Sorry, but I think generic extension names are far from
perfect. Here
are some additional problems to consider:
1) Language. When people talk about file types, they almost
never
say "dot" at the beginning. They say "MP3
files". For example, "Does
that player support MP3 files?" If you have an
extension of ".music"
this ends up being "Does that player support music
files?" Which is
useless, of course.
2) Search. In this age of search, it's essential to give
things
unique names so that people can find information on them.
If someone
gets a .music or .voice file from somewhere and can't play
it, do you
think they're going to have much luck searching for info on
the format?
3) Attitude. Promotion is one thing, but trying to claim
such generic
names in the name of open source is simply arrogant, I
think.
4) Confusion about purpose. When it comes to audio, your
proposed
names are .music and .voice. What happens when some content
falls into
both categories, or neither? Example 1: Sound effects for a
game.
They'd have to be called .music, which is confusing.
Example 2: A
podcast with a little bit of music at the beginning and end,
but all
voice in the middle. If they're not willing to take a big
quality hit
on the music, they'd have to make it .music. Again,
confusing. It's
better to have .ogg (associated with music and high quality
audio)
and .spx (associated with efficient encoding of speech).
Finally, I disagree with your assessment of .oga/.ogv on all
counts.
Three letter extensions are good for many reasons: easy to
display,
easy to read, easy to type, and overall it's a familiar,
consistent,
and tried-and-true approach. I also don't see how they're
hard to
remember (people are quite used to remembering TLAs),
especially if
they follow a logical and consistent naming convention like
.oga/.ogv.
As for not telling what the file is about, it seems more
helpful to me
for the extension to differentiate between formats as
opposed to media
types. People usually have at least a hint about media type
from
context (i.e. where the file came from, what the name before
the dot
is, file size), but they usually don't have any such
guidance when it
comes to format.
So, in my opinion, Xiph format adoption is best advanced by
continuing
to promote OGG as an MP3 alternative while following
established
conventions in introducing additional extensions.
I hope you will consider this as feedback and not flames.
Tom
"Ivo_Emanuel_Gon=C3=A7alves?=" <justivo gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > What is wrong with the MP4/Matroska/Windows
Media/RealVideo model?
> > .oga (Vorbis, Speex)
> > .ogv (Theora, Theora + Vorbis, Theora + Speex,
Tarkin, etc)
>
> All kinds of things are wrong there. Those extensions
use a three
> letter namespace, they are hard to remember, easy to
confuse, and
> moreover they tell the user nothing much about what the
file is
> supposed to be about.
>
> ...
>
> Although .music-perfect has a nice sound to it, it's
possibly too
> large for an extension. Of course that applies to
.video-perfect as
> well, but those are so far only a suggestion asking for
feedback.
>
> Personally, I stand behind .video, .music and .voice.
It's simply perfect.
>
> It's a shame that we are apparently going over yet
another extension
> flamewar, but things as they are, are not all right.
There wouldn't
> be this kind of talk all the time if things were okay.
Let's hope a
> consensus is achieved soon, because there's far more
important things
> to fix around here.
>
> ...
>
> Finally, I also believe that this change means also a
change of
> attitude from Xiph. Many in the industry, or even in
the
> mailing-lists here, have quite a few times pointed out
that we are not
> promoting our projects well, or even at all. This, I
hope, is a step
> in the right direction.
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