Living together BUT not married: RR/MC and Linux

[Scott Rossi]

Recently,Mark Talluto wrote:

>> Maybe it is time for RR/MC to contain an in-built media
>> player that 'travels with it' and standalones ? ? ?
>> 
>> This would certainly make things considerably more
>> "seamless".
> 
> 
> I can feel your pain when it comes to multi-media on Linux.  Though,
> it would not be wise for a company the size of RunRev to take
> something like this on.  Having a partner in Apple that manages QT is
> a huge time and money saver.  It allows Apple to carry the burden of
> maintaining a solid multi-media offering.  It is a lot cheaper for
> RunRev to support this than to create something on their own.
> 
> We can hope that QT will eventually be released for Linux.  I have
> heard that such a beast exists and Apple is waiting for the right
> time and/or need to release it.  I think we will see Rev support some
> other player for Linux before we see this happen.  Mplayer would suit
> my needs just fine.

To take this further, in-house support for media need not be exclusive of
supporting QT or other big-name media technologies -- support both.  Keep
the ability to tie into QT, but there's gotta be a dozen or so libraries out
there that RunRev could license or otherwise make use of to beef up media
support.  No need to reinvent the wheel.

That being said, IMO reliance on QuickTime for (what are now) basic audio
features is bad.  Sorry for repeating this broken record mantra every 4 to 6
months or so, but audio support in Rev is primitive needs an overhaul.
Updates to the language aren't even really necessary, just better underlying
architecture.  Play multiple sounds, as many as memory allows, and generate
Ids for each, same as video and pendingMessages.  Enhance players to work
with in-house (3rd party) technologies other than QT, or extend the player
functions to work with built-in audio support (playRate, currentTime,
startTime, stopTime, etc).  Even if we had to distribute a library along
with our stacks/standalones, at least we would have control over delivery.
Currently, we're left saying "Sorry, if you don't have QT, I can't help
you."  Pretty please?...

Best Regards,

Scott Rossi
Creative Director
Tactile Media, Multimedia & Design
-----
E: scott at tactilemedia.com
W: http://www.tactilemedia.com