chuso.net

Category: FLOSS

Why there are no good video editing free software

It's something that I ever asked myself and recently I have somebody asked it to me again: what free (as in free beer or as in free speech) video editors are there?
A video editor is a very complex piece of software to develop, so there are not many free solutions, the few ones that we can find are not very good and the ones you have to pay for are quite expensive.
There are other types of complex software developments like web browsers and office suites, but a video editor can be even more complex and in addtion it has very specific and small user group, so they will have less ability to attract volunteer developers. Everyone use a web browser, but too few people use a video editor. It is difficult to entice a developer to devote their free time to a project so complex and with so little reception as a video editor and those who do it, won't expend the same effort. A web browser and an office suite have a much larger user base and therefore may attract a larger number of volunteer programmers willing to develop a free version. So there are very good browsers (Firefox, Chromium) and office suites (LibreOffice) and sometimes the free version may even exceed commercial version and although part of their development is done by volunteers as a hobby it also gets support and funding from major corporations and foundations such as Google, Mozilla, Oracle, Apple and Apache. Actually, none of the success stories mentioned departed from scratch but it originated in a commercial project freeing its source: Firefox comes from Netscape, LibreOffice from StarOffice and Chromium ... well, Chromium story is a little different as it has always been free software (KHTML), although it would have been impossible to exists without the contributions of Apple and Google to its WebKit engine through its commercial projects Safari and Chrome, respectively. So to have a free video editor that can compete with commercial versions, we will have to wait for Apple releasing Final Cut source code as free (don't expect for that right now).
In addition , those who have already worked with video editing have proven that it is a resource-intensive task (processor, memory and hard drive), so a video editor has to be efficient and well planned, adding more complexity to the project.
For all this, the few free solutions that are can't compete with commercial software: cut video pieces and put them somewhere else, add some simple effects and little else. As my video editing needs are very basic, with LiVES I have more than enough. Another solution is VLMC from VideoLan people who often do things pretty well (VLC Media Player), but the last time I tried VLMC was still in a very early stage of development and very limited, it was little more than a sketch. I don't know how VLMC have evolved since then, but I would not have much hope now.
An often recommended option in forums is Cinelerra, but my experience with it was disastrous because its instability made it unusable: every time I tried to do something it either hanged or closed, it was impossible to do anything.
But overall, my experience with video editing free software goes back some years, so it may have changed, hopefully well.


How I recovered the system after renaming ld.so

Yes, I know, it may be a little stupid renaming ld.so, can we skip this detail?
It's not something I do very often, but that day I felt like I had to innovate or something like that.

But innovation was a disaster, it is not a good idea to rename a library linked using its exact path by all system dynamic executables, just to take into account if you are going to have the same idea.


kdepim-runtime patch for standard IMAP flags in KMail (KDE bug 291332)

This is a situation that I found at work: I use KMail and my co-workers use Thunderbird. We use a shared e-mail account and, when they reply to a message, I can see it as replied, but when I reply to a message from KMail, only KMail can see it as replied.
You can imagine where the problem may be and, after a little research, this is what I found.


Linux kernel module that allows you to set events on pressed keys

As a probe of the use of kprobes for Extension of Operating Systems I have made a Linux module that allows you to execute a command for every pressed key and see its keycode.

It includes some sample scripts that can be used as the command to be executed on every key pressed, these scripts are:

  • keylogger

    Registers every pressed key in a file.

  • printscr

    If framebuffer is enabled it allows doing a console screenshot using print screen key.


Adding links to MLDonkey from Opera

I envied Firefox extension for MLDonkey which allows you to add elinks and torrents to MLDonkey from the browser with a single click, even if MLDonkey is running in other PC. It's a luxury I want to have in Opera, is quite easy.

It should be even easier using -remote openURL() Opera parameter, but I got problems doing it this way (it seems to ignore %U parameter), so I finally did it this way:


Set Up Balls Number In Neverball

Neverball infinite lifes

If you don't know it you should try it. Neverball is one of the best free games (thanks, Adian), based on Monkey Target minigame from Super Monkey Ball. It's a bit difficult the first time, but then it becomes quite entertaining and very addictive.

In one of those nightly Neverball sessions two days ago, this time with PedrE, we got the idea: Why only three lifes? It's very annoying when you are obstinate to have only three tries and you have to go back to main menu to select again the same level. Why we can't have infinite lifes?. Well, here it is, the patch to be able to set up the number of balls in Neverball. You have to use balls option in ~/.neverball/neverballrc file, with negative values meaning infinite balls.


Amelia - A Utility to Free Disk Space

Since I don't know about any utility to free disk space and what I rm to get free disk space is always the same (Portage temp files, thumbnails, kernel temp files, ...) I decided to make a quick-and-dirty script with graphical interface which automates the process.

I named it Amelia in memory of the cleaning woman used by my teacher school to threaten us, if you are interested in this utility:

amelia webpage


I want him in the games until he dies playing

Tron (1981) (is from where I took the phrase for the title) was one of the first movies to use scenes generated by computer. This movie talks about "life" inside computers. Characters live games as if they were real and the game seen in the video has been developed for PC becoming very popular and one of my favorites for Linux. Yes, there are games for Linux although many people says that you can't play in Linux. In fact, I have made a list of Linux games which I was going to post here, but since it became very large, I published it in documents section.


Is Linus a Troll?

Flame war
Image: Silicon Valley Tarot

One of the heroes of the last 60 years has shown again his most critical side. If other times were GNOME times, now it's FSF turn again:

  • Linux has never been an FSF project, and has never even been a "Free Software" project.
  • The whole "Open Source" renaming was done largely exactly because people wanted to distance themselves from the FSF.
  • So go fight the problem [DRM] at the source of the problem, not in my project that has got nothing to do it.
  • I absolutely hate how the FSF has tried to use my code as a weapon, just because I decided that their license was good.
  • [To Michiel de Boer] Write your own kernel and poll which one is more popular.

Some people say Linux is flaming, others just think he's the voice representing against the FSF what many of us think. Or may be they are just humans after all.