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• Running Windows XP In 2016

  2 janvier 2016, par Multimedia Mike

  I have an interest in getting a 32-bit Windows XP machine up and running. I have a really good yet slightly dated and discarded computer that seemed like a good candidate for dedicating to this task. So the question is : Can Windows XP still be installed from scratch on a computer, activated, and used in 2016 ? I wasn’t quite sure since I have heard stories about how Microsoft has formally ended support for Windows XP as of the first half of 2014 and I wasn’t entirely sure what that meant.

  Spoiler : It’s still possible to install and activate Windows XP as of the writing of this post. It’s also possible to download and install all the updates published up until support ended.

  The Candidate Computer
  This computer was assembled either in late 2008 or early 2009. It was a beast at the time.

  
  
  Click for a larger image
  

  It was built around the newly-released NVIDIA GTX 280 video card. The case is a Thermaltake DH-101, which is a home theater PC thing. The motherboard is an Asus P5N32-SLI Premium with a Core 2 Duo X6800 2.93 GHz CPU on board. 2 GB of RAM and a 1.5 TB hard drive are also present.

  The original owner handed it off to me because their family didn’t have much use for it anymore (too many other machines in the house). Plus it was really, obnoxiously loud. The noisy culprit was the stock blue fan that came packaged with the Intel processor (seen in the photo) whining at around 65 dB. I replaced the fan and brought the noise level way down.

  As for connectivity, the motherboard has dual gigabit NICs (of 2 different chipsets for some reason) and onboard wireless 802.11g. I couldn’t make the latter work and this project was taking place a significant distance from my wired network. Instead, I connected a USB 802.11ac dongle and antenna which is advertised to work in both Windows XP and Linux. It works great under Windows XP. Meanwhile, making the adapter work under Linux provided a retro-computing adventure in which I had to modify C code to make the driver work.

  So, score 1 for Windows XP over Linux here.

  The Simple Joy of Retro-computing
  One thing you have to watch out for when you get into retro-computing is fighting the urge to rant about the good old days of computing. Most long-time computer users have a good understanding of the frustration that computers keep getting faster by orders of magnitude and yet using them somehow feels slower and slower over successive software generations.
  

  This really hits home when you get old software running, especially on high-end hardware (relative to what was standard contemporary hardware). After I got this new Windows XP machine running, as usual, I was left wondering why software was so much faster a few generations ago.

  Of course, as mentioned, it helps when you get to run old software on hardware that would have been unthinkably high end at the software’s release. Apparently, the minimum WinXP specs as set by MS are a 233 MHz Pentium CPU and 64 MB of RAM, with 1.5 GB of hard drive space. This machine has more than 10x the clock speed (and 2 CPUs), 32x the RAM, and 1000x the HD space. Further, I’m pretty sure 100 Mbit ethernet was the standard consumer gear in 2001 while 802.11b wireless was gaining traction. The 802.11ac adapter makes networking quite pleasant.

  Purpose
  Retro-computing really seems to be ramping up in popularity lately. For some reason, I feel compelled to declare at this juncture that I was into it before it was cool.

  Why am I doing this ? I have a huge collection of old DOS/Windows computer games. I also have this nerdy obsession with documenting old video games in the MobyGames database. I used to do a lot of this a few years ago, tracking the effort on my gaming blog. In the intervening years, I have still collected a lot of old, unused, unloved video games, usually either free or very cheap while documenting my collection efforts on that same blog.

  So I want to work my way through some of this backlog, particularly the games that are not yet represented in the MobyGames database, and even more pressing, ones that the internet (viewed through Google at least) does not seem to know about. To that end, I thought this was a good excuse to get Windows XP on this old machine. A 32-bit Windows XP machine is capable of running any software advertised as supporting Windows XP, Windows ME, Windows 98, Windows 95, and even 16-bit Windows 3.x (I have games for all these systems). That covers a significant chunk of PC history. It can probably be made to run DOS games as well, but those are (usually) better run under DosBox. In order to get the right display feel, I even invested in a (used) monitor sporting a 4:3 aspect ratio. If I know these old games, most will be engineered and optimized for that ratio rather than the widescreen resolutions seen nowadays.

  I would also like to get back to that Xbox optical disc experimentation I was working on a few years ago. Another nice feature of this motherboard is that it still provides a 40-pin IDE/PATA adapter which makes the machine useful for continuing that old investigation (and explains why I have that long IDE cable to no where pictured hanging off the board).

  The Messy Details
  I did the entire installation process twice. The first time was a bumbling journey of discovery and copious note-taking. I still have Windows XP installation media that includes service pack 2 (SP2), along with 2 separate licenses that haven’t been activated for a long time. My plan was to install it fresh, then install the relevant drivers. Then I would investigate the Windows update and activation issues and everything should be fine.

  So what’s the deal with Windows Update for XP, and with activations ? Second item first : it IS possible to still activate Windows XP. The servers are still alive and respond quickly. However, as always, you don’t activate until you’re sure everything is working at some baseline. It took awhile to get there.

