMD-Athlon FX based computer running windows XP from a few years back, and tell foobar to transcode my files into whatever whiz-bang newfangled codec I may happen to need at the time.

I'd call that a worst case scenario...  but the point is, transcoding your CD images with something like foobar2000 is relatively painless, and isn't like the whole process of ripping hundreds of CDs again.  I'm betting a lot on this notion, because I just finished ripping 300 CDs into APE format (which I DON'T think will be around the longest at all) with the belief that I can, in the distant future, pull out all my archival DVDs and transcode to any codec that I might want.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #12
I've got to remember to burn a copy of the version of codec and encoder that I'm using at the moment with the archive, so that years later if backwards compatibility is not there with the newest versions, I can still have something to use!  In fact, I try to keep a copy of evey OS that I leave behind. I have a bunch of games that only run on Win98. . ..

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #13
Lunatique:
The first time that I used APE was to back up a very long mixtape that I made as a DJ onto a CD.  (It was over two hours long).  At that time I had only just heard of ape, and lossless codecs in general, so it seemed really weird and obscure to me, so I stuck a copy of ape onto the CD with the ape file, and a special cuesheet I made to label it all. (my weird over 99 min. cuesheet seems to work in most programs too).

Of course, now it seems like a moot point, because that particular version of Monkey's Audio is out of date, but I'm sure that even many years from now, it would not be hard to find a copy of a decoder for your current operating system (even if it must be run under an emulator or something).  That is, of course, barring some kind of massive, cataclysimic event that destroys all of the technology on the planet.  Y10K anyone?

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #14
Quote
Any MPEG codec from mpeg 4 family has the best chanses IMHO.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=281995"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Don't be so sure. Microsoft will always go the proprietary route, and even Apple got fed up with the high licensing costs so they just went ahead and made their own codec.

Who's left to adopt MPEG 4 lossless then?

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #15
Quote
even Apple got fed up with the high licensing costs so they just went ahead and made their own codec.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282071"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Apple paid for AAC support, MP3 support, HE-AAC support, MPEG-4 video support... how could they be fed up with another format?

Apple released Apple Lossless one year ago. MPEG-4 Lossless wasn't ready at this time. It's maybe enough to explain why Apple developed ALAC.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #16
Quote
Quote
even Apple got fed up with the high licensing costs so they just went ahead and made their own codec.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282071"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Apple paid for AAC support, MP3 support, HE-AAC support, MPEG-4 video support... how could they be fed up with another format?
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282076"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Well, it's pretty obvious they would shoot themselves in the foot if they made a proprietary lossy video/audio codec (ATRAC anyone..). QuickTime 6 was delayed for several months because of licensing issues with the MPEG association over the MPEG 4 video codec btw.

However, for such a simple thing as a lossless codec, I can very well see why they didn't want to pay yet another "per unit" fee to the MPEG group.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #17
Quote
Everyone who is voting for WMA or Apple Lossless has got their reasoning completely backwards. The fact that it is a proprietary format backed by a big company makes it less likely to survive for long term. FLAC, WavPack, and TTA have open source, which means no matter what happens in the future you will still be able to playback your audio files.

Thought experiment: What if, five years from now, the PC market gets eaten by some sort of PS4/PC hybrid powered by the Cell2? Further assume that the the OS that powers it is some new, totally proprieraty thing designed by IBM. Will you be able to play a WMA on this hypothetical computer? Probably not. But it takes just one person a bit of time to port the FLAC code to the new platform and compile it, and everybody can still play their FLACs.

I'm not trying to sound like an open source zealot, but propoietary code means you can never be sure what will happen in the future. Open source means the soure will always be there. Whatever platform or system we are using ten years from now, I'm certian it will be possible to play one of the open source codecs on it.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282027"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Da*n STRAIGHT! Someone commented saying they're all good because you can assume that you will always be able to transcode losslessly and easily,
but do you really think microsoft and it's bucketloads of patents will allow that? Would they allow some future open source or free WMA decoder for transcoding? THAT WOULD BE LIKE THEM HAVING GIVING AWAY A FREE CONVERTER FOR THE MS WORD FORMAT.  I've never heard of WMA lossless, but I assume you can only convert within Microsheister's WM apps. Microsheister wants to control everything, and this is another of their schemes. Have sense people,
look at MS's past. The past is sometimes a good indication of the
future. Microsheister Corp is the archivist's and audiophile's mortal enemy. I say to hell with the proprietary ones.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #18
Quote
Generally speaking it does not matter which, they are all lossless and all can be converted without loss to any future current standard. Just as long as you have a bridge between old and new, which there should always be.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282033"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Correct. People making a big fuss over closed source codecs locking their ripped tracks if they ever become undecodable are overreacting badly. And I don't know where the paranoia comes from, considering we have no example of an audio codec becoming completely dead and all its binaries not working anywhere.

If any, ReallyRareWares is a good example that most codecs, even very unpopular ones, can be preserved for posterity.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #19
Quote
However, for such a simple thing as a lossless codec, I can very well see why they didn't want to pay yet another "per unit" fee to the MPEG group.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282080"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Apple released a proprietary version because they couldn't wait - what, two years already? - for the standardization of MPEG4 ALS to release their lossless codec. They would lag behind the competition (MS, Real) that was releasing their own lossless codecs by then.

And I got this information directly from an Apple engineer.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #20
Quote
but do you really think microsoft and it's bucketloads of patents will allow that? Would they allow some future open source or free WMA decoder for transcoding?


As far as I know they never went after the reverse-engineered WMA Std. decoder, that has been available for more than an year, in FFMPEG. And WMA Std. is much more strategical to them than WMA Lossless.

Quote
I've never heard of WMA lossless, but I assume you can only convert within Microsheister's WM apps. Microsheister wants to control everything


Changing the name of Microsoft in an attempt to make them look bad like "Micro$oft" and "Microsheister" is so childish and pathetic, it hurts.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #21
Quote
Quote
Generally speaking it does not matter which, they are all lossless and all can be converted without loss to any future current standard. Just as long as you have a bridge between old and new, which there should always be.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282033"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Correct. People making a big fuss over closed source codecs locking their ripped tracks if they ever become undecodable are overreacting badly. And I don't know where the paranoia comes from, considering we have no example of an audio codec becoming completely dead and all its binaries not working anywhere.

If any, ReallyRareWares is a good example that most codecs, even very unpopular ones, can be preserved for posterity.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282094"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


That makes sense, until ReallyRareWares falls off the internet, like
every other website with any non-insubstantive content.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #22
half of these options have source available, so i don't see how this is all that relevant...
(flac, monkey's audio, shorten, tta, wavpack)

also, like roberto said, binaries will be around forever.

(oh, i voted wavpack, but that is irrelevant  )


later

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #23
Quote
That makes sense, until ReallyRareWares falls off the internet, like
every other website with any non-insubstantive content.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=282098"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


How can you be so sure it'll fall off the internet?

I've been maintaining RareWares for almost 4 years now. ReallyRareWares is in its infancy. Also, it gives me much more pleasure to maintain than RareWares, since I just love research work, and maintenance takes much less effort. Unless I'm left without any web space to use (and I believe I can count on several friends in this community and elsewhere to help me with hosting), ReallyRareWares won't go down.

Which has best chance at development longevity?

Reply #24
The question is phrased incorrectly.  It should read, "Which codec is most likely to be around for the long haul."  Otherwise allow for multi-voting.

I voted for WMA because M$ will continue to push it.  2nd place would be Apple for the same reason.  3rd place is Flac because of its popularity.

I actually use FLAC because I use Linux for audio ripping and it has the widest support.