[vlc-devel] Can anyone tell me why this patch was done?

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

On Wed, 19 Aug 2009 12:27:05 +0200, Jean-Baptiste Besnard
<jbbesnard at actech-innovation.com> wrote:
> I tried medialistplayer too but it seems quite unstable.

Yes. The whole idea is dead born due to excessive complexity. Even if
LibVLC were implemented "right" (if at all possible), there is almost zero
chance that LibVLC-based application would get it right, because thread
safety and event handling w.r.t. the playlist.

> As to me the media_player should have a working playlist
> at the API level as it is quite a basic functionality
> but this would involve more work.

I completely disagree. Implementing a private playlist is a lot simpler for
a UI "front-end" to LibVLC, than synchronizing the UI with the LibVLC
playlist. The countless playlist related remaining or recently fixed bugs
in the various VLC built-in interfaces, and the complexity of the VLC
playlist code proves the point.

It is a LOT simpler to push the next item when the previous item ends. In
fact, the reason why LibVLC provides a media list abstraction is to support
service discovery and playlist file parsing. But it has failed miserably.

-- 
Rémi Denis-Courmont