> As a content provider, I have to support HLS if I want to support adaptive streaming in iOS.
I see. Safari on iOS is still missing MSE? Is Apple doing it to slow down DASH adoption?
The other expected problem is codecs. Apple are being sleazy and refuse to support free codecs like VP9 and Opus. So making DASH serving those won't work with Apple too (unless you'll use pure JavaScript decoder which is very not optimal).
May be Daala / Thor will eventually break their nasty behavior, especially if it will be adopted as mandatory for WebRTC.
> DASH264 is an attempt to keep it simple, and tie it down to a smaller subset of codecs (x264/5 and the like), and seems to be making headway.
Tying DASH to a set of proprietary codecs to propose a standard sounds like a very bad idea. I don't see it going anywhere.
> Apple are being sleazy and refuse to support free codecs like VP9 and Opus.
> May be Daala / Thor will eventually break their nasty behavior, especially if it will be adopted as mandatory for WebRTC.
I think AV1 (Alliance for Open Media's codec) is likely to be the video codec Apple joins in on, unless it tries to push HEVC. With Intel, AMD and ARM in the group, basically every computing device is going to have hardware support for it so Apple would have to actively cripple it in their hardware to go without.
As for audio, Opus is great for low latency and low bitrate but AAC is widely available and supported and performs better than Opus at high bitrates (which I suspect are more important to Apple than low bitrates). Maybe if Opus becomes part of a telecom spec for VoIP or something Apple will pick it up but I think it's unlikely otherwise.
AV1 is the new codename for Daala + Thor? They used to call it NetVC. I hope they'll come up with better name than something that sounds like a virus :)
> As for audio, Opus is great for low latency and low bitrate but AAC is widely available and supported and performs better than Opus at high bitrates
Opus beats AAC even for music from what I saw and provides same quality at lower bitrates. I.e. it has lower transparency level, which means it's simply better overall. See http://listening-test.coresv.net/results.htm
No, AV1 is the name of the codec the Alliance for Open Media is producing. The Alliance for Open Media is a coalition formed by Amazon, AMD, ARM, Cisco, Google, Intel, Ittiam, Microsoft, Mozilla, Netflix and NVIDIA [0]. I don't believe Daala is involved.
> Opus beats AAC even for music from what I saw and provides same quality at lower bitrates.
That test notably omits the proprietary Fraunhofer AAC codec, which may outperform the others.
It also produces results differing from the SoundExpert ratings [1], which show Opus and AAC both achieving transparency around 128K, but with AAC doing it by a more comfortable margin.
> Plus AAC is not free.
Freedom isn't relevant to what will be adopted. The parties in control aren't motivated by freedom.
> Freedom isn't relevant to what will be adopted. The parties in control aren't motivated by freedom.
Oh, they are. It's only the matter of scale and who owns the non-free options. If those who have adopt some codecs need to pay tons of money for non-free ones they start caring about
freedom quite a bit ;)
That's exactly why HEVC shot itself in the foot and will eventually die miserably.
I see. Safari on iOS is still missing MSE? Is Apple doing it to slow down DASH adoption?
The other expected problem is codecs. Apple are being sleazy and refuse to support free codecs like VP9 and Opus. So making DASH serving those won't work with Apple too (unless you'll use pure JavaScript decoder which is very not optimal).
May be Daala / Thor will eventually break their nasty behavior, especially if it will be adopted as mandatory for WebRTC.
> DASH264 is an attempt to keep it simple, and tie it down to a smaller subset of codecs (x264/5 and the like), and seems to be making headway.
Tying DASH to a set of proprietary codecs to propose a standard sounds like a very bad idea. I don't see it going anywhere.