About the Public Relations, folks!

[blausand]

Hey there,
i appreciate that, after clicking through the devasted areas of

AviSynth.org,
there: /mediawiki, /avisynth3, German pages etc.
SourceForge.net
QUITE some forum.doom9.org threads,
and, finally, some absolutely uncommented indexOf in
members.optusnet.com.au/squid_80
for AviSynth x64,


i find signs of life here and there. Brave developers! Really.
Thank you for sissiphossing all those lines of x86 code to x86-64, thanks for struggling through the pains and wonders of Windows Media Foundation Whatsoever.

As everybody knows, 64bit is finally coming down the main road. Windows7 is 64bit and some major media production software vendors have finally managed to release 64bit versions of their video editing software <hint,hint>.
And i think right now it is time to plan some changes to the FRONTpages of Avisynth. It is just evident that a software without noticeable signes of life on it's homepage is deemed to be DOOMED.
So let's talk about updating those wiki-pages a bit, please!

To make a beginning, i start this thread for collecting necessary information about what's really going on everywhere:

First, there is SET (http://forum.doom9.org/member.php?u=133923), who released a V2.60a. The release thread (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=148782) shows that there is decent code digging going on since then.
Apparently, Joshua "JoshD (http://forum.doom9.org/member.php?u=178596)" (isn't he the same as "Jeremy (http://forum.doom9.org/member.php?u=133923)"?) Duncan has chosen to host the code of his x86-64 code, based on SET's release as announced here (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=152800), on :
code.google.com (http://code.google.com/p/avisynth64/), where a version of August, 29th 2010 can be found:
avisynth64_8-29-10.rar (http://code.google.com/p/avisynth64/downloads/detail?name=avisynth64_8-29-10.rar&can=2&q=) Test Release, x64 ABI compliant, not considered stable / final Featured
Thomas "flend" Ford (http://sourceforge.net/users/flend) develops the AVS PlugIn for Adobe's Premiere. Nobody knows, whether DebugMode's Frameserver (http://www.debugmode.com/frameserver/) or ths plugIn will ever support the (64bit) Version CS5.
Last, but not least, as we read, Kemuri-_9 (http://forum.doom9.org/member.php?u=118295) and Squid_80 (http://forum.doom9.org/member.php?u=67865) are pretty active about the x246 coDec and testing.


So far, nothing very new has been said.
Wilbert (http://forum.doom9.org/member.php?u=2705), you did most of the documentation / homepage of the last decades, right? I'm confident that you won't misunderstand this:
Doom9's Forums are perfect for discussing, but some of the results IMHO have to land on the avisynth.org homepage, which does not say a single word about the latest developments.

The IRC channel (irc://irc.freenode.net/avisynth) is vivid, but not the right place to gather information.

So please, i invite you to discuss in this thread or on the wiki-discussion page (http://avisynth.org/mediawiki/Talk:Main_Page) about a strategy for bringing the latest information back to where it belongs, so surfing avisynth.org (http://avisynth.org) tells any user what happened since she/he last took notice.

[Gavino]

Perhaps all that is needed is to add a new page describing the various ongoing development initiatives and add a link to it in the Development (http://avisynth.org/mediawiki/Main_Page#Development) section of the main page (where there is still a reference to the defunct Avisynth v3).

Bear in mind also that all of the developments you mentioned (while welcome and to be encouraged) are independent efforts outside the 'official' Avisynth project (http://sourceforge.net/projects/avisynth2/).

[TheFluff]

what

no seriously, what?

[Buggle]

I truly applaud you for taking this initiative: I have also been quite, well, disoriented about all developments going on.
It is a well known engineering disposition (though I'm not a software engineer, also we civil engineers suffer from this) to directly move to 'making something', as all the talk and planning before is too often considered a waste of time since nothing tangible is emerging from it.

Of course, I also believe it is, at this point, more important to concentrate on developing AVS64 further, but it is evident that this development becomes directed and structured. SET created a separate version, JoshD adjusted it, features are constantly requested and new bugs are introduced. At thesame time, the official (as was noted here) developer(s) of AviSynth keep on doing their/his/her own stuff (are they? is he/she?). I consider that to be a waste of effort due to unnessecary parallel effort. Why is it, that these efforts are not concentrated on a common code base? Why not invest now to come on top a few months later? I think working out a strategy for further development with clear milestones or development levels is most needed at this point to focus the talents in the most productive direction.
And if this is not possible with the -official- AviSynth development, would forking the project be considered a possibility?
In comparison, I would like to point to PeerBlock, a refreshing fork of PeerGuardian, but also the work of Aoyumi to tune Ogg Vorbis further, working -with- the Ogg Vorbis developers to progress its development.
I am grateful for all that is done to Avisynth, be it x86-64 or x86, to all other developers that make things possible, and I apologise beforehand if I misunderstood anything (as noted: I'm good with projects involving rail infrastructure, I haven't written a line of code in my life), but I believe that the future of AviSynth is at this point helped more with communication and structure than with more lines of code from different persons in different versions.

[TheFluff]

The reason nobody talks about or documents avs64 is that nobody cares about avs64, and nobody cares about avs64 because it is in pretty much every significant way worse than plain old 32-bit avisynth. I suggest that efforts to rectify that are started before you start trying to hype it.

[Buggle]

The reason nobody talks about or documents avs64 is that nobody cares about avs64, and nobody cares about avs64 because it is in pretty much every significant way worse than plain old 32-bit avisynth. I suggest that efforts to rectify that are started before you start trying to hype it.
Ever heard about the chicken and the egg? This is exactly the point: development effort needs to be focused, not separated in multiple directions with everyone doing a bit here and a bit there. I agree with you that External PR is not useful (who said anything about hyping?), it is the Internal PR that is -to my eyes at least- useful at this point. Everything is moving towards x64, especially in the video-encoding arena. x64 provides clear performance benefits, and yes, the current state is nowhere near good functionality. Isn't that just what needs to be tackled here... Raising avs64 profile means more attention for its development. And the more profile it has, the more people would be around to test it. There's a x64 MeGUI, there's tons of x64 AVS filters, there's been x64 x264 for ages... I'd say it has become time to also look at avs64, and improve it to a level where it has all the basic needed functionality without being so damn buggy.
Again, I know nothing of programming, so I might say something stupid, but it would theoretically be logical to integrate the x64 into the main codebase, be it directly or via 'feedbackloops' as I mentioned exist for Ogg Vorbis. In that way, JoshD and SET for instance would be able to work -together- with the main AVS developers and thereby increasing both efficiency and effectiveness.

[StainlessS]

Again, I know nothing of programming.

Well, perhaps now is the time to obviate that sentence.

The Avisynth community is eager to accept newcomers,
all of your ideas will be listened to and I feel sure that
they will, when implemented be applauded by the masses.
Just because you presently "know nothing of programming",
does not mean that you cannot learn and contribute.
I look forward to reading more about your advances in this
respect.