[Freeze Exception] Please sync libtheora 1.0 beta 1 from Debian

[Mantas Kriaučiūnas]

Please sync new libtheora version from Debian (currently Ubuntu has ALPHA version, while in Debian is BETA), upstream recommends upgrading to beta1 to everyone !

from Debian changelog:

 libtheora (1.0~beta1-1) unstable; urgency=low

   * New upstream beta release.
     - Remove upstream_r12376-amd64_unpack_comment_crash.diff.
   * Change Source-Version to binary:Version.

 -- Clint Adams <email address hidden> Sat, 22 Sep 2007 14:56:16 -0400

libtheora 1.0beta1 contains following upstream changes comparing to 1.0alpha7, which is in Ubuntu Gutsy currently:

libtheora 1.0beta1 (2007 September 22)

 - Granulepos scheme modified to match other codecs. This bumps
   the bitstream revision to 3.2.1. Bitstreams marked 3.2.0 are
   handled correctly by this decoder. Older decoders will show
   a one frame sync error in the less noticable direction.

libtheora 1.0alpha8 (2007 September 18)

 - Switch to new spec compliant decoder from theora-exp branch.
   Written by Dr. Timothy Terriberry.
 - Add support to the encoder for using quantization settings
   provided by the application.
 - more assembly optimizations

(look at http://svn.xiph.org/trunk/theora/CHANGES )

[Onkar Shinde (onkarshinde)]

Following is a link to a testing source and binary package (386 only). I have tested totem, mplayer, ffmpeg2theora and thoggen and have not found any problem.
http://onkarshinde.googlepages.com/theora.tar.gz

According a this thread http://lists.xiph.org/pipermail/theora/2007-September/001599.html there is a problem on PPC in decoding. The problem is fixed in SVN trunk between revisions r13909 through r13911. So we may want to patch the package in Ubuntu. But since it affects only PPC it is not high priority.

I will attach debdiff and diffstat output shortly.

[Jonathan Riddell (jr)]

Shipping with beta is better than with alpha in general so this seems a sensible target for freeze exception.

The package linked to in comment 1 makes unnecessary changes from Debian, please make an updated packages with only the existing Ubuntu changes included.

A commant from seb128 would also be useful, as the previous uploader.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

I've reviewed the symbol tables from libtheora0 alpha7 and beta1, and verified that there are no symbols removed in the new version, so at least on that level the library is ABI-compatible, yes.

Given that it seems to work with the apps here and in Debian, this is ok to upload. Including the patch for powerpc (now rather than later) would be appreciated.

[Onkar Shinde (onkarshinde)]

If we need the PPC patch then someone else will have to work on the package as I don't have any knowledge of using quilt. Till now I have tried patching only just one package using dpatch.

While I try to refine the package by Wednesday end of day as per Jonathan's comments, if any of the official uploaders want to create the package on their own, please go ahead. I don't want my inexperience in packaging to cause any delay in the inclusion of new version.

[Michael Smith (msmith-xiph)]

The other option (instead of applying the patch) is to compile libtheora with "-fsigned-char".

That won't affect e.g. x86/x86-64 (where signed chars are the default), but will make the beta1 release work correctly on PPC (where unsigned is the default).

So, that would allow just changing some build-related things, rather than patching the source.

[j^ (j)]

the newly released beta2 also addresses the PPC issue and is the recommended way: upgrade to beta2.

[Janek (thefoxx)]

It would be really nice if you update to beta 2. Not only couse of the exception - there is also software which needs >= beta 1 to encode files with the theora codec (OGMRip).

[Onkar Shinde (onkarshinde)]

beta 2 will now won't make it to gutsy except in gutsy-backports. I have created a ubuntu package from the debian one. Unfortunately due to the version I chose for beta1 in my PPA I can not upload the latest one to my PPA. So I am attaching source package and .deb for i386 here.

[Wouter Stomp (wouterstomp-deactivatedaccount)]

Fixed in hardy: 1.0~beta2-2