MKVToolNix v100.0 released

[bruno321]

I've an mkv with the following mediainfo:

Video
ID : 1
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L4.1
Format settings : CABAC / 9 Ref Frames
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, Reference frames : 9 frames
Codec ID : V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Duration : 1 h 15 min
Bit rate : 1 457 kb/s
Width : 696 pixels
Height : 532 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 25.000 FPS
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.157
Stream size : 783 MiB (92%)
Writing library : x264 core 161 r3018 db0d417
Encoding settings : cabac=1 / ref=9 / deblock=1:-3:-3 / analyse=0x3:0x133 / me=umh / subme=11 / psy=1 / psy_rd=1.00:0.03 / mixed_ref=1 / me_range=32 / chroma_me=1 / trellis=2 / 8x8dct=1 / cqm=0 / deadzone=21,11 / fast_pskip=0 / chroma_qp_offset=-3 / threads=6 / lookahead_threads=1 / sliced_threads=0 / nr=0 / decimate=0 / interlaced=0 / bluray_compat=0 / constrained_intra=0 / bframes=16 / b_pyramid=2 / b_adapt=2 / b_bias=0 / direct=3 / weightb=1 / open_gop=0 / weightp=2 / keyint=250 / keyint_min=25 / scenecut=40 / intra_refresh=0 / rc_lookahead=150 / rc=crf / mbtree=0 / crf=17.7 / qcomp=0.65 / qpmin=0 / qpmax=69 / qpstep=4 / vbv_maxrate=62500 / vbv_bufsize=78125 / crf_max=0.0 / nal_hrd=none / filler=0 / ip_ratio=1.40 / pb_ratio=1.30 / aq=2:1.00
Default : Yes
Forced : No

I used mkvtoolnix's "split after specific timestamps", which got me two files. The first part has a similar mediainfo. The second, however, has this:

Video
ID : 1
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L4.1
Format settings : CABAC / 9 Ref Frames
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, Reference frames : 9 frames
Codec ID : V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Duration : 1 h 14 min
Bit rate : 1 461 kb/s
Width : 696 pixels
Height : 532 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 25.000 FPS
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.158
Stream size : 780 MiB (92%)
Default : Yes
Forced : No

Notably, the Writing library and the Encoding settings are gone. Why is that? Is this expected behavior, or a bug I should report somewhere?

[hubblec4]

Splitting and appending mkv files, are features which currently not work 100%.
If you do that then you have to life with issues.

[sneaker_ger]

It's not really a problem. The custom SEI x264 writes with settings is in the beginning of the stream so it ends up in the first part only. That SEI is totally optional and not needed.

[bruno321]

I don't know what SEI means, but I can say that I'd appreciate it if those lines made it to every one of the split pieces.

[stax76]

Why is that? Is this expected behavior, or a bug I should report somewhere?

It's probably a missing feature and not a bug.

[bruno321]

Thanks, stax. I wrote about it and it got swiftly closed, the developer doesn't intend to work on such a feature. https://gitlab.com/mbunkus/mkvtoolnix/-/issues/2994

[Boulder]

Using mkvalidator on files with a Dolby Atmos track takes a very long time to finish. Is this something that cannot be helped? I also noticed that the process uses quite a lot of memory if the file is big, like almost 4GB for a 15GB Matroska file.

[Mosu]

mkvalidator is not part of MKVToolNix, nor am I its author. Therefore I cannot say anything about it.

[stax76]

@bruno321

It can be achieved via simple script however:

1. Read tag data, very easy with Get-MediaInfo for instance
2. Create tag file
3. Re-mux

[Perenista]

Is there a way to force MKVToolnix into saying all UNDETERMINED languages are english (or other language)? When I add an AVI into a new MKV file the english audio track is said to be UND. I always need to modify that to english, the problem is doing that with dozens of files.

[Mosu]

Originally Posted by Perenista

Is there a way to force MKVToolnix into saying all UNDETERMINED languages are english (or other language)? When I add an AVI into a new MKV file the english audio track is said to be UND. I always need to modify that to english, the problem is doing that with dozens of files.

