We all know that MP3 is the standard in audio compression, but there is a solution that, according to many, has a future: the Ogg format.
Ogg Vorbis unlike the rest has no limit of use and its developers do not charge anyone for their use and much less impose their patent. In this article you will immerse yourself in the new revolution of sound for computers.
” A little history
We all know the MP3 music format which allows you to take music on the Internet with a quality similar to that of music CDs, exchange it with others, store it on your computer, store music CDs on your hard drive, listen to music on a small portable device Without moving parts.
The future of MP3 is at stake. And now they are not the lawyers, it turns out that the format itself is patented from the beginning and they will ask for a commission for use soon, so for a long time the one that will be the most advanced successor has been perfected: the OGG.
Programmers have used the MP3 freely without problems since it was born, but the fact is that the institute has the intellectual property of the format.
In September 1998, Fraunhofer began sending letters to software developers saying they plan to start charging for MP3 use licenses. Fraunhofer and the other members of the MPEG Consortium say it is impossible to create an mp3 encoder without infringing their patents.
Ogg Vorbis is a compressed audio format of high quality and general purpose (44.1-48.0kHz, 16+ bit and polyphonic, it supports up to 255 independent audio channels), which places Vorbis in the same category as MPEG-1 audio Layer 3, MPEG-4 audio (AAC and TwinVQ), and PAC.
To create or use an encoder, the law says that royalties must be paid both to the institute and to the other members of the consortium. In other words, you can listen to MP3, but you cannot contribute by recording anything in mp3.
It is a problem, the patent can limit the growth and make only those who can afford it use the mp3. They say there is no problem without a solution and OGG Vorbis is the technological solution to the challenge of MP3 patents.
In fact we can talk about Ogg Vorbis as an MPEG-4 compressor, which is trying to get ahead of the rest of competitors that exist in this format, specifically we talk about AAC and TwinVQ.
Ogg Vorbis files have the ogg extension and are only the beginning of a family of multimedia products that OggSquish is developing as part of the Xiphophorus project.
»OGG Vorbis the solution to the problem
It is an open format, that is, without an owner and without the possibility of being patented, created by volunteers in the style of free software and therefore, more technologically advanced when receiving contributions and ideas from a huge community of programmers.
It supports high quality audio, in variable bitrates, several channels and for now up to 128kb / channel. This puts OGG at the same height currently as MP3, MP4 (AAC and TwhinVQ) and PAC.
The project leader’s name is Christopher Montgomery and he started coding ogg from the moment he got the news of the patent collection threats of the German institute. Since then, there are many volunteers who have joined Montgomery while still providing ideas and lines of code, making the average OGG files 25% lower than mp3s of the same quality.
OGG Vorbis has been designed for final use, that is, you can encode everything in OGG without paying patents and never have to go back to MP3, so you can also share the OGG format on P2P networks. The most popular players already support OGG with or without extensions, as well as many reprogrammable hardware players.
The license is the GPL, it is the seed of the entire free software movement, and which allows no one to take advantage and appropriate the code that volunteers provide selflessly.
The fact that it is an open format guarantees that OGG grows and improves. MP3 is defined from the beginning, and it will never have more quality than it deserves, nor will it be smaller or more compressed, because it is closed.
OGG, however, will benefit from the improvements that the research brings and will gradually be more compressed, more optimized and sound better than it already sounds.
Live audio streaming is an important component of Vorbis. The format has been designed to be easily transmitted live.
Vorbis designers are working hand in hand with the creators of Icecast (a program for live broadcasts) to make Icecast compatible with Vorbis.
They are also working on a player that supports live ogg files. In addition, these components will soon be available from the ogg website as accessories for current players. This will be when Vorbis version 1.0 comes out.
»Unique features of Ogg Vorbis
Vorbis has a very well defined header for comments, which is extensible and easy to use, without having to use ID3 tags. Vorbis has a sampling scale, a function that allows you to change the sample amount of a file or transmission without having to recode; Simply shorten packages to the desired size.
Vorbis files can be cut and then edited with extraordinary fine sampling. Vorbis can implement multiple channels, not just one or two. In addition, files in Vorbis can be logically chained.
