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Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by Bluestein on Saturday August 17, 2024 @04:15PM (#41277592)
> There have files I’ve encountered that for example VLC will play with quirks (color reproduction is not quite right, etc) that mpv plays perfectly.

Given how VLC is basically bulletproof and will play absolutely anything thrown at it - it's great to hear that mpv is up there ...

Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by mixmastamyk on Saturday August 17, 2024 @04:48PM (#41277834)
While great in general, vlc has many small seek/sync issues, and also seems to be in maintenance mode.
Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by 0cf8612b2e1e on Saturday August 17, 2024 @06:51PM (#41278675)
What non-maintenance work needs doing? From the outside, it plays basically all the formats. There is always the potential for improving algorithms, but it strikes me as pretty feature complete.
Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by mixmastamyk on Saturday August 17, 2024 @08:12PM (#41279121)
> has many small seek/sync issues

Playback issues... scrub problems mentioned elsewhere, audio/video get out of sync when seeking a lot; need to hit left arrow to reset, speed changes lag when changed a lot, when there's a short clip it can end audio early, etc, etc.

Not a huge deal, but if you use it every day for video and audio file testing/lyric transcribing these little bugs get old. The playback core needs a rewrite to be "preemptive" I'd guess.

Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by mixmastamyk on Saturday August 17, 2024 @10:38PM (#41279717)
Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by d110af5ccf on Sunday August 18, 2024 @01:30AM (#41280312)
> audio/video get out of sync when seeking a lot

I have a very similar issue with subtitles in MPV sometimes. Some unknown (at least to me) combination of codec, encoding settings, subtitle format, switching subtitle tracks, and seeking will utterly break it to the point that I have to exit and reopen the file. I can't be bothered to debug the issue (so far).

In general I don't understand the negative comments I see VLC get. I've never encountered major problems with either piece of software. I've encountered minor bugs and annoyances with both.

Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by mixmastamyk on Sunday August 18, 2024 @02:51PM (#41284444)
Lots more folks use vlc I’d guess.

The media players we have on mobile don’t suffer from these issues, so they must be solvable.

Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by Bluestein on Saturday August 17, 2024 @05:53PM (#41278306)
> to be in maintenance mode.

Sad to hear.-

PS. On a tangent, rethorically - baring bugs and security - at one point is (if ever) software "finished"?

"We built this search engine. It works. The infrastructure has team enough to run it. But we have this huge payroll of people."

So "improvements" and "features" (and constant UI and UX changes) ...

... "enshittification" ensues.-

When is "good enough" ... good enough?

Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by nine_k on Sunday August 18, 2024 @12:58AM (#41280210)
A web search engine is never done because spammers never cease attempts to.game it in new ways, and because new phenomena keep appearing on the web, from presidents posting official news on twitter to the proliferation of AI-generated texts with subtly incorrect information.

A media player, though, has fewer challenges.

Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by hollerith on Sunday August 18, 2024 @06:41AM (#41281517)
Media player projects are in an arms race with exploit devs, though, especially since Google keeps introducing and popularizing new media formats.

Speaking of which: which project tkaes security more seriously, vlc or mpv?

Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by latexr on Sunday August 18, 2024 @05:19AM (#41281191)
> PS. On a tangent, rethorically - baring bugs and security - at one point is (if ever) software "finished"?

“PS” originates from “post scriptum”, meaning “written after”. It doesn’t make sense to have it at the start of the text.

But to answer your question, yes, it is definitely possible for software to be done and finished. I’ve done it multiple times, where I have built something that does exactly what I set it out to do, it does it fast and without bugs and has been doing so for years and years with zero maintenance needs.

The general obsession with the idea that “software is never done, only abandoned” needs to end, it’s harmful to good software and its users.

Here’s millions more examples of finished software, in a single word: games.

Re:mpv a free, open-source, and cross-platform media player by Bluestein on Sunday August 18, 2024 @06:46AM (#41281535)
> The general obsession with the idea that “software is never done, only abandoned” needs to end,

My thinking was along those lines. Or at least along the lines of "engineering and/or organizational processes should exist to know when to stop".-

PS. Thanks for your attention to detail. It was a "PS" to an otherwise one-sentence comment.-