[winswitch] H264 encoder missing?

[Antoine Martin]

On 05/06/15 20:43, Jiang Qian wrote:
> Hi Antoine,
>
> Thanks for this quick clarification!
>
> I'm glad that there is an open source alternative. However, I do not
> have vp9, either. How do I get that? I see that you need libvpx that's
> higher than 1.4, whereas 14.04 only have 1.3. Do you know if there's a
> repository for it or do I need to compile it?
Odd, the build file should enable VP9 with libvpx 1.3 or higher. I'll
have to check this.
libvpx 1.4 adds only one option we actually use, but it does make a
noticeable difference (prevents jerky video).
> If I just compile and install it in /usr/loca/lib/, would the xpra
> binary from the repository automatically recognize it or do I need to
> recompile xpra as well?
You would need to recompile it against the new headers.
> How big is the difference between vp8 and vp9? I am using it in the
> scenario that, contrary to the normal use on gigabit, I log in from
> outside LAN, and the downlink is really slow (because it is the uplink
> of a residential internet!) at about 1Mb/s and the uplink is about
> 8-10Mb/s
In that case, VP8 might still be usable and good enough.
The lossless refresh code should take care of clearing up the visual
artifacts that come with VP8's lossy compression.
One of the main benefits of VP9 is the lossless and YUV444 modes, but
those use quite a bit more bandwidth.

Cheers
Antoine

PS: please always CC the list.

>
> Thanks for this clarification!
> Jiang
>
> On Fri, Jun 5, 2015 at 6:12 AM, Antoine Martin <antoine at nagafix.co.uk> wrote:
>> On 05/06/15 08:26, Jiang Qian wrote:
>>> Hi everyone,
>>>
>>> This must be the dumbest question ever asked on this list, but what do
>>> I need to do to enable h264 encoding?
>> Not at all, I should have mentioned this in the more detailed release
>> notes on the subject of "removing legacy code":
>> 0.15 dropped support for the Debian libav fork of ffmpeg, so there is no
>> h264 decoding out of the box any more.
>>> I am running xpra 0.15 on both server and client, both running ubuntu
>>> 14.04 (server is 64 bit and client is 32 bit). I installed xpra on
>>> both client and server from the xpra's official repository:
>>> deb: http://xpra.org/ trusty main
>>> and I assume all the necessary dependency should be met automatically.
>> Yes.
>>> But when I do
>>> xpra --encoding=help ...
>>> the only encoding I have is v8 and webp, various png and rgb. h264 is
>>> also missing from the tray menu of GUI.
>> That's right.
>> FYI: only decoding has been removed, the h264 encoder should still be
>> present since we use x264 library directly, you can verify this with:
>> xpra start --encoding-help
>>> Do I need to install additional packages and configure xpra server and
>>> client somehow to use H264 encoding?
>> No, but you can:
>> * switch to VP9 instead - which has similar characteristics, if not
>> better (and ignore the warnings about it being too slow - it isn't any
>> longer, as long as your server is running 0.15 or later)
>> * upgrade to Ubuntu 14.10, 15.04 or later which support the newer ffmpeg
>> codec and have h264 decoding out of the box
>> * stick to the 0.14.x branch
>>
>> Cheers
>> Antoine
>>> Thanks in advance for any hints!
>>> Regards
>>> Jiang
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>>> shifter-users at lists.devloop.org.uk
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>>
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