[Asterisk-Users] Open G.729A codec

[Steve Underwood]

Eric Wieling wrote:

>On Tue, 2003-08-12 at 15:37, Mark Spencer wrote:
>  
>
>>>Couldn't agree more. The G.729 codec is so unDigium-like... don't buy
>>>it is my recommendation.
>>>      
>>>
>>I don't think anybody buys G.729 just to have it.  They buy it because
>>they *have* to have it.  And we sell it because they *have* to have it.  I
>>think eventually we'll be able to come up with a better (but not, for the
>>near future, open) G.729 solution from us.
>>    
>>
>
>What is the "license" for?  The actual binary module or for the patented
>codec?  If it's for the codec, then why can't you get a license from
>voiceage and then use your own code.  As you said it's available from
>the ITU.
>
I have no idea why VoiceAge want to protect the code as they do. The 
code isn't interesting to licence. Its the pool of patents you really 
need to licence, and that is bundled with the VoiceAge codec. I don't 
know if they indemnify their licencees with regard to other patent 
holders crawling out of the woodwork with fresh claims on G.729, but 
they do include a licence for the known patents. Believe VoiceAge have 
some kind of exclusive pool licencing rights. I'm not clear how this 
works, though.

The ITU G.729 code is pretty much useless for real world use. It is very 
slow. It gets the right answers, but not by efficient means. All the 
voice codec reference code I have seen is like this. The people who 
develop these things *have* to write an efficient version, as standards 
bodies demand to know the approximate MIPS a good implementation will 
require. The implementors do not release this version as the reference 
model. I've been through this from the codec developer's side. The 
reference model may be 10 or more times slower than a commercial grade 
implementation. I've no idea what the ratio might be for G.729.

If someone produced a good open implementation of G.729, then it might 
be interesting to see how much the patents could be licenced for. The 
usual problem with these pooling things is they offer you two deals: One 
is US$many per port for one port up. The other is US$little per port for 
larger volumes, but you need to pay a one off fee of US$100,000 (or 
something on that scale) up front.

Regards,
Steve