Undeprecating libsidplay and fbg

[Hans de Goede]

Hi all,

just a quick headsup that I'm undeprecating libsidplay and fbg.

libsidplay, review request:
949165 - Review Request: libsidplay - SID chip music module playing library
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=949165

Rationale for undeprecating: .sid files are cool and libsidplay is needed
to (re-)add support for them to gstreamer using packages.


fbg, review request:
949167 - Review Request: fbg - Falling Block Game
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=949167

Rationale for undeprecating: I'm the original packager of fbg and handed
it over to lower my package load, only to later found out it got orphaned
(and I missed this), so now I want to get it back into Fedora, as this is
still a nice and simple game.

Regards,

Hans

[Michael Schwendt]

On Sat, 06 Apr 2013 16:54:45 +0200, Hans de Goede wrote:

>  Hi all,
>  
>  just a quick headsup that I'm undeprecating libsidplay and fbg.
>  
>  libsidplay, review request:
>  949165 - Review Request: libsidplay - SID chip music module playing library
>  https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=949165
>  
>  Rationale for undeprecating: .sid files are cool and libsidplay is needed
>  to (re-)add support for them to gstreamer using packages. 
Please reconsider. Just because libsidplay v2 is not "free" (due to the
Microsoft Basic and Kernal ROM images it includes), that should not mean that
the ancient libsidplay v1 lives on forever. It simply does not support current
SID files formats, such as PSID v2NG and RSID, and cannot support them.

[Hans de Goede]

Hi,

On 04/06/2013 09:20 PM, Michael Schwendt wrote:
>  On Sat, 06 Apr 2013 16:54:45 +0200, Hans de Goede wrote:
>
> > Hi all,
> >
> > just a quick headsup that I'm undeprecating libsidplay and fbg.
> >
> > libsidplay, review request:
> > 949165 - Review Request: libsidplay - SID chip music module playing library
> > https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=949165
> >
> > Rationale for undeprecating: .sid files are cool and libsidplay is needed
> > to (re-)add support for them to gstreamer using packages.
>
>  Please reconsider. Just because libsidplay v2 is not "free" (due to the
>  Microsoft Basic and Kernal ROM images it includes), that should not mean that
>  the ancient libsidplay v1 lives on forever. It simply does not support current
>  SID files formats, such as PSID v2NG and RSID, and cannot support them. 
This is not only about free-ness this is also about some multimedia players
(notably the gstreamer framework) not having libsidplay v2 support.

Regards,

Hans

[Michael Schwendt]

On Sun, 07 Apr 2013 22:42:11 +0200, Hans de Goede wrote:

>  This is not only about free-ness this is also about some multimedia
> players
>  (notably the gstreamer framework) not having libsidplay v2 support. 
That's all?

Will it ever support libsidplay v2 or libsidplayfp, if distributions
continue to include libsidplay v1?

Some distributions even build with libsidplay v1 but [cluelessly] link to
the sidplay2 home page.

Building GStreamer only for libsidplay v1 means that it cannot play
.sid files in PSID v2NG and RSID format. That's not very useful.
http://www.hvsc.c64.org/#question9

There's not even any guarantee that it could play all .sid files with
a PSID header, because if that file had been tested in a more capable
SID player only, it could be that it doesn't work with libsidplay v1.
Even the officially registered MIME type for .sid files (audio/prs.sid)
covers RSID files, which would not be supported by GStreamer.

The original message about retiring libsidplay v1 before F18:
http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/devel/2012-May/167573.html

If you worry just about GStreamer, I think it does a disservice to the
community if it doesn't support any of the later and more capable SID
music playing libs.

-- 
Fedora release 19 (Schrödinger’s Cat) - Linux 3.9.0-0.rc5.git1.301.fc19.x86_64
loadavg: 0.03 0.14 0.22

[Michael Schwendt]

Amazingly, somebody even has forked the old Qt based XSIDPLAY to
port it libsidplayfp and reSID:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/xsidplay2/files/xsidplay2/

[Hans de Goede]

Hi,

On 04/08/2013 12:01 AM, Michael Schwendt wrote:
>  On Sun, 07 Apr 2013 22:42:11 +0200, Hans de Goede wrote:
>
> > This is not only about free-ness this is also about some multimedia players
> > (notably the gstreamer framework) not having libsidplay v2 support.
>
>  That's all?
>
>  Will it ever support libsidplay v2 or libsidplayfp, if distributions
>  continue to include libsidplay v1?
>
>  Some distributions even build with libsidplay v1 but [cluelessly] link to
>  the sidplay2 home page.
>
>  Building GStreamer only for libsidplay v1 means that it cannot play
>  .sid files in PSID v2NG and RSID format. That's not very useful.
>  http://www.hvsc.c64.org/#question9
>
>  There's not even any guarantee that it could play all .sid files with
>  a PSID header, because if that file had been tested in a more capable
>  SID player only, it could be that it doesn't work with libsidplay v1.
>  Even the officially registered MIME type for .sid files (audio/prs.sid)
>  covers RSID files, which would not be supported by GStreamer.
>
>  The original message about retiring libsidplay v1 before F18:
>  http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/devel/2012-May/167573.html
>
>  If you worry just about GStreamer, I think it does a disservice to the
>  community if it doesn't support any of the later and more capable SID
>  music playing libs. 
Ok, you've got me convinced, I'll closing the review request and look into
porting the gstreamer plugin ti sidplay v2.

Regards,

Hans

[Michael Schwendt]

On Mon, 08 Apr 2013 09:39:50 +0200, Hans de Goede wrote:

>  > If you worry just about GStreamer, I think it does a disservice
> to the
>  > community if it doesn't support any of the later and more capable SID
>  > music playing libs.
>  
>  Ok, you've got me convinced, I'll closing the review request and look into
>  porting the gstreamer plugin ti sidplay v2. 
Or libsidplayfp which is active and has released 1.0 just recently:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/sidplay-residfp/

-- 
Fedora release 19 (Schrödinger’s Cat) - Linux 3.9.0-0.rc5.git1.301.fc19.x86_64
loadavg: 0.39 0.37 0.36

[Tom Callaway]

On 04/06/2013 10:54 AM, Hans de Goede wrote:
>  fbg, review request:
>  949167 - Review Request: fbg - Falling Block Game
>  https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=949167
>  
>  Rationale for undeprecating: I'm the original packager of fbg and handed
>  it over to lower my package load, only to later found out it got orphaned
>  (and I missed this), so now I want to get it back into Fedora, as this is
>  still a nice and simple game. 
I'm assuming you saw later why I deprecated it, there are legal issues
with the use of a sound trademark in that game, and the format for the
music file in question was... archaic. There is a sequel to fbg called
"fbg2", and I was able to resolve the music issue in that version.

~tom

==
Fedora Project

[Hans de Goede]

Hi,

On 04/08/2013 11:04 PM, Tom Callaway wrote:
>  On 04/06/2013 10:54 AM, Hans de Goede wrote:
> > fbg, review request:
> > 949167 - Review Request: fbg - Falling Block Game
> > https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=949167
> >
> > Rationale for undeprecating: I'm the original packager of fbg and handed
> > it over to lower my package load, only to later found out it got orphaned
> > (and I missed this), so now I want to get it back into Fedora, as this is
> > still a nice and simple game.
>
>  I'm assuming you saw later why I deprecated it, there are legal issues
>  with the use of a sound trademark in that game, and the format for the
>  music file in question was... archaic. There is a sequel to fbg called
>  "fbg2", and I was able to resolve the music issue in that version. 
Yes, I've already closed the review ticket and I've made fbg2 obsolete
fbg for F-19+

Regards,

Hans