For a while, we used this to transfer PCM from demuxer to the filter
chain. We had a special "codec" that mapped what MPlayer used to do
(MPlayer passes the AF sample format over an extra field to ad_pcm,
which specially interprets it).
Do this by providing a mp_set_pcm_codec() function, which describes a
sample format in a generic way, and sets the appropriate demuxer header
fields so that libavcodec interprets it correctly. We use the fact that
libavcodec has separate PCM decoders for each format. These are
systematically named, so we can easily map them.
This has the advantage that we can change the audio filter chain as we
like, without losing features from the "rawaudio" demuxer. In fact, this
commit also gets rid of the audio filter chain formats completely.
Instead have an explicit list of PCM formats. (We could even just have
the user pass libavcodec PCM decoder names directly, but that would be
annoying in other ways.)
Until now, the audio chain could handle both little endian and big
endian formats. This actually doesn't make much sense, since the audio
API and the HW will most likely prefer native formats. Or at the very
least, it should be trivial for audio drivers to do the byte swapping
themselves.
From now on, the audio chain contains native-endian formats only. All
AOs and some filters are adjusted. af_convertsignendian.c is now wrongly
named, but the filter name is adjusted. In some cases, the audio
infrastructure was reused on the demuxer side, but that is relatively
easy to rectify.
This is a quite intrusive and radical change. It's possible that it will
break some things (especially if they're obscure or not Linux), so watch
out for regressions. It's probably still better to do it the bulldozer
way, since slow transition and researching foreign platforms would take
a lot of time and effort.