In the GUI's preferences you can configure it to use a default languages for tracks that don't have such a property, or even for those whose language property is "und": "Preferences" → "Multiplexer" → "Default values" → "Default track languages to set". You can configure it per track type (mostly for handling video tracks differently than audio & subtitle tracks). This setting is evaluated whenever you add new files to multiplex settings.

If you want to modify existing files, you can look into scripting mkvpropedit to change the properties of existing tracks. This automation example does something very similar and can serve as a basis for your own script.

If scripting isn't your thing, there's also JMkvpropedit, though I've never used it myself and cannot attest to its suitability to your problem.

[Mosu]

Heydiho,

trying to keep up my usual schedule in 2021 of about four to five weeks between releases. This time it's even a bit less than four weeks. Several bug fixes and small enhancements were made.

There have been no changes for package maintainers.

Here are the usual links: the MKVToolNix home page, the Windows installer/portable version & macOS DMG & Linux AppImage and the source code.

The Windows and macOS binaries as well as the Linux AppImage are available already. The other Linux binaries are still being built and will be available over the course of the next couple of hours.

Here are the NEWS since the previous release:

Version 53.0.0 "Fool's Gold" 2021-01-30
New features and enhancements

• mkvmerge: AVI reader: added support for reading the video aspect ratio from the video properties header ("vprp" chunk) if present and setting the display dimensions accordingly. Implements #2993.
• mkvmerge: MP4 reader: for h.264/AVC tracks that don't have an "AVCConfigurationBox" ("avcC" atom) in their sample description ("stsd") atom or whose "avcC" atom contains no content "mkvmerge" will now re-derive the "AVCConfigurationBox" from the bitstream. Implements #2995.
• mkvextract: mkvextract will now check if any of the destination file names is the same as the source file name and abort with an error if that's the case. Implements #3001.
• MKVToolNix GUI: when querying the user for a file name for saving things (e.g. multiplexer settings or an attachment in the header editor), the automatically suggested file name will now be based on the situation-specific file names (e.g. the destination file name for multiplexer settings or the attachment's name when saving an attachment in the header editor) instead of the directory's name. Implements #3012.
• MKVToolNix GUI: multiplexer: when deriving track languages from file names the GUI will now select the right-most match instead of the left-most one. For example, "La.vie.en.rose.(fr).srt" will now be detected as French (fr) instead of English (en). Implements #3013.
• MKVToolNix GUI: preferences: the items in the "pre-defined …" lists can now be renamed by double-clicking with the mouse or pressing the F2 key.
• Windows installer: the "bluray_dump" command-line utility will be installed into the "tools" sub-directory. "bluray_dump" can read & dump certain file types used on Blu-rays: ".mpls" playlists, ".clpi" clip information databases, ".bdmv" index files, "bdmt_….xml" disc library databases and "tnmt_….xml" track & chapter name databases.

Bug fixes

• mkvmerge: stretching chapter timestamps with "--chapter-sync" now works correctly with floating point values including fractions of floating point numbers (e.g. "12.3/45.67"). The tooltips in the GUI have been adjusted accordingly. Fixes #3002.
• mkvmerge: MPEG 1/2 video handling: the "default duration" header field was often half the value it actually should be, resulting in all video frames having an explicit block duration with the correct value. This has been fixed with a patch by Tom Yan.
• mkvmerge: MPEG 1/2 video handling: the data stored in "Codec private" and "Codec state" doesn't contain extensions other than sequence & sequence display extensions anymore. Fix by Tom Yan.
• mkvmerge: tag handling: when remuxing a Matroska file with the "--no-track-tags", existing "SOURCE_ID" track tags are now skipped, too.
• MKVToolNix GUI: multiplexer: the drop-down boxes with pre-defined track names now follow the order set in the preferences instead of sorting the entries alphabetically. Fixes #2999.

