MIDI music file support

[Silken Healer]

Edit Simon: Split from Music in Lix?

Mp3 won't be supported, it compresses worse than ogg and is patent-encumbered. Midi probably won't be supported because Allegro 5 doesn't offer easy access.

Seeing as you said mp3 definetly won't be supported, and now it is, is there any more updates on whether .midi, which was just probably not could be supported for a future version of Lix?

[Simon]

In 2021, MP3 has become patent-free. Allegro 5 has some support for it, I don't know for what platforms or with which dependencies. I don't know if MP3 support is compiled into the Windows DLLs that I ship. Yes, since 2023, MP3 support is compiled into the Allegro 5 DLLs that I ship with my Windows releases of Lix.

I haven't looked recently what audio file formats Allegro 5 supports these years. I don't think it offers Midi support.

-- Simon

[Silken Healer]

What actually is "Allegro." I keep on hearing that word. Why does a file format need to be in Allegro to be in Lix? Can't you get support for it in Lix without using Allegro

[Simon]

Allegro 5 homepage, read the first section.
Allegro 5 Github repo

When A5 supports a format, the existing infrastructure in Lix can play it without extra hassle.

When A5 doesn't support a format, I'll have to find decoders for the format and then find a way to get the decoded PCM into Allgero 5, or even to write platform-dependent audio playback code.

-- Simon