source: multimedia/videoutils/ffmpeg.xml@ 4162bcd

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<!DOCTYPE sect1 PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.5//EN"
   "http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.5/docbookx.dtd" [
  <!ENTITY % general-entities SYSTEM "../../general.ent">
  %general-entities;

  <!ENTITY ffmpeg-download-http "http://ffmpeg.org/releases/ffmpeg-&ffmpeg-version;.tar.bz2">
  <!ENTITY ffmpeg-download-ftp  " ">
  <!ENTITY ffmpeg-md5sum        "dc665cc599a739e3c5262ccdac13d129">
  <!ENTITY ffmpeg-size          "5.5 MB">
  <!ENTITY ffmpeg-buildsize     "209 MB">
  <!ENTITY ffmpeg-time          "3.2 SBU">
]>

<sect1 id="ffmpeg" xreflabel="FFmpeg-&ffmpeg-version;">
  <?dbhtml filename="ffmpeg.html"?>

  <sect1info>
    <othername>$LastChangedBy$</othername>
    <date>$Date$</date>
  </sect1info>

  <title>FFmpeg-&ffmpeg-version;</title>

  <indexterm zone="ffmpeg">
    <primary sortas="a-FFmpeg">FFmpeg</primary>
  </indexterm>

  <sect2 role="package">
    <title>Introduction to FFmpeg</title>

    <para><application>FFmpeg</application> is a solution to record, convert and
    stream audio and video. It is a very fast video and audio converter and it
    can also acquire from a live audio/video source. Designed to be intuitive,
    the command-line interface (<command>ffmpeg</command>) tries to figure out
    all the parameters, when possible. <application>FFmpeg</application> can
    also convert from any sample rate to any other, and resize video on the fly
    with a high quality polyphase filter. <application>FFmpeg</application> can
    use a video4linux compatible video source and any Open Sound System audio
    source.</para>

    <!-- xine-lib and everything else that I've tried will not compile against
    current FFmpeg from git 
    <para>The developers of this package do not make releases very often, so you
    may wish to use a snapshot instead of this release.  If you do that, you
    must expect the acceptable <command>configure</command> switches, and the
    dependencies, to change.</para> -->

    &lfs70_checked;

    <bridgehead renderas="sect3">Package Information</bridgehead>
    <itemizedlist spacing="compact">
      <listitem>
        <para>Download (HTTP): <ulink url="&ffmpeg-download-http;"/></para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>Download (FTP): <ulink url="&ffmpeg-download-ftp;"/></para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>Download MD5 sum: &ffmpeg-md5sum;</para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>Download size: &ffmpeg-size;</para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>Estimated disk space required: &ffmpeg-buildsize;</para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>Estimated build time: &ffmpeg-time;</para>
      </listitem>
    </itemizedlist>

    <bridgehead renderas="sect3">FFmpeg Dependencies</bridgehead>

    <bridgehead renderas="sect4">Recommended</bridgehead>
    <para role="recommended">
      <xref linkend="yasm"/>
    </para>

    <bridgehead renderas="sect4">Optional</bridgehead>
    <para role="optional">
      <xref linkend="faad2"/>, 
      <xref linkend="lame"/>,
      <xref linkend="libtheora"/>, 
      <xref linkend="libvorbis"/>,
      <xref linkend="libvpx"/>, 
      <xref linkend="x-window-system"/>,
      <ulink url="http://www.videolan.org/developers/x264.html">x264</ulink>
      <xref linkend="xvid"/>,
      <ulink url="http://www.penguin.cz/~utx/amr">AMR narrowband
      (floating point)</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://www.penguin.cz/~utx/amr">AMR wideband</ulink>,
      <xref linkend="faac"/>, 
      <xref linkend="freetype2"/>,
      <ulink url="http://libgsm.sourcearchive.com/">GSM</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/projects/libdc1394">libdc1394</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://svn.mplayerhq.hu/nut/src/trunk/">libnut</ulink>
         (SVN checkout),
      <ulink url="http://xavs.sourceforge.net/">libxavs</ulink>
         (SVN checkout),
      <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/projects/librtmp">librtmp</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://diracvideo.org/">libschroedinger</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://medialibrary.sourceforge.net/">MediaLibrary</ulink>,
      <ulink
      url="http://connect.creativelabs.com/openal/default.aspx">OpenAL</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://tipok.org.ua/node/17">libaacplus</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://code.google.com/p/libass/">libass</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://www.celt-codec.org/">libcelt</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/libcdio/">libcdio</ulink>,
      <ulink
      url="http://sourceforge.net/projects/opencvlibrary/">libopencv</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/projects/libdc1394/">libdc1394</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://linuxtv.org/downloads/v4l-utils/">libv4l2</ulink>,
      <ulink url="http://www.openjpeg.org">OpenJPEG</ulink>
        (<application>FFmpeg</application> includes code for it's own jpeg2000
        encoder and decoder which is enabled by default),
      <xref linkend="speex"/>,
      <xref linkend="gnutls"/>,
      <xref linkend="openssl"/>,
      <xref linkend="sdl"/> and
      <ulink url="http://www.nongnu.org/texi2html">texi2html</ulink>
        (to build HTML documentation).</para>