  As for whether Windows Update still works for XP, that’s a tougher question. Short answer is yes ; longer answer is that it can be difficult to kick off the update process. At least on SP2, the “Windows Update” program launches IE6 and navigates to a special microsoft.com URL which initiates the update process (starting with an ActiveX control). This URL no longer exists.

  From what I can piece together from my notes, this seems to be the route I eventually took :

  1. Install Windows XP fresh
  2. Install drivers for the hardware ; fortunately, Asus still has all the latest drivers necessary for the motherboard and its components but it’s necessary to download these from another network-connected PC since the networking probably won’t be running “out of the box”
  3. Download the .NET 3.5 runtime, which is the last one supported by Windows XP, and install it
  4. Download the latest NVIDIA drivers ; this needs to be done after the previous step because the installer requires the .NET runtime ; run the driver installer and don’t try to understand why it insists on re-downloading .NET 3.5 runtime before installation
  5. While you’re downloading stuff on other computers to be transported to this new machine, be sure to download either Chrome or Firefox per your preference ; if you try to download via IE6, you may find that their download pages aren’t compatible with IE6
  6. Somewhere along the line (I’m guessing as a side effect of the .NET 3.5 installation), the proper, non-IE6-based Windows Update program magically springs to life ; once this happens, there will be 144 updates (in my case anyway) ; installing these will probably require multiple reboots, but SP3 and all known pre-deprecation security fixes will be installed
  7. Expect that, even after installing all of these, a few more updates will appear ; eventually, you’ll be at the end of the update road
  8. Once you’re satisfied everything is working satisfactorily, take the plunge and activate your installation

  Residual Quirks
  Steam runs great on Windows XP, as do numerous games I have purchased through the service. So that opens up a whole bunch more games that I could play on this machine. Steam’s installer highlights a curious legacy problem of Windows XP– it seems there are many languages that it does not support “out of the box” :

  
  
  

  It looks like the Chinese options and a few others that are standard now weren’t standard 15 years ago.

  Also, a little while after booting up, I’ll get a crashing error concerning a process called geoforms.scr. This appears to be NVIDIA-related. However, I don’t notice anything obviously operationally wrong with the system.

  Regarding DirectX support, DirectX 9 is the highest version officially supported by Windows XP. There are allegedly methods to get DirectX 10 running as well, but I don’t care that much. I did care, briefly, when I realized that a bunch of the demos for the NVIDIA GTX 280 required DX10 which left me wondering why it was possible to install them on Windows XP.

  Eventually, by installing enough of these old games, I fully expect to have numerous versions of .NET, DirectX, QT, and Video for Windows installed side by side.

  Out of curiosity, I tried playing a YouTube HD/1080p video. I wanted to see if the video was accelerated through my card. The video played at full speed but I noticed some tearing. Then I inspected the CPU usage and noticed that the CPU was quite loaded. So either the GTX 280 doesn’t have video acceleration, or Windows XP doesn’t provide the right APIs, or Chrome is not able to access the APIs in Windows XP, or perhaps some combination of the foregoing.

  Games are working well, though. I tried one of my favorite casual games and got sucked into that for, like, an entire night because that’s what casual games do. But then, I booted up a copy of WarCraft III that I procured sometime ago. I don’t have any experience with the WarCraft universe (RTS or MMO) but I developed a keen interest in StarCraft II over the past few years and wanted to try WarCraft III. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get WarCraft III to work correctly on several different Windows 7 installations (movies didn’t play, which left me slightly confused as to what I was supposed to do).

  Still works beautifully on the new old Windows XP machine.

• Issues with processing media on windows Azure

  23 septembre 2015, par Ahmed Mujtaba

  I have a website built on ASP.NET web forms that works as a media portal for users to upload videos. I’m using ffmpeg encoders to produce video contents to be streamed in the browser. I’m using the web deploy method to publish the site on the Azure server. The website get’s deployed properly however I get following issues in the live site.

  1. Video never get’s encoded and published. I get some sort of error.

  2. Video get’s published but the process of uploading and encoding the video is way too slow on the web server.

  My project solution contains upload.ashx that handles the upload requests and makes the call to encode.ashx which is responsible for the encoding and publishing of the videos. I tried to remotely debug the site but the debugger never get’s to encode.ashx.

  I was wondering if these issues can be resolved by having the website deployed with a VM ?

