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RealNetworks Releases Helix Source
teeheehee writes "According to this DigitalMass article, RealNetworks yesterday released source code for their audio and video players, with server-side and encoding software coming maybe in December. The code isn't complete, it's missing things like burning-to-cd routines; and they're getting flak from Microsoft calling it a ploy. Regardless, anytime a big company releases their source only good can come of it (for the public.)" Our story a few days ago had more information on the licensing, and gathered a couple of interesting posts from one user.
The code isn't complete, it's missing things like burning-to-cd routines;
How long before some enterprising h4x0r finds a way around this?
And what license is this released under? Can the code be legally extended/tweaked by others?
Real has realized that if they do not embrace OSS, they will be swept under the rug by the combined might of M$ (Windows Media) and AOL (Nullsoft Winamp).
If we see a real open-source Real-compatible player out there soon, it will fill a huge void in the rich media world. Combined with the existence of WMA codecs, we will at last have a simple, spam-free player that just works. No one uses RealOne or WMP or even QuickTime because they want to. These players are slow, intrusive, proprietary, and often loaded with spyware. Bring on the OSS alternative!
"I am root. Bow before me." To this I say, "You are root, and you bear the sins of the world upon your shoulders."
I was trying to add RTSP/RTP support to wget, but it turns out that Real uses a "secret handshake" to validate clients before xmiting data.
I am simply not smart enough (or at least not knowledgeable enough about debuggers and asm) to reverse engineer the protocol. I tried to check the Helix source a few weeks ago . . . but obviously it wasn't there.
Does anyone know if the handshake code is included in this source release?
-Peter
Microsoft is just upset because Real used to be just as rabid about protecting their source code as Microsoft is and now they've released it. Interest in Real media formats is not exactly skyrocketing, and by doing this, they may be able to boost these sentiments, at least among the geek crowd. Integrating this into something like XMMS (personal preference) would be a Good Thing(tm).
Sounds to me like a last ditch effort to keep out of Chapter 11.
Real is known for proprietary products that take over a user's system.
Their most recent free player installs a system tray icon that can't be removed. Includes an auto-update feature that can't be disabled. And periodically uses that auto-update feature to spam the user.
Finding the free version of their player on their website is next to impossible.
The compression techniques are bulky and result in a lot of artifacting (both audio and video).
Its a bad product by a bad company and I refuse to install it on my systems. If there is something I want to see/hear and its only available as a RealMedia stream/file, then I don't download it.
Granted, in the long run, this may be a good thing because it is already a commonly used, established format, which is the kind of thing open-source software thrives on.
But like I said, I'm more inclined to believe that this is a last-ditch effort by RealNetworks to get their install base back up to the kinds of numbers they used to have.
I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
Here's some more coverage at Salon. Dig M$'s reaction:
We should stop and think about the fact that a major competitor in the multimedia playback and streaming market has embarked on it's promised initiative of open source development. This is significant. The opening of the code will allow highly adept open source hackers to "learn a few new tricks". If this "ploy", as some call it, is successful, then we can expect an increased amount of participation with the FOSS crowd from RealMedia. Such a thing could persuaude other companies to join the fun....
Well done.
Is it everything the community could wish for? Of course not. Is it everything that you plan on releasing? I hope not. Is it a gutsy step by a technology company trying to open up parts of its IP? Absolutely.
There's been a lot of people whining here about the pieces that aren't open-released yet. Remember that many of those are not Real's to release, but rather incorporate technologies that they themselves have licensed. They say that they are trying to resolve these issues - give them the benefit of the doubt here.
If the community is going to jeer anything less than full source release of all commercial software, it's going to be really hard to convince commercial software developers to release anything.
"Microsoft said RealNetworks' Helix initiative is a ploy."
MS should know. Lets see:
1) Ploy #1: bundling IE, WM Player, Outlook Express, etc. with Windows.
2) Ploy #2: using its billion in cash to enlist the help of politicians.
3) Ploy #3: calling open-source a 'virus'.
4) Ploy #4: due to the failure of Ploy #3, sharing some of its source in its shared-source initiative.
smd4985
They certainly do want 3rd party help in porting client software to non-mainstream OS's. RealOne is only available for Windows and (in beta) MacOS X. While they've had a *NIX client in the past, I'm guessing that this source release is how they expect to address those platforms in the future.
Which, given how much "if they just released the source, I'd port it" offers media software have received on Slashdot over the years, it's certainly a fair calling of that bluff.
They've said one of the big motivating factors being their OSS initiative is the daunting task of having to port RealPlayer to about 30 different mobile phone platforms. Real simply doesn't have enough engineers to do all that in-house.
My video compression blog
At least by my definitions, Real is neither "going the Open Source way" nor becoming a true community player. The code they have released does nothing that MPlayer and others can't already. We already have (usually superior) Open Source implementations of MP3, H.263, RTSP, RTP, RTCP, etc. and we don't need their cheezy bloated client frontend. Real makes money on their proprietary codec licensing and associated marketing / branding / etc. Although I believe this is a flawed business model, it's unlikely they will change anytime soon, though we can hope for the best. I think most of their protocols and codecs have been reverse enginneered and re-implemented by now anyways. If not, it's only a matter of time. Unless they get big into the whole DRM nonsense game..
Why not choose a license that people understand? Why not offer the code *ALSO* under the GPL license.
This what Mozilla, Sun (OpenOffice), Trolltech (QT) and no doubt others, realized was the best course (often IN ADDITION to other licenses).
Any non-free competitor (like MS) is not going to be able to use the GPL code, so I don't see how it will hurt.
I guess they don't want you to have the freedom to distribute commercially, so they would object to Redhat etc.. charging for a CD with their code on it.
They may need to make an exception to the GPL, to allow for their binary only modules to be linked in, but that is not unheard of.
jabber: johnynek@jabber.org
So, they will Open the source of that Realvideo 9 (which is ages ahead of wmedia imho), ms will grab the source than release Windows Media 10 with all those features?
:)
I am a windows media 9 beta user too... I, in fact had to install it since my player was seriously broken. It still misses features, the fun is, MS can't still use flash etc in streams (makes some funny scripting in browser for that functionality), it can't render HTML in a presentation while Real uses IE dll's to make that stuff happen.
It sounds like Sorenson matter to me... What will they do than? work at some pizza place?