[FFmpeg-devel] OpenEXR update and question

[Gonzalo Garramuno]

As you might not know, there's a new version of the OpenEXR library.  
This version introduces a new compressing scheme from Dreamworks 
Animation which is really great.  It is patented but free to use as long 
as you use the openexr library.
I asked the owner of the patent whether it should be possible to 
re-implement the code in ffmpeg as part of exr.c.  The answer has been 
to rely on the openexr C API functions which are added on top of the C++ 
API code.  But it is not clear if this is even possible as there may be 
compiler trouble in Windows.  My guess is that if mingw compiles openexr 
it would link against a mingw ffmpeg just fine, but applications that 
use msvc would not be able to access the openexr functions.  If msvc 
compiles openexr, mingw ffmpeg would not know about them and would fail 
to link.
I am asking here if my reasoning is correct and what would the best 
approach be.  The author of the patent is not being unreasonable as he 
thinks that "as long as the code is used to read and write openexr 
files, all would be fine and an agreement might be found".