  Script that uploads the video file :

   var filesuploaded = 0;
  
      var faileduploaded = 0;
  
  
  
      $(function () {
  
          var uploader = new plupload.Uploader({
  
              runtimes: 'gears,html5,flash,silverlight,browserplus',
  
              browse_button: '<%= pickfiles.ClientID %>',
  
              container: 'container',
  
              max_file_size: '<%= MaxMediaSize %>mb',
  
              url: '<%=Config.GetUrl() %>videos/upload/upload.ashx',
  
              flash_swf_url: '<%=Config.GetUrl() %>plupload/js/plupload.flash.swf',
  
              silverlight_xap_url: '<%=Config.GetUrl() %>plupload/js/plupload.silverlight.xap',
  
              chunk_size: '4mb',
  
              <%= UniqueNames %>
  
              filters: [
  
              { title: '<%= AllowedFormatsDisplay %>', extensions: '<%= AllowedFormats %>'}],
  
              headers: { UName: '<%=UserName %>', MTP: '<%= MediaType %>' }
  
          });
  
          //uploader.bind('Init', function (up, params) {
  
          //    $('#filelist').html("<div>Current runtime: " + params.runtime + "</div>");
  
          //});
  
  
  
          uploader.init();
  
  
  
          $('#uploadfiles').click(function (e) {
  
              uploader.start();
  
              e.preventDefault();
  
              $("#uploadfiles").hide();
  
              $("#&lt;%= embd.ClientID %>").hide();
  
          });
  
  
  
          uploader.bind('FilesAdded', function (up, files) {
  
              $("#uploadfiles").show();
  
              $("#&lt;%= msg.ClientID %>").html("");
  
              var count=0;
  
              $.each(files, function (i, file) {
  
                  $('#filelist').append(
  
                      '<div class="item_pad_4 bx_br_bt">' + (count + 1) + ': ' + file.name + ' (' + plupload.formatSize(file.size) + ')  <b></b></div>' );
  
                  count++;
  
              });
  
              var maxupload = &lt;%= MaxVideoUploads %>;
  
              if(count > maxupload) 
  
              {               
  
                  $.each(files, function(i, file) {
  
                      uploader.removeFile(file);
  
                  });
  
  
  
                  $('#filelist').html("");
  
                  $("#uploadfiles").hide();
  
                  Display_Message("#&lt;%= msg.ClientID %>", "Can't upload more than " + maxupload + " records at once!", 1, 1);
  
                  return false;
  
              }
  
              else {
  
                  $("#tfiles").html(count);
  
                  $("#uploadfiles").removeClass("disabled");
  
                  $("#&lt;%= pickfiles.ClientID %>").hide();
  
              }
  
              up.refresh(); // Reposition Flash/Silverlight
  
          });
  
  
  
          uploader.bind('UploadProgress', function (up, file) {
  
              $('#' + file.id + " b").html(file.percent + "%");
  
          });
  
  
  
          uploader.bind('Error', function (up, err) {
  
              $('#filelist').append("<div>Error: " + err.code +
  
                  ", Message: " + err.message +
  
                  (err.file ? ", File: " + err.file.name : "") +
  
                  "</div>"
  
              );
  
              up.refresh(); // Reposition Flash/Silverlight
  
          });
  
  
  
          var failedstatus = 0;
  
          uploader.bind('FileUploaded', function (up, file, info) {
  
              // encode started
  
              if (info.response != "failed" &amp;&amp; info.response != "") {
  
                  EncodeVD(file.id, info.response, file.size);
  
                  Display_Message('#' + file.id, "Please wait for final processing", 0, 1);
  
                  if (failedstatus == 0)
  
                      Redirect(info.response);
  
                  filesuploaded++;
  
              }
  
              else {
  
                  Display_Message('#' + file.id, "Response is: " + info.response, 0, 1);
  
              }
  
          });
  
      });
  
      var redcnt = 0;
  
      function Redirect(filename) {
  
          var IntervalID = setInterval(function () {
  
              redcnt++;
  
              if (redcnt > 2) {
  
                  clearInterval(IntervalID);
  
                  var tfiles = $("#tfiles").html();
  
                  if(tfiles == faileduploaded) { // break further processing all videos failed to upload
  
                  }
  
                  else if (filesuploaded >= tfiles) {
  
                      document.location = "&lt;%=ConfirmPageUrl %>?fn=" + filename + "&amp;gid=&lt;%=GalleryID %>&amp;uvids=" + $("#tfiles").html() + "&amp;mpid=" + $("#maxpid").html().trim() + "&lt;%=GroupParam %>";
  
                  }
  
          }
  
          }, 2000);
  
  }
  
  function EncodeVD(mid, mfile, msize) {
  
      var params = '&lt;%= EncodingParams %>&amp;fn=' + mfile;
  
          $.ajax({
  
              type: 'GET',
  
              url: '&lt;%= Encoding_Handler_Path %>',
  
              data: params,
  
              async: true,
  
              success: function (msg) {
  
                  if (msg == "Success" || msg == "") {
  
                      $('#' + mid).html('<strong>Uploading Completed Successfully - Wait for Processing.');
  
                  }
  
                  else {
  
                      failedstatus = 1;
  
                      faileduploaded++;
  
                      Display_Message('#' + mid, "Response is: " + msg, 0, 1);
  
                  }
  
              }
  
          });
  
      }
  
  </strong>

  Server side code for processing the file upload :

   private int MediaType = 0; // 0 : video, 1: audio
  
  
  
      public void ProcessRequest (HttpContext context) {
  
          try
  
          {
  
              context.Response.ContentType = "text/plain";
  
              context.Response.Write(ProcessMedia(context));
  
          }
  
          catch (Exception ex)
  
          {
  
              context.Response.Write("error|" + ex.Message);
  
