From Hi-Fi to CLI [Bits Versus Electrons]

Abstract

I recently discovered FFMPEG. In itself, it’s not that special—another program for processing video. The significance comes from the context. I had just written a simple video server in JavaScript and discovered that I needed to convert the videos to formats that the browsers understood with different formats being required for different browsers. The first step was to find a program that could do the conversion. In fact, there are many for purchase and for free. I happened across FFMPEG when I wanted to add an automatic thumbnail feature to my site. I found the FFMPEG library and then discovered the command- line interface (CLI). I realized I could write simple command files to assist me in the conversions. Text commands using the keyboard have advantages over graphical user interfaces (GUIs) in making the actions more explicit. The command lines can be captured in files to be replayed later.