Have fun

[hubblec4]

Hi Mosu

Originally Posted by Mosu

Bug fixes

• mkvmerge: MPEG 1/2 video handling: the "default duration" header field was often half the value it actually should be, resulting in all video frames having an explicit block duration with the correct value. This has been fixed with a patch by Tom Yan.

What a lucky coincidence. I got yesterday the Star Trek Voyager DVD's and had muxed the episodes from DVD 1.

With the new MTX version, I can confirm for the video frames is no longer a BlockGroup used.

I was always wondering why the "default duration" header field shows the half and in the BlockGroup shows the block duration the correct value.

Originally Posted by Mosu

Bug fixes

• mkvmerge: MPEG 1/2 video handling: the data stored in "Codec private" and "Codec state" doesn't contain extensions other than sequence & sequence display extensions anymore. Fix by Tom Yan.

In the mkv's muxed with MTX 52 there are "Codec state" elements which now not anymore present.
This data was really superfluous?

[Mosu]

Originally Posted by hubblec4

In the mkv's muxed with MTX 52 there are "Codec state" elements which now not anymore present.
This data was really superfluous?

Yes. A "codec state" says that the initialization data from that state element is to be used instead of "codec private" from the point where the state element occurs in the file.

All the change does is removing the very first state element if and only if its content is the same as the private element. Semantically nothing changes by leaving out that particular state element.

[hubblec4]

Fine. I'm glad to have this improvement now.
The file size is round about 700kb smaller. For 178 episodes it is more than 100mb.

[stax76]

staxrip always re-muxes mkvextract extracted AAC files to M4A using MP4Box, but is this necessary or do the AAC files contain all important metadata?

There is currently a discussion here:

https://github.com/staxrip/staxrip/issues/489

[Mosu]

ADTS AAC files only include as much information as necessary for decoding. Extracting to it loses quite a lot of meta data, of course, such as the timestamps or user-supplied data such as track names, tagging, chapter information. Most of those could be stored in MP4, but they don't survive the .mkv → .aac step.

Or to put it differently: the .aac → .mp4 step cannot invent metadata that isn't present in the .aac already.

So no, .mkv → .aac → .mp4 doesn't make much sense. One exception would be to feed the .mp4 to programs that don't support ADTS AAC files.

If you want to keep more metadata intact, you'll have to use other applications that support reading Matroska and writing MP4 files. An obvious one is ffmpeg, another choice might be the gstreamer framework (no idea if that offers more than what libavformet does, though).

Edited to add: mkvextract doesn't support extraction of 7.1 AAC to ADTS AAC files at the moment due to a more or less easily fixed but. Other channel configurations (7.0, 8.0 and more than 8 channels in general) aren't suported at all. The reason is that things get somewhat dicey with ADTS AAC files and the higher channel counts; the stream will have to contain a program_config_element to signal the higher channel count. mkvextract cannot generate said program_config_element at the moment.

[pson80]

I'm trying to figure out how to use the 'Directory relative to first source file's directory'-setting but can't find any info about it other than this post that just says it now remembers your setting and there's nothing in the FAQ or documentation either. Maybe it's so obvious for the most you of that it isn't needed

Maybe it isn't even possible to do what I want to do anyway.
I would like to set the output directory to Y:\CurrentJobName (remote server) if the input is located locally in D:\Incoming\CurrentJobName. Is that doable or am I stuck to changing it manually every time?

[Mosu]

That scheme isn't supported by MKVToolNix GUI. What "parent directory" means is: same drive, one directory up. For example, if the first file is located in "D:\Some\Where", the destination file name will be set to "D:\Some".

[Nejiro]

Hello everyone, I am using version 53.0.0 on Ubuntu 20.04 lts and I cannot merge two files, I get the error that a file cannot be merged with itself, this is the first time this happens to me and I don't know how Obviously they are two compatible files and it is an operation that I have done many times, I load the first file then with the function "append to an existing source file" I put the second file, only I get this error ... .... I hope someone can help me.
Thank you