Currently, AVStream contains an embedded AVCodecContext instance, which
is used by demuxers to export stream parameters to the caller and by
muxers to receive stream parameters from the caller. It is also used
internally as the codec context that is passed to parsers.
In addition, it is also widely used by the callers as the decoding (when
demuxer) or encoding (when muxing) context, though this has been
officially discouraged since Libav 11.
There are multiple important problems with this approach:
- the fields in AVCodecContext are in general one of
* stream parameters
* codec options
* codec state
However, it's not clear which ones are which. It is consequently
unclear which fields are a demuxer allowed to set or a muxer allowed to
read. This leads to erratic behaviour depending on whether decoding or
encoding is being performed or not (and whether it uses the AVStream
embedded codec context).
- various synchronization issues arising from the fact that the same
context is used by several different APIs (muxers/demuxers,
parsers, bitstream filters and encoders/decoders) simultaneously, with
there being no clear rules for who can modify what and the different
processes being typically delayed with respect to each other.
- avformat_find_stream_info() making it necessary to support opening
and closing a single codec context multiple times, thus
complicating the semantics of freeing various allocated objects in the
codec context.
Those problems are resolved by replacing the AVStream embedded codec
context with a newly added AVCodecParameters instance, which stores only
the stream parameters exported by the demuxers or read by the muxers.
Since 596e5d4783, this is not necessary anymore. It also allows to
actually disable the flushing, improving write performance (but
possibly giving worse latency in real-time streaming).
Signed-off-by: Martin Storsjö <martin@martin.st>
Also add missing trailing commas, break long codec_tag lines and
add spaces in codec_tag declarations.
Signed-off-by: Martin Storsjö <martin@martin.st>
In the name of consistency:
put_byte -> avio_w8
put_<type> -> avio_w<type>
put_buffer -> avio_write
put_nbyte will be made private
put_tag will be merged with avio_put_str
Signed-off-by: Ronald S. Bultje <rsbultje@gmail.com>
Anton Khirnov
Clément Bœsch
Martin Storsjö
Mans Rullgard
Diego Elio Pettenò
Reimar Döffinger