ffmpeg and mencoder GUI for Windows

There in the web, I found a GUI wrapper for ffmpeg and mencoder for windows called Media coder. This is an open source software distributed under GPL license. Download it and try it (I have done some basic conversion _single files | not in batch_ and it worked okay) and do not forget to convey your gratitude to the author/developer of the application if it helped you in any way.

ffmpeg with AMR (nb & wb), lame, FAAC and FAAd codec.

Below is how I have installed and used ffmpeg to convert avi and wmv files to 3gp format so that I can store and play them in my mobile phone. I have a very rough guide, but hope that will help you in understanding more about the procedure by doing your own research. Consider the below scribble as a pointer to get things started. Now that being said, lets get started..

Download the source for amr_nb (nb stands for narrow band; amr is for the 3gp support). If you can find the sources for both you can use both of them. I was not able to find the source for amr_wb and at last I had to beg in irc://irc.freenode.net (#ffmpeg) to get the source from a fellow who had it uploaded in some file sharing site for me.

For mp3 support, get the lame codec from sourceforge

Download faac, faad2 from sourceforge.net and get them installed.

get the amr and lame codecs compiled and installed.

Get the source for ffmpeg from the svn or search for the tarball.

svn://svn.mplayerhq.hu/ffmpeg/trunk

Get things going with the configure, make & make install.

./configure --enable-libmp3lame  --enable-libvorbis --enable-libamr-nb --enable-libamr-wb --enable-gpl --enable-libfaac --enable-libfaad --enable-shared

voila.. you are ready to convert video files for your mobile ~smile~

Below is the way I use ffmpeg to convert. Figuring out the options for ffmpeg is your job (hint: man ffmpeg)

./ffmpeg -i /home/old_desktops/sabarish.old/laptop_backup/Azureus\ Downloads/Kylie\ Minogue\ -\ Spinning\ Around\ \(xvid\ K-rip\).avi -f 3gp -vcodec mpeg4 -acodec faac -ar 8000 -ac 1 -ab 12.2k -y Kylie.3gp

I have used options, -acodec libamr_wb also but had some issues with the sound in the video, so rolled back using faac audio codecs. You can experiment around and use the best to get things done.

vtap.com or regionalized India.vtap.com !

What would you do when you want to see the new Rs. 1 Lakh car  which was presented to us, Indians by TATA Motors ? What if you want to see the video of the car to find the look and feel of it ?

My choice would be to search in vtap.com. This ultimate video search engine gives me the power to find out informational videos, entertainment videos, news videos, sports, user videos (which are hugely crappy or pathetic, but a few gems), music videos etcetera. The most powerful feature of vtap engine is its search capability, where it does an incremental search and you can see results of the typed in query without you clicking on the "Go" button. The search is so good that, I don't have to type in the whole characters of my (current) favourite singer "alizee" to find her videos. All it takes is type up to "aliz" and I can see the results already showing the pretty singer smiling at me.

vtap.com also provides your mobile (iphone, windows mobiles (source available here), large number of web enabled phones and itouch) with this search facility where you can use either a downloadable client or by going to vtap for mobile (http://m.vtap.com). Alas, one feature missing in vtap for mobile is the incremental search, so you have to go "clicky clicky" each time you want to see the results. Over the gprs in India this will really test your patience, talking about rigorous testing. Though at office or home, with those wifi enabled mobile, its a virtue.

Latest news is that vTap is bundled with Motorola mobile phones starting from their latest model MOTO Z10 onwards. I bought a Motorokr E6 recently and now I feel I should have waited a little while more so that I can buy MOTO Z10 with vTap bundled.

If you have a mobile which is supported by vtap and have a data plan activated, do try out vTap. Even with a PC you can use vTap to do more precise search than any other video search feature provides.

Let CamStudio make videos of your computer screen!

Below are two quotes from their home page which caught my eyes.

uno:

CamStudio is able to record all screen and audio activity on your computer and create industry-standard AVI video files and using its built-in SWF Producer can turn those AVIs into lean, mean, bandwidth-friendly Streaming Flash videos (SWFs)

Due:

You can download and use it completely free - yep - completely 100% free for your personal and commercial projects as CamStudio and the Codec are released under the GPL (for more details on this license, click here.)

This was all I wanted to know about CamStudio and there ended my search for a screen capture utility. After installing and trying, CamStudio left me with no reason to hit Google.com for more software of similar nature. I wanted this for giving a video demo configuring route based VPN on our Juniper Netscreen NS25. This proved to be a very handy tool for creating demos and short video tutorials for people who need support beyond voice. I have not tried any feature in CamStudio other than creating a screen shot video. But that was all I wanted and CamStudio did it extremely well in with very simple steps.

I suggest you download and install it. You will never know when you want to tell a video story to someone who has no receptive ability enable by default on his/her ears when it comes to technical trouble shooting.

                                                  ~

In honour of "nickthegeek" and "windycity" (Project Admins)

CamStudio - Free Streaming Video Desktop Recording Software

Clean way to get one's network IP address? - comp.lang.python | Google Groups

The best way of finding the IP address using python, that I have seen so far. Look for "Jean Paul Calderone's" post in the below link.

Clean way to get one's network IP address? - comp.lang.python | Google Groups

Here is what he posted.

    >>> from socket import socket, SOCK_DGRAM, AF_INET
    >>> s = socket(AF_INET, SOCK_DGRAM)
    >>> s.connect(('google.com', 0))
    >>> s.getsockname()
    ('192.168.1.113', 43711)