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Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2008 3:09:14 PM<br>
From: David L. Willson <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:DLWillson@TheGeek.NU"><DLWillson@TheGeek.NU></a><br>
To: clue-tech <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:clue-tech@cluedenver.org"><clue-tech@cluedenver.org></a> <br>
Subject: [clue-tech] DVDs, Christmas, and morons
<blockquote
cite="mid:2965205.14181230242954206.JavaMail.root@zimbra.thegeek.nu"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">Some time ago, I found that if I put a bunch of JPGs on a DVD, that just about any Video DVD player would be able to show them in a slideshow. Are there video and audio codecs that work the same way? OK, nevermind about the audio codec, I know: MP3 and WMA. It galls me to have to use proprietary codecs, but I'll get over it. What about video, though? I made a 4GB USB stick with mixed media for my family and friends this year for Christmas, and I'd like to do something like it next year, but I want to make it tech-noob friendly, by making it possible to "just throw it in the DVD player" and enjoy most of the content, if not all of it, without ruining the cross-platform enjoyability of the computer-based experience.
Maybe I should be asking if there's a way to produce a Video DVD that works well in most DVD players and most computers, without using proprietary software or codecs?
If not, how close can I get? This year, the disk contains a bunch of programs for Windows, that also exist for Linux, HTML or RTF (text) files, OGV's (Ogg Theora), OGA's (Ogg Vorbis), and JPG's. I included the Windows DirectX codec installer for the media, so everything can be consumed by a Windows or Linux user, but not a complete moron with no understanding of either one.
My goal next year, is to make most of the content accessible, even to the family moron. :-)
David L. Willson
Network Engineer
MCT, MCSE, Linux+
tel://720.333.LANS
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</pre>
</blockquote>
<font size="-1"><font face="Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif">The only
codecs you can use for DVD's are MPEG-2 for video and MP2 or AC3 for
audio. Certain players support other formats such as divx, but the only
guaranteed format that will work is mpeg-2.<br>
Its not too difficult to create a video dvd out of video files, unless
you want to create menus, and then it becomes a royal pain.<br>
<br>
Anyway, transcode is probably the most powerful video software
available for linux, and they even have a guide for converting video to
the format a DVD player will recognize, and also how to author it to a
DVD.<br>
<a
href="http://www.transcoding.org/cgi-bin/transcode?Tutorials/Authoring_PC_Media_To_DVD">http://www.transcoding.org/cgi-bin/transcode?Tutorials/Authoring_PC_Media_To_DVD</a><br>
<br>
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