    <para condition="html" role="usernotes">User Notes:
    <ulink url="&blfs-wiki;/ffmpeg"/></para>

  </sect2>

  <sect2 role="installation">
    <title>Installation of FFmpeg</title>

    <para>Install <application>FFmpeg</application> by running the following
    commands:</para>

<screen><userinput>mkdir build &amp;&amp;
cd build &amp;&amp;
../configure --prefix=/usr --enable-shared --disable-static --enable-gpl &amp;&amp;
make</userinput></screen>

    <para>The <application>FFmpeg</application> source contains a tool called
    <command>qt-faststart</command> that can modify QuickTime formatted movies
    (mov or mp4) so that the header information is located at the beginning of
    the file instead of the end. This allows video players to begin playing the
    content before the entire file has been downloaded. An example of where
    this is useful for preparing videos before uploading them to YouTube. If
    need <command>qt-faststart</command>, you can compile it with gcc:</para>

<screen><userinput>gcc ../tools/qt-faststart.c -o qt-faststart</userinput></screen>

    <para>If you have <xref linkend="doxygen"/> installed and wish to create
    the API documentation (takes about 150 MB of space), issue the command
    <command>doxygen</command>.</para>

    <para>This package does not come with a test suite.</para>

    <para>Now, as the <systemitem class="username">root</systemitem>
    user:</para>

<screen role="root"><userinput>make install &amp;&amp;
make install-man &amp;&amp;
mkdir /usr/share/doc/ffmpeg-&ffmpeg-version; &amp;&amp;
cp ../doc/*.txt /usr/share/doc/ffmpeg-&ffmpeg-version;</userinput></screen>

    <para>If you used <command>doxygen</command> to create the API
    documentation, install it by issuing the following commands as the
    <systemitem class="username">root</systemitem> user:</para>

<screen role="root"><userinput>mkdir /usr/share/doc/ffmpeg-&ffmpeg-version;/api &amp;&amp;
cp -v doxy/* /usr/share/doc/ffmpeg-&ffmpeg-version;/api</userinput></screen>

    <para>If you compiled <command>qt-faststart</command> install it as the
    <systemitem class="username">root</systemitem> user:</para>

<screen role="root"><userinput>cp qt-faststart /usr/bin</userinput></screen>

  </sect2>

  <sect2 role="commands">
    <title>Command Explanations</title>

    <para><command>mkdir build</command> and <command>cd build</command>:
    This ensures that we compile the <application>FFmpeg</application> object
    files in a separate directory to the source files.</para>
    
    <para><option>--enable-shared</option>: This switch is needed to
    build the shared libraries, otherwise only static libraries are built
    and installed.</para>

    <para><option>--disable-static</option>: This switch prevents the static
    libraries from being built.</para>

    <para><option>--enable-gpl</option>: This switch enables the
    use of GPL code and permits support for postprocessing, swscale and many
    other features.</para>

    <para><option>--enable-<replaceable>&lt;codec&gt;</replaceable></option>:
    <application>FFmpeg</application> comes with code to compile decoders for
    almost every codec you could think of. The only reason to enable a specific
    codec (and make <application>FFmpeg</application> link to the prerequisite
    shared library installed on your system) is to make ffmpeg compile an
    <emphasis>encoder</emphasis> for that codec. Encoding video is a
    specialist job. If that is what you want to do with
    <command>ffmpeg</command>, study the output of <command>configure
    --help</command>. Remember, the dependencies all install their own encoders
    (that are often better than <application>FFmpeg</application>'s).
    <application>FFmpeg</application> is an excellent collection of decoders.
    If you just want to use <application>FFmpeg</application> to watch video or
    listen to music (via other applications like
    <application>Gstreamer</application>) then you will not benefit from
    linking it to another library.</para>

    <para><option>--disable-yasm</option>: use this option if you've not
    installed yasm and you want what configure describes as "a crippled
    build".</para>

  </sect2>

  <sect2 role="configuration">
    <title>Configuring FFmpeg</title>

    <sect3 id="ffmpeg-config">
      <title>Config Files</title>

      <para><filename>/etc/ffserver.conf</filename> and
      <filename>~/.ffmpeg/ffserver-config</filename></para>

      <indexterm zone="ffmpeg ffmpeg-config">
        <primary
        sortas="e-AA.ffmpeg-ffserver-config">~/.ffmpeg/ffserver-config</primary>
      </indexterm>

