Controlling ffdshow

[7ore]

It would be cool if there where a way to control ffdshow from within NextPVR.
Like changing audiostream or turning Subtitles on, off or switching between them.

I've benn looking for a way to let my remote control ffdshow in the background and maybe I succeed. But it would be nice if it were possible to do directly from within npvr.
I found this page with code examples for the ffdshow API

[mvallevand]

This is a good idea I will look into it. I am a big fan of ffdshow and NPVR and anything I can do to improve this relationship and getting more people onboard helps. One of GBPVR and NPVR weaknesses (and strengthes at times) is the reliance on installed DS components and when you look at how the competition (MythTV, XBMC, SageTV, MPC-HD, MP, SageTV) use ffdshow or ffmpeg to me it makes a lot of sense to keep in this direction

Martin

[johnsonx42]

Agreed; being able to use various decoders is very nice, but having a standard decoder that works for the majority and that the program knows how to interface with would be most welcome. It would be particularly helpful to new users, who don't understand the whole decoder thing.

Hoborg has put in a lot of effort with his SAF package, and I gather it works well for many users. I've never explicitly steered users towards it for two reasons: 1) I generally am wary of 'black-box' solutions for this sort of thing - you don't learn anything by installing it, and don't really know what all it does. 2) it appears to depend on being *unlocked* which I gather means a commercial decoder gets provided somehow on the sly. So hoborg's work is good and is to be applauded, but I don't think it can be made the official go-to solution for NPVR.

By the way, a quick question, when we say "ffdshow" do we mean "ffdshow-tryouts" or is there another version/fork of ffdshow that I don't know about? I'm not being picky or suggesting it has to be called by full name every time, I just want to make sure ffdshow-tryouts is what "ffdshow" means in 2010.

[mvallevand]

ffdshow development stopped many years ago so yes I mean tryouts.

Martin

[7ore]

I meant tryouts as well.
Awesome initiative, Martin! Send me a PM if you come to the point you need a tester for it.

[Reddwarf]

I meant tryouts as well.
Awesome initiative, Martin! Send me a PM if you come to the point you need a tester for it.

What about all of us that never had any sucess using ffdshow? I'v tried SAF and various builds of ffdshow tryouts but never managed to get both audio and video at the same time. My feeling about the project is that it is abandond and every Joe, Dick and Harry's dog have their own version of ffdshow so there is no reliable development going on.

[mvallevand]

I don't agree ffdshow-tryout is an active project on soureforge which seems well supported. Like every open source project with nightly builds some might be better than others, but overall I am happier using it with mpeg HD including h264 and ac3 then other choices.

Martin

[Reddwarf]

Well if it is well supported it is good, but nevertheless locking npvr to one set of decoders is throwing away an important piece of it's versatility.

[johnsonx42]

Well if it is well supported it is good, but nevertheless locking npvr to one set of decoders is throwing away an important piece of it's versatility.

I don't think anyone has suggested doing that.

[mvallevand]

7ore, you wrote about using the API to control subtitles. Using NPVR the only subtitles I seem to be able to control using ffdshow are North American closed captions. I can create my own graphs using the Haali splitter that I can control, and even then if DirectVobSub is included, I don't have any luck.

Can you control them manually using the red ffdshow tray icon?

Martin