          }
  
      }
  
  
  
      public string ProcessMedia(HttpContext context)
  
      {
  
          if (context.Request.Files.Count > 0)
  
          {
  
              int chunk = context.Request["chunk"] != null ? int.Parse(context.Request["chunk"]) : 0;
  
              string fileName = context.Request["name"] != null ? context.Request["name"] : string.Empty;
  
              //string _fileName = fileName.Remove(fileName.LastIndexOf(".")) + "-" + Guid.NewGuid().ToString().Substring(0, 6) + "" + fileName.Remove(0, fileName.LastIndexOf("."));
  
              HttpPostedFile fileUpload = context.Request.Files[0];
  
  
  
              string upath = "";
  
              if (context.Request.Headers["UName"] != null)
  
                  upath = context.Request.Headers["UName"].ToString();
  
  
  
              //if (CloudSettings.EnableCloudStorage && upath != "")
  
              //    _fileName = upath.Substring(0, 3) + "-" + _fileName; // avoid duplication in cloud storage
  
  
  
              if (context.Request.Headers["MTP"] != null)
  
                  MediaType = Convert.ToInt32(context.Request.Headers["MTP"]);
  
  
  
              //string extensions = "";
  
              //if (MediaType == 0)
  
              //    extensions = Site_Settings.Video_Allowed_Formats;
  
              //else
  
              //    extensions = Site_Settings.Audio_Allowed_Formats;
  
  
  
              //bool sts = UtilityBLL.Check_File_Extension(extensions, fileName.ToLower());
  
              //if (sts == false)
  
              //{
  
              //    return "Invalid format, please upload proper video!"; // Invalid video format, please upload proper video
  
              //}
  
  
  
              int allowable_size_mb = 0;
  
              if (MediaType == 0)
  
              {
  
                  allowable_size_mb = Site_Settings.Video_Max_Size;
  
              }
  
              else
  
              {
  
                  allowable_size_mb = Site_Settings.Audio_Max_Size;
  
              }
  
              int UploadSize = allowable_size_mb * 1000000;
  
              if (fileUpload.ContentLength > UploadSize)
  
              {
  
                  return "Video Limit Exceeds";
  
              }
  
  
  
              string uploadPath = "";
  
              // check whether audio / mp3 encoding enabled
  
              if (this.MediaType == 1)
  
              {
  
                  // audio encoding
  
                  if (fileName.EndsWith(".mp3"))
  
                  {
  
                      // upload mp3 directly in mp3 path instead of default path
  
                      if (upath == "")
  
                          uploadPath = UrlConfig.MP3_Path(); // source video path
  
                      else
  
                          uploadPath = UrlConfig.MP3_Path(upath); // source video path
  
                  }
  
                  else
  
                  {
  
                      // default path
  
                      if (upath == "")
  
                          uploadPath = UrlConfig.Source_Video_Path(); // source video path
  
                      else
  
                          uploadPath = UrlConfig.Source_Video_Path(upath); // source video path
  
                  }
  
              }
  
              else
  
              {//azure
  
                  // default path
  
                  if (upath == "")
  
                      uploadPath = UrlConfig.Source_Video_Path(); // source video path
  
                  else
  
                      uploadPath = UrlConfig.Source_Video_Path(upath); // source video path
  
              }
  
  
  
              FileStream fs;
  
              using (fs = new FileStream(Path.Combine(uploadPath, fileName), chunk == 0 ? FileMode.Create : FileMode.Append))
  
              {
  
                  byte[] buffer = new byte[fileUpload.InputStream.Length];
  
                  fileUpload.InputStream.Read(buffer, 0, buffer.Length);
  
  
  
                  fs.Write(buffer, 0, buffer.Length);
  
              }
  
              return fileName; // "Success";
  
          }
  
          else
  
          {
  
              return "failed";
  
          }
  
  
  
          return "";
  
      }
  
      public bool IsReusable {
  
          get {
  
              return false;
  
          }
  
      }

  code in encode.aspx responsible for encoding the video :

  private string EncodeMedia(HttpContext context)
  
  {
  
      string sourcepath = "";
  
      string publishedpath = "";
  
      string mp3path = "";
  
      string thumbpath = "";
  
      if (this.UserName != "")
  
      {//azure
  
          sourcepath = UrlConfig.Source_Video_Path(this.UserName);
  
          publishedpath = UrlConfig.Published_Video_Path(this.UserName);
  
          mp3path = UrlConfig.MP3_Path(this.UserName);
  
          thumbpath = UrlConfig.Thumbs_Path(this.UserName);
  
      }
  
      else
  
      {
  
          sourcepath = UrlConfig.Source_Video_Path();
  
          publishedpath = UrlConfig.Published_Video_Path();
  
          mp3path = UrlConfig.MP3_Path();
  
          thumbpath = UrlConfig.Thumbs_Path();
  
      }
  
      if (this.FileName.EndsWith(".mp3") && this.MediaType == 1)
  
      {
  
          // mp3 and audio format
  
          if (!File.Exists(mp3path + "/" + this.FileName))
  