      <indexterm zone="ffmpeg ffmpeg-config">
        <primary sortas="e-etc-ffserver.conf">/etc/ffserver.conf</primary>
      </indexterm>

      <para>You'll find a sample <command>ffserver</command> configuration file
      at <filename>doc/ffserver.conf</filename> in the source tree.</para>

    </sect3>

  </sect2>

  <sect2 role="content">
    <title>Contents</title>

    <segmentedlist>
      <segtitle>Installed Programs</segtitle>
      <segtitle>Installed Libraries</segtitle>
      <segtitle>Installed Directories</segtitle>

      <seglistitem>
        <seg>ffmpeg, ffplay, ffprobe, ffserver and qt-faststart</seg>
        <seg>libavcodec.so, libavdevice.so, libavfilter.so, libavformat.so,
        libavutil.so, libpostproc.so, and libswscale.so</seg>
        <seg>/usr/include/libavcodec, /usr/include/libavdevice, 
        /usr/include/libavfilter, /usr/include/libavformat,
        /usr/include/libavutil, /usr/include/postproc, /usr/include/libswscale,
        /usr/share/ffmpeg, and /usr/share/doc/ffmpeg-&ffmpeg-version;</seg>
      </seglistitem>
    </segmentedlist>

    <variablelist>
      <bridgehead renderas="sect3">Short Descriptions</bridgehead>
      <?dbfo list-presentation="list"?>
      <?dbhtml list-presentation="table"?>

      <varlistentry id="ffmpeg-prog">
        <term><command>ffmpeg</command></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is a command-line tool to convert video files, network streams
          and input from a TV card to several video formats.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg ffmpeg-prog">
            <primary sortas="b-ffmpeg">ffmpeg</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="ffplay">
        <term><command>ffplay</command></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is a very simple and portable media player using the
          <filename>ffmpeg</filename> libraries and the SDL library.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg ffplay">
            <primary sortas="b-ffplay">ffplay</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="ffprobe">
        <term><command>ffprobe</command></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>gathers information from multimedia streams and prints it in
          a human and machine-readable fashion.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg ffprobe">
            <primary sortas="b-ffprobe">ffprobe</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="ffserver">
        <term><command>ffserver</command></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is a streaming server for everything that
          <command>ffmpeg</command> could use as input (files, streams, TV card
          input, webcam, etc.).</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg ffserver">
            <primary sortas="b-ffserver">ffserver</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="qt-faststart">
        <term><command>qt-faststart</command></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>moves the index file to the front of quicktime (mov/mp4)
          videos.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg qt-faststart">
            <primary sortas="b-qt-faststart">qt-faststart</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="libavcodec">
        <term><filename class="libraryfile">libavcodec.so</filename></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is a library containing the <application>FFmpeg</application>
          codecs (both encoding and decoding).</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg libavcodec">
            <primary sortas="c-libavcodec">libavcodec.so</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="libavdevice">
        <term><filename class="libraryfile">libavdevice.so</filename></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is the <application>FFmpeg</application> device handling
          library.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg libavdevice">
            <primary sortas="c-libavdevice">libavdevice.so</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="libavfilter">
        <term><filename class="libraryfile">libavfilter.so</filename></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is a library of filters that can alter video or audio between
          the decoder and the encoder (or output).</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg libavfilter">
            <primary sortas="c-libavfilter">libavfilter.so</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="libavformat">
        <term><filename class="libraryfile">libavformat.so</filename></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is a library containing the file formats handling (mux and demux
          code for several formats) used by <command>ffplay</command> as well as
          allowing the generation of  audio or video streams.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg libavformat">
            <primary sortas="c-libavformat">libavformat.so</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="libavutil">
        <term><filename class="libraryfile">libavutil.so</filename></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is the <application>FFmpeg</application> utility library.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg libavutil">
            <primary sortas="c-libavutil">libavutil.so</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <!-- Both mplayer and ffmpeg now create libpostproc.  The validation
      for the book is not impressed by that, and it falls apart without giving
      any useful information if the id is changed to "libpostproc (from ffmpeg)"
      or any other variant using spaces or parenthesis or square brackets, so
      try this variant : mmm, bizarrely, it accepts this but drops everything
      from the first hyphen, so that in longindex.html it looks just right (one
      library, two packages)  -->
      <varlistentry id="libpostproc-from-ffmpeg">
        <term><filename class="libraryfile">libpostproc.so</filename></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is the <application>FFmpeg</application> post processing
          library.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg libpostproc">
            <primary sortas="c-libpostproc">libpostproc.so</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

      <varlistentry id="libswscale">
        <term><filename class="libraryfile">libswscale.so</filename></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>is the <application>FFmpeg</application> image rescaling
          library.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ffmpeg libswscale">
            <primary sortas="c-libswscale">libswscale.so</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </sect2>
</sect1>