Cisco announces plans to open-source its H.264 codec, Mozilla promises to include it in Firefox for WebRTC use
Cisco and Mozilla today made a joint announcement that will see the popular codec H.264 opened up to the broader Web. Cisco plans to open source its H.264 codec for WebRTC, while Mozilla is in turn promising to include in future versions of Firefox.
H.264 has been the industry standard for years, but it unfortunately requires royalty payments to MPEG LA under terms that prevent distributing it with open source products. By open-sourcing its H.264 codec, and providing it as a binary module that can be downloaded for free from the Internet, Cisco is choosing not to pass on its MPEG LA licensing costs, effectively making H.264 free for use in WebRTC.
For those who don’t know, WebRTC enables real-time communication (such as videoconferencing) in the browser without installing any plugins. It consists of three independent components: getUserMedia (provides access to the user’s webcam and microphone), PeerConnection (sets up calls with the ability to traverse NATs and firewalls), and DataChannels (establishes peer-to-peer data communication between browsers).
“It hasn’t been easy, but Mozilla has helped to lead the industry toward interoperable video on the Web,” Brendan Eich, Mozilla Chief Technology Officer, said in a statement. “Cisco’s announcement helps us support H.264 in Firefox on most operating systems, and in downstream and other open source distributions using the Cisco H.264 binary module. We are excited to work with Cisco on advancing the state of interoperable Web video.”
See also – WebRTC plus Social API: Mozilla demoes browser sharing in Firefox like you’ve never seen it before and Google and Mozilla show off video chat between Chrome and Firefox thanks to WebRTC support
Top Image Credit: Eastop