          {
  
              return "Audio file not found!";
  
          }
  
      }
  
      else
  
      {
  
          // rest normal video and audio encoding
  
          if (!File.Exists(sourcepath + "/" + this.FileName))
  
          {
  
              return "Source file not found!";
  
          }
  
      }
  
  
  
      if (CloudSettings.EnableCloudStorage && this.UserName != "")
  
          this.FileName = this.UserName.Substring(0, 3) + "-" + this.FileName; // avoid duplication in cloud storage
  
  
  
  
  
      //double f_contentlength = 0;
  
      //if (Site_Settings.Feature_Packages == 1)
  
      //{
  
      //    if (Config.GetMembershipAccountUpgradeType() != 1)
  
      //    {
  
      //        // Check whether user have enough space to upload content
  
      //        // Restriction only for normal or premium users
  
      //        f_contentlength = (double)fileUpload.ContentLength / 1000000;
  
      //        string media_field_name = "space_video";
  
      //        if (MediaType == 1)
  
      //            media_field_name = "space_audio";
  
      //        if (!User_PackagesBLL.Check_User_Space_Status(upath, media_field_name, f_contentlength) && !isAdmin)
  
      //        {
  
      //            // insufficient credits to upload content
  
      //            return "Insufficient credits to upload media file"; //   Response.Redirect(Config.GetUrl("myaccount/packages.aspx?status=" + media_field_name), true);
  
      //        }
  
      //    }
  
      //}
  
  
  
      this.backgroundpublishing = true; // should be true on direct encoding
  
      // Video Processing
  
      string flv_filename = "";
  
      string original_filename = "";
  
      string thumb_filename = "";
  
      string duration = "";
  
      int duration_sec = 0;
  
  
  
      // set video actions : 1 -> on, 0 -> off
  
      int isenabled = 1;
  
      int ispublished = 1;
  
      int isreviewed = 1;
  
      int isresponse = 0;
  
      if (Response_VideoID > 0)
  
          isresponse = 1;
  
  
  
      string flv_url = "none";
  
      string thumb_url = "none";
  
      string org_url = "none";
  
      string _embed = "";
  
  
  
      string errorcode = "0";
  
      VideoInfo info = null;
  
  
  
      if (Site_Settings.Content_Approval == 0)
  
          isreviewed = 0;
  
  
  
  
  
      // check whether audio / mp3 encoding enabled
  
      if (this.FileName.EndsWith(".mp3") && this.MediaType==1)
  
      {
  
          // audio encoding
  
          // mp3 file already
  
          // so no encoding happens
  
          MediaHandler _minfo = new MediaHandler();
  
          _minfo.FFMPEGPath = Encoding_Settings.FFMPEGPATH;
  
          _minfo.FileName = FileName;
  
          _minfo.InputPath = mp3path;
  
          info = _minfo.Get_Info();
  
  
  
          flv_filename = FileName;
  
          original_filename = FileName;
  
          duration = info.Duration;
  
          duration_sec = info.Duration_Sec;
  
          isenabled = 1; // enabled
  
      }
  
      else if (this.directpublishing)
  
      {            
  
  
  
          // publish video
  
          ArrayList itags = new ArrayList();
  
          MHPEncoder encoder = new MHPEncoder();
  
          //if (this.FileName.EndsWith(".mpeg") || this.FileName.EndsWith(".mpg")) // use mpg compatible ffmpeg encoder
  
          //    encoder.FfmpegPath = HttpContext.Current.Server.MapPath(HttpContext.Current.Request.ApplicationPath) + "\\ffmpeg\\ffmpegbk\\ffmpeg.exe";
  
              //encoder.ThumbFfmpegPath = Encoding_Settings.FFMPEGPATH; // use normal ffmpeg encoder for thumbs processing
  
  
  
          //azure
  
          encoder.FfmpegPath = Encoding_Settings.FFMPEGPATH; // use normal ffmpeg encoder
  
          encoder.FlvToolPath = Encoding_Settings.FLVTOOLPATH; // set meta information for flv videos
  
          encoder.Mp4BoxPath = Encoding_Settings.MP4BoxPath; // set meta information for mp4 videos
  
          encoder.SourcePath = sourcepath;
  
          encoder.SourceFileName = this.FileName;
  
  
  
          // No cloud storage on direct encoding
  
          //if (CloudSettings.EnableCloudStorage)
  
          //    encoder.EnableCloudStorage = true;
  
  
  
  
  
          if (MediaType == 1)
  
          {
  
              // audio encoding
  
              itags.Add("14");
  
              encoder.iTags = itags;
  
              encoder.GrabThumbs = false;
  
              encoder.PublishedPath = mp3path;
  
  
  
              //_vprocess.OutputPath = this.MP3Path;
  
              //_vprocess.isAudio = true;
  
          }
  
          else
  
          {
  
              // video encoding
  
              itags.Add(EncoderSettings.DefaultITagValue.ToString()); // 5 for 360p mp4 encoding    
  
              //itags.Add(7);   // this will call 7 case settings to publish next video ending with _7.mp4 instead of _5.mp4
  
              // so there will be 2 videos with different resoultions published at the end of the process?
  
