[XviD-devel] [RFC] A solution to avoid API incompatibilities.

[xvid-devel@xvid.org]

On Tue, Oct 15, 2002 at 07:01:52PM +1000, peter ross wrote:
> here what i'd like to see have.
> 
> 1. the uci api is complete and released.

I'm working on it :)

Just so people know, work is progressing on UCI.. the spec isn't quite finished
(so we're still open to input from folks) but I am in the process of writing up
a basic UCI library base to get in CVS for people to play with and experiment
on, and expect to have that available soon.  (those interested should keep an
eye on the UCI-devel list for updates)

> 2. xvid adopts uci as a frontend.
> 3. all applications on the unix platform uses uci to access xvid
>   ...
> 4. the vfw and directshow frontends are adopted to use uci, instead
>     of the native xvid api.
> 5. xvid drops the native api and implements uci natively.

This sounds like a really good plan to me :).  The plan for UCI, BTW, is to
eventually have generiric VfW and Dshow wrappers for UCI under windows anyway
(so any UCI codec can also be usable through the VfW or Dshow interface too),
but we're concentrating on building the UCI spec and core interface and getting
it working cross-platform first, so the first stage probably won't include this
in UCI itself.

Since you guys are considering doing a VfW-on-top-of-UCI wrapper as part of
XviD (which makes sense for the interim where UCI doesn't have one itself), It
might be handy to use XviD's UCI-VfW wrapper down the line as a basis for the
more generalized UCI-VfW stuff, if folks would be willing.  That would
potentially save some duplicated effort..

I have to say it's very encouraging to see the support that UCI is gathering
out there..  (and support from XviD folks means a lot)

-alex