On Aug 1, 2007, at 1:44 PM, Brian Gupta wrote: > > If Mac OS and Windows, and Ubuntu > > can view these files, we should look at making a solaris desktop > as easy > > to use. Currently desktop usage of Solaris is tiny. Large developers > > aren't really targetting SOlaris (just as most large developers > aren't > > targeting ubuntu yet.) > > I think there are legal avenues for reasonable media support on > Solaris, > and these avenues will improve over time. Especially if people > support > companies like Fluendo by purchasing their plugins and letting them > know there is a Solaris media market. > > I can understand paying for authoring tools. But playback is free > on Linux, Windows and Mac.. (Pretty much all standards). I need > video codecs, because tech companies are putting out technical > videos, and there is no format standard. (You name it Flash, > Mindows Media, Quicktime, Divx, etc). Developers are used to > certain things from their platforms in this day and age. Multiple > format video playback happens to be one of those things. Ubuntu, > which is closer to Solaris in desktop market share than Windows and > MacOSX have figured out a way to do it, we should at least > investigate what and how they are doing it... (I will try to > contribute more feedback in the install community, but I just > started using Ubuntu so my knowledge is limited.).
Playback is free on Windows and Mac OS because Microsoft and Apple licensed the codecs from their respective owners. Playback is free on Linux only because the Linux movement doesn't care much about the IP Laws in the US (understandably) and thus leaves the decision of "can I use these codecs legally" up to the user (which most users, even in the US just don't bother with and go on using things that are against US law). You won't see Sun including code that it doesn't have a legal right to include. By extension, neither should OpenSolaris. Whether or not it makes Solaris (open or otherwise) seem lacking misses the point, Sun isn't about to start breaking the law and neither should OpenSolaris. Keep in mind, what's legal in one country isn't necessarily legal in all countries. With a globally used OS like OpenSolaris you have to cater to the lowest common denominator. Now if someone wants to pony up some money to license the various non- free codecs that the community would like to see, I'm certain the community (and Sun) would be happy to accept it. Cheers, -- Glenn _______________________________________________ opensolaris-discuss mailing list opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