              // yesmake sure use proper settings first test it directly via command.     
  
              //okay i got it. But i'm gonna have to use a different media players to incroporate those settings
  
              // once published you can load different videos for different user by checking _7.mp4 (end) va
  
             //okay got it.
  
  
  
              //azure
  
              encoder.PublishedPath = publishedpath;
  
              encoder.iTags = itags;
  
              encoder.ThumbsDirectory = thumbpath;
  
              encoder.TotalThumbs = 15;
  
  
  
              //_vprocess.ThumbPath = this.ThumbPath;
  
              //_vprocess.OutputPath = this.FLVPath;
  
              //if (Config.isPostWaterMark())
  
              //{
  
              //    // script for posting watermark on video
  
              //    _vprocess.WaterMarkPath = Server.MapPath(Request.ApplicationPath) + "\\contents\\watermark";
  
              //    _vprocess.WaterMarkImage = "watermark.gif";
  
  
  
              //}
  
          }
  
          int deleteoption = Site_Settings.Video_Delete_Original;
  
          if (deleteoption == 1)
  
          {
  
              encoder.DeleteSource = true;
  
          }
  
          // background processing
  
          if (this.backgroundpublishing && this.MediaType==0)
  
          {
  
              encoder.BackgroundProcessing = true;
  
              // get information from source video in order to store it in database
  
              MediaHandler _minfo = new MediaHandler();
  
              //if (this.FileName.EndsWith(".mpeg") || this.FileName.EndsWith(".mpg")) // use mpg compatible ffmpeg encoder
  
              //    encoder.FfmpegPath = HttpContext.Current.Server.MapPath(HttpContext.Current.Request.ApplicationPath) + "\\ffmpeg\\ffmpegbk\\ffmpeg.exe";
  
              //else
  
                  _minfo.FFMPEGPath = Encoding_Settings.FFMPEGPATH;
  
  
  
              _minfo.FileName = FileName;
  
              _minfo.InputPath = sourcepath;
  
              info = _minfo.Get_Info();
  
          }
  
          // encode video processing
  
          Video_Information vinfo = encoder.Process();
  
          if (vinfo.ErrorCode > 0)
  
          {
  
              errorcode = vinfo.ErrorCode.ToString();
  
              ErrorLgBLL.Add_Log("Encoding Failed Log", "", "encoding error: " + vinfo.ErrorCode.ToString() + "<br />Description: " + vinfo.ErrorDescription.ToString());
  
               //return vinfo.ErrorDescription;
  
          }
  
          // Double check validation
  
          // if published video exist
  
          // if thumb exist
  
          // then proceed further
  
  
  
          if (MediaType == 0)
  
          {
  
              if (!File.Exists(encoder.PublishedPath + "/" + vinfo.FLVVideoName))
  
              {
  
                  return "Video failed to published properly.";
  
              }
  
              if (!File.Exists(encoder.ThumbsDirectory + "/" + vinfo.ThumbFileName))
  
              {
  
                  return "Thumbs failed to grab from video properly.";
  
              }
  
          }
  
          else
  
          {
  
              if (vinfo.FLVVideoName == "")
  
              {
  
                  vinfo.FLVVideoName = this.FileName.Remove(this.FileName.LastIndexOf(".")) + "_14.mp3"; // mp3 file path name
  
              }
  
              if (!File.Exists(encoder.PublishedPath + "/" + vinfo.FLVVideoName))
  
              {
  
                  return "Audio failed to published properly.";
  
              }
  
          }
  
          // Now thumbs and video published, procceed for data processing
  
          // get information from vinfo object
  
          if (this.backgroundpublishing &amp;&amp; this.MediaType == 0)
  
          {
  
              string OutputFileName = this.FileName.Remove(this.FileName.LastIndexOf("."));
  
              flv_filename = OutputFileName + "_" + EncoderSettings.DefaultITagValue + "." + EncoderSettings.Return_Output_Extension(EncoderSettings.DefaultITagValue);
  
              original_filename = vinfo.OriginalVideoName;
  
              thumb_filename = OutputFileName + "_008.jpg"; // info.ThumbFileName;
  
              duration = info.Duration;
  
              duration_sec = info.Duration_Sec;
  
          }
  
          else
  
          {
  
              flv_filename = vinfo.FLVVideoName;
  
              original_filename = vinfo.OriginalVideoName;
  
              thumb_filename = vinfo.ThumbFileName;
  
              duration = vinfo.Duration;
  
              duration_sec = vinfo.Duration_Sec;
  
              isenabled = vinfo.isEnabled;
  
          }
  
  
  
          // No cloud storage on direct encoding.
  
