Linked by Eugenia Loli on Wed 17th Sep 2008 23:09 UTC

Thread beginning with comment 330662
To view parent comment, click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
To view parent comment, click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
According to Wikipedia WMV is ASF, so if true I would say it is rather used, if only typically tied to Windows Media codecs. Not that I actually know, though.
I know what you mean, and I do agree. It's just that not actually all those many codecs were equally appropriate at one time. AVI (or more appropriately, DivX codec contained into it), for example, was a nightmare for Mac users pretty much until Perian, VLC or MPlayer for OS X came by, which is not that too long ago.
Edited 2008-09-18 06:25 UTC
According to Wikipedia WMV is ASF, so if true I would say it is rather used, if only typically tied to Windows Media codecs. Not that I actually know, though.
ASF is a container (like AVI, MP4, QuickTime, Matroska, Ogg etc.) WMV is a video format. Those are two different categories.
AVI (or more appropriately, DivX codec contained into it), for example, was a nightmare for Mac users pretty much until Perian, VLC or MPlayer for OS X came by, which is not that too long ago.
AVI files do not contain the DivX codec or any other codec. Codec is a software library, while AVI (and ASF MP4 etc.) files contain audio and video streams (typically) compressed with audio and video codecs. That is, A/V streams in some formats, because codecs use formats, usually common standards developed by someone else (for example, the video format that the DivX codec uses is standard MPEG-4 ASP, which means that AVI files containing streams encoded with DivX contain MPEG-4 ASP video).
Furthermore, it's not AVI's (or MPEG-4's or the codec makers') fault that QuickTime sucks big time. Anyone who uses Apple software for video playback on Mac OS X gets what he/she deserves. It could never play MPEG-4 ASP video properly, and in 2008, it still cannot play H.264 video properly. That does not mean MPEG-4 ASP or H.264 is bad, it just means QuickTime is really impotent (and therefore should be ignored completely when it comes to discussions about A/V format decisions).
Member since:
2005-06-28
AVI is pretty popular. ASF, not anymore. It used to.
Look, all I want, is to be able to export from my video editor to it, and know that there's a decoder for my viewers. Currently, neither the exporting thing, or the decoding thing is taken care of properly.