[gst-devel] Re: [tarkin-dev] Tarkin file extension

[Erik Walthinsen]

On Tue, 4 Sep 2001, t . wrote:

> I would kill for a universal player FE that would look at the
> file, determine what kind of file it is, parse it a bit to
> determine what codec was used, and then launch the correct
> program to view/play/whatever it. If it fails to find the
> correct program, it would display all the necessary urls
> for the person to get the tools to watch it. That way you

This is what GStreamer can and does do today, for supported media.  It
creates a file reader and attaches a 'typefind' that runs through a list
of test functions to determine a) what the file type is, and b) what some
of the basic properties are.  The autoplugging system then inspects all
available plugins and automatically constructs a pipeline that will render
the media file.

A future project is to optionally send the URL or the first part of the
media file to an "all-knowing" server on the net that would respond with
the location and configuration of plugins needed to play the file, if they
exist.  The plugins would be downloaded and inserted right into the live
application, so the media can start playing.

See http://gstreamer.net/ for more.

      Erik Walthinsen <omega at temple-baptist.com> - System Administrator
        __
       /  \                GStreamer - The only way to stream!
      |    | M E G A        ***** http://gstreamer.net/ *****
      _\  /_