          // Note cloude storage only works if background processing is disabled
  
          // Or works in cased of sheduled processing
  
          if (CloudSettings.EnableCloudStorage &amp;&amp; errorcode == "0")
  
          {
  
              flv_url = "amazon";
  
              org_url = "https://s3.amazonaws.com/" + CloudSettings.OriginalVideoBucketName + "/" + this.FileName;
  
              thumb_url = "https://s3.amazonaws.com/" + CloudSettings.ThumbsBucketName + "/" + thumb_filename;
  
  
  
          }
  
  
  
      }
  
      else
  
      {
  
          // set publishing status off.
  
          ispublished = 0;
  
          original_filename = this.FileName;
  
      }
  
  
  
      // Store video information in database
  
      string ipaddress = context.Request.ServerVariables["REMOTE_ADDR"].ToString();
  
  
  
      // Store media information in database
  
      Video_Struct vd = new Video_Struct();
  
      vd.CategoryID = 0; // store categoryname or term instead of category id
  
      vd.Categories = Categories;
  
      vd.UserName = UserName;
  
      vd.Title = "";
  
      vd.Description = "";
  
      vd.Tags = Tags;
  
      vd.Duration = duration;
  
      vd.Duration_Sec = duration_sec;
  
      vd.OriginalVideoFileName = original_filename;
  
      vd.VideoFileName = flv_filename;
  
      vd.ThumbFileName = thumb_filename;
  
      vd.isPrivate = Privacy;
  
      vd.AuthKey = PAuth;
  
      vd.isEnabled = isenabled;
  
      vd.Response_VideoID = Response_VideoID; // video responses
  
      vd.isResponse = isresponse;
  
      vd.isPublished = ispublished;
  
      vd.isReviewed = isreviewed;
  
      vd.FLV_Url = flv_url;
  
      vd.Thumb_Url = thumb_url;
  
      vd.Org_Url = org_url;
  
      vd.Embed_Script = _embed;
  
      vd.isExternal = 0; // website own video, 1: embed video
  
      vd.IPAddress = ipaddress;
  
      vd.Type = MediaType;
  
      vd.YoutubeID = "";
  
      vd.isTagsreViewed = 1;
  
      vd.Mode = 0; // filter videos based on website sections
  
      //vd.ContentLength = f_contentlength;
  
      vd.GalleryID = GID;
  
      vd.ErrorCode = Convert.ToInt32(errorcode);
  
      long videoid = VideoBLL.Process_Info(vd, false);
  
  
  
      // Process tags
  
      if (Tags != "")
  
      {
  
          int tag_type = 0; // represent videos
  
          if (MediaType == 1)
  
              tag_type = 4; // represent audio file
  
          TagsBLL.Process_Tags(Tags, tag_type, 0);
  
      }
  
  
  
      if (Response_VideoID > 0)
  
      {
  
          VideoBLL.Update_Responses(Response_VideoID);
  
      }
  
  
  
      return "Success";
  
  }

• The 11th Hour RoQ Variation

  12 avril 2012, par Multimedia Mike — Game Hacking, dreamroq, Reverse Engineering, roq, Vector Quantization

  I have been looking at the RoQ file format almost as long as I have been doing practical multimedia hacking. However, I have never figured out how the RoQ format works on The 11th Hour, which was the game for which the RoQ format was initially developed. When I procured the game years ago, I remember finding what appeared to be RoQ files and shoving them through the open source decoders but not getting the right images out.

  I decided to dust off that old copy of The 11th Hour and have another go at it.

  
  
  

  Baseline
  The game consists of 4 CD-ROMs. Each disc has a media/ directory that has a series of files bearing the extension .gjd, likely the initials of one Graeme J. Devine. These are resource files which are merely headerless concatenations of other files. Thus, at first glance, one file might appear to be a single RoQ file. So that’s the source of some of the difficulty : Sending an apparent RoQ .gjd file through a RoQ player will often cause the program to complain when it encounters the header of another RoQ file.

  I have uploaded some samples to the usual place.

  However, even the frames that a player can decode (before encountering a file boundary within the resource file) look wrong.

  Investigating Codebooks Using dreamroq
  I wrote dreamroq last year– an independent RoQ playback library targeted towards embedded systems. I aimed it at a gjd file and quickly hit a codebook error.

  RoQ is a vector quantizer video codec that maintains a codebook of 256 2×2 pixel vectors. In the Quake III and later RoQ files, these are transported using a YUV 4:2:0 colorspace– 4 Y samples, a U sample, and a V sample to represent 4 pixels. This totals 6 bytes per vector. A RoQ codebook chunk contains a field that indicates the number of 2×2 vectors as well as the number of 4×4 vectors. The latter vectors are each comprised of 4 2×2 vectors.

  Thus, the total size of a codebook chunk ought to be (# of 2×2 vectors) * 6 + (# of 4×4 vectors) * 4.

  However, this is not the case with The 11th Hour RoQ files.

  Longer Codebooks And Mystery Colorspace
  Juggling the numbers for a few of the codebook chunks, I empirically determined that the 2×2 vectors are represented by 10 bytes instead of 6. Now I need to determine what exactly these 10 bytes represent.

