opensource client

Now that the viewer is opensource, maybe it's time to work on specific linux patch ? I have in view this points in particular :

- add video supprt (ffmpeg?)
- add a better opensource codec for jpeg rendering
- free sound library ? I try to check what is available and only aw xmp and mikmod that could replace fmod for now .

So are there any peopole already working on it ? Maybe we could create a linux group for it ? I'm ready to help

- benoît

Let me say I'm quite disappointed. No answer here nor thread about making a better viewer for linux. That's too bad :/

OpenAL is the sound library that one probably ought to use.

It would be a huge effort to maintain a separate SL client for Linux, because the SL server and protocols are always being updated. It would be awesome to do so -- but it'd be best if Tofu had an SVN tree somewhere he'd be willing to open up Or if he would take patches. Any *usable* SL client is going to need to keep all the LL changes synced in addition to whatever of its own changes it makes.

I'd *love* to see the client move away from whatever sound library it uses right now, because it seems to cause all kinds of trouble.

I took a look at the audio code in the client, and I dare say its understandable! I <3 objects.

I intend to try writing an audio driver, assuming someone else doesn't beat me to it. Initially it will only play music streams, that looks easy to do. Getting the rest to work may be too much for me...

Though what I really want to do, is patch in a script hook, so that when you hit play in SL, it forks a shell script that can then cue up the stream in XMMS or what have you. Script hooks, its the unix way.

Also of note, Windows Vista has dropped accelerated Directsound3D, relegating it to a software compatability layer. Thus, due to Creative's backing, leaves OpenAL the only accelerated 3D audio API on Vista:

http://www.openal.org/openal_vista.html

Apple has also officially adopted OpenAL, it ships in Tiger.

Thus OpenAL could fully replace fmod on all officially supported platforms.

Before anyone starts working on it, maybe you'd like to take a look at this first:

http://jackaudio.org

Cheers,
Felix

Yes, I've been aware of jack for years. It is not in the same scope as OpenAL/FMOD. Its a low level layer that deals with passing plain (floating point only!) audio streams between processes, nothing more. It does not provide multi channel mixing or spacialization or anything else a 3D game needs.

openal sound good for me.

I would like to work with ffmpeg for the video to replace quicktime if noone works on it yet. Maybe we could justs setup a trac+svn somwhere in which we reverse code in phase with the official sl viewer ? Like the cinelerra project in fact.


- benoît

@Seg,
That is true... Jack is actually a server that manages communication of audio streams from different applications. Mixers or other devices are built seperately to work with it. Pretty much like the X server for graphics. Maybe I misunderstood the original question. It was created as alternative to ALSA or the old OSS and is particularly designed to eliminate the lag problem. Using Jack, you can achieve to press the lag below the 3 ms limit, which is essential if you want to use the computer as a musical instrument in a live setting e.g.

One excellent source for audio algorithms of all sorts is found in the CSound project. Anything conceivable you want to do with sound, somebody has already made a CSound module for it. Its structure is easy to understand and the code usually very readable. Have a look here:

http://www.csounds.com/

Cheers

lets turn it the other way ...
I am disappointed that linden lab does not pay linux developer and leave the linux version grow by itself ...
but neverthemind ... hope they can fix the network problems ...
at least for this I hope they do not use volunteers !!!