  I should note that I suspect that everything else about these files lines up with successive generations of the format. For example if a file has 640×320 resolution, that amounts to 40×20 macroblocks. dreamroq iterates through 40×20 8×8 blocks and precisely exhausts the VQ bitstream. So that all looks valid. I’m just puzzled on the codebook format.

  Here is an example codebook dump :
  

  ID 0x1002, len = 0x0000014C, args = 0x1C0D
    0 : 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 80 80
    1 : 08 07 00 00 1F 5B 00 00 7E 81
    2 : 00 00 15 0F 00 00 40 3B 7F 84
    3 : 00 00 00 00 3A 5F 18 13 7E 84
    4 : 00 00 00 00 3B 63 1B 17 7E 85
    5 : 18 13 00 00 3C 63 00 00 7E 88
    6 : 00 00 00 00 00 00 59 3B 7F 81
    7 : 00 00 56 23 00 00 61 2B 80 80
    8 : 00 00 2F 13 00 00 79 63 81 83
    9 : 00 00 00 00 5E 3F AC 9B 7E 81
    10 : 1B 17 00 00 B6 EF 77 AB 7E 85
    11 : 2E 43 00 00 C1 F7 75 AF 7D 88
    12 : 6A AB 28 5F B6 B3 8C B3 80 8A
    13 : 86 BF 0A 03 D5 FF 3A 5F 7C 8C
    14 : 00 00 9E 6B AB 97 F5 EF 7F 80
    15 : 86 73 C8 CB B6 B7 B7 B7 85 8B
    16 : 31 17 84 6B E7 EF FF FF 7E 81
    17 : 79 AF 3B 5F FC FF E2 FF 7D 87
    18 : DC FF AE EF B3 B3 B8 B3 85 8B
    19 : EF FF F5 FF BA B7 B6 B7 88 8B
    20 : F8 FF F7 FF B3 B7 B7 B7 88 8B
    21 : FB FF FB FF B8 B3 B4 B3 85 88
    22 : F7 FF F7 FF B7 B7 B9 B7 87 8B
    23 : FD FF FE FF B9 B7 BB B7 85 8A
    24 : E4 FF B7 EF FF FF FF FF 7F 83
    25 : FF FF AC EB FF FF FC FF 7F 83
    26 : CC C7 F7 FF FF FF FF FF 7F 81
    27 : FF FF FE FF FF FF FF FF 80 80
  

  Note that 0x14C (the chunk size) = 332, 0x1C and 0x0D (the chunk arguments — count of 2×2 and 4×4 vectors, respectively) are 28 and 13. 28 * 10 + 13 * 4 = 332, so the numbers check out.

  Do you see any patterns in the codebook ? Here are some things I tried :

  • Treating the last 2 bytes as U & V and treating the first 4 as the 4 Y samples :
    
    
    
  • Treating the last 2 bytes as U & V and treating the first 8 as 4 16-bit little-endian Y samples :
    
    
    
  • Disregarding the final 2 bytes and treating the first 8 bytes as 4 RGB565 pixels (both little- and big-endian, respectively, shown here) :
    
    
    
  • Based on the type of data I’m seeing in these movies (which appears to be intended as overlays), I figured that some of these bits might indicate transparency ; here is 15-bit big-endian RGB which disregards the top bit of each pixel :
    
    
    

  These images are taken from the uploaded sample bdpuz.gjd, apparently a component of the puzzle represented in this screenshot.

  Unseen Types
  It has long been rumored that early RoQ files could contain JPEG images. I finally found one such specimen. One of the files bundled early in the uploaded fhpuz.gjd sample contains a JPEG frame. It’s a standard JFIF file and can easily be decoded after separating the bytes from the resource using ‘dd’. JPEGs serve as intraframes in the coding scheme, with successive RoQ frames moving objects on top.

  However, a new chunk type showed up as well, one identified by 0×1030. I have never encountered this type. Where could I possibly find data about this ? Fortunately, iD Games recently posted all of their open sourced games at Github. Reading through the code for their official RoQ decoder, I see that this is called a RoQ_PACKET. The name and the code behind it are both supremely unhelpful. The code is basically a no-op. The payloads of the various RoQ_PACKETs from one sample are observed to be either 8784, 14752, or 14760 bytes in length. It’s very likely that this serves the same purpose as the JPEG intraframes.

  Other Tidbits
  I read through the readme.txt on the first game disc and found this nugget :

          g)      Animations displayed normally or in SPOOKY MODE
                  SPOOKY MODE is blue-tinted grayscale with color cursors, puzzle
  
                  and game pieces.  It is the preferred display setting of the
  
                  developers at Trilobyte.  Just for fun, try out the SPOOKY
  
                  MODE.
  

  The MobyGames screenshot page has a number of screenshots labeled as being captured in spooky mode. Color tricks ?

  Meanwhile, another twist arose as I kept tweaking dreamroq to deal with more RoQ weirdness : After modifying my dreamroq code to handle these 10-byte vectors, it eventually chokes on another codebook. These codebooks happen to have 6-byte vectors again ! Fortunately, I was already working on a scheme to automatically detect which codebook is in play (plugging the numbers into a formula and seeing which vector size checks out).