Helix DNA is a project to produce
computer software that can play audio and video media in various formats and aid in producing such media. It is intended as a largely
free and open-source
Free and open-source software (FOSS) is a term used to refer to groups of software consisting of both free software and open-source software where anyone is freely licensed to use, copy, study, and change the software in any way, and the source ...
digital media framework that runs on numerous
operating systems and processors (including mobile phones) and was started by
RealNetworks
RealNetworks, Inc. is a provider of artificial intelligence and computer vision based products. RealNetworks was a pioneer in Internet streaming software and services. They are based in Seattle, Washington, United States. The company also p ...
which contributed much of the code. The Helix Community is an open collaborative effort to develop and extend the Helix DNA platform.
Helix DNA Client is a software package for multi-platform multi-format media playback. Helix Player is a
media player that runs on
Linux,
Solaris
Solaris may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Literature, television and film
* ''Solaris'' (novel), a 1961 science fiction novel by Stanisław Lem
** ''Solaris'' (1968 film), directed by Boris Nirenburg
** ''Solaris'' (1972 film), directed by ...
,
Symbian
Symbian is a discontinued mobile operating system
A mobile operating system is an operating system for mobile phones, tablets, smartwatches, smartglasses, or other non-laptop personal mobile computing devices. While computers such as typic ...
and
FreeBSD
FreeBSD is a free and open-source Unix-like operating system descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), which was based on Research Unix. The first version of FreeBSD was released in 1993. In 2005, FreeBSD was the most popular ...
and uses the Helix DNA Client.
The Helix DNA Producer application aids in the production of media files, and Helix DNA Server can
stream
A stream is a continuous body of water, body of surface water Current (stream), flowing within the stream bed, bed and bank (geography), banks of a channel (geography), channel. Depending on its location or certain characteristics, a stream ...
media files over a network.
Licenses
The code is released in binary and source code form under various licenses, notably the
proprietary RealNetworks Community Source License and the
free
Free may refer to:
Concept
* Freedom, having the ability to do something, without having to obey anyone/anything
* Freethought, a position that beliefs should be formed only on the basis of logic, reason, and empiricism
* Emancipate, to procur ...
and
open source
Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...
software
RealNetworks Public Source License. Additionally, the Helix DNA Client and the Helix Player are licensed under the popular
GNU General Public License (GPL) free and open source license.
Use of the
RDT, the default proprietary Real data transport, and of the
RealVideo
RealVideo, or also spelled as Real Video, is a suite of proprietary video compression formats developed by RealNetworks – the specific format changes with the version. It was first released in 1997 and was at version 10. RealVideo is supported ...
and
RealAudio codecs requires binary components distributed under the Helix DNA Technology Binary Research Use License.
Helix DNA Client
Helix DNA Client powers many digital media applications, including
RealPlayer for MS Windows, Mac OS and Linux (since version 10), RealPlayer Mobile, and Helix Player. It is used on
Nokia,
Motorola,
Samsung and
Sony Ericsson mobile phones. According to https://helixcommunity.org, 800 million mobile phones with the Helix client have been shipped since 2004. It is also being used in embedded devices like the
Internet Tablet OS from
Nokia, which is found on the
Nokia 770,
N800 and
N810 Internet Tablets.
Cingular Video is also based on the framework. Other projects that use the Helix framework include RealNetwork's
Rhapsody
Rhapsody may refer to:
* A work of epic poetry, or part of one, that is suitable for recitation at one time
** Rhapsode, a classical Greek professional performer of epic poetry
Computer software
* Rhapsody (online music service), an online m ...
online music service, the
Banshee and
Amarok
Amarok may refer to:
Music
* Amarok (band), a Spanish progressive rock band
* ''Amarok'' (Mike Oldfield album), 1990
* ''Amarok'' (Nargaroth album), 2000
* ''Amarok'', 2010 album by Francisco López (musician)
Other uses
* Amarok (wolf), in In ...
music players, and MediaReady 4000. Helix DNA also manifests itself as the RealPlayer on Mobile Internet Devices (MID) and on Netbooks.
Developers from the
Open Source Lab announced in 2007 they would use Helix technologies for content creation applications and collaboration in the
One Laptop Per Child project.
Helix DNA client contains support for the following media formats:
* Audio formats:
Vorbis,
AAC
AAC may refer to:
Aviation
* Advanced Aircraft, a company from Carlsbad, California
* Alaskan Air Command, a radar network
* American Aeronautical Corporation, a company from Port Washington, New York
* American Aviation, a company from Cleveland, ...
,
AAC+,
M4A,
MP3,
AMR-NB,
AMR-WB,
RealAudio,
WMA,
a-law,
u-law and audio containers
AIFF,
WAV,
AU
* Video formats:
Theora,
RealVideo
RealVideo, or also spelled as Real Video, is a suite of proprietary video compression formats developed by RealNetworks – the specific format changes with the version. It was first released in 1997 and was at version 10. RealVideo is supported ...
,
WMV,
H.263
H.263 is a video compression standard originally designed as a low-bit-rate compressed format for videotelephony. It was standardized by the ITU-T Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG) in a project ending in 1995/1996. It is a member of the H.26x fam ...
,
H.264,
VC-1,
H.261,
MJPEG and container formats RealMedia file format,
3GP
3GP (3GPP file format) is a multimedia container format defined by the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) for 3G UMTS multimedia services. It is used on 3G mobile phones but can also be played on some 2G and 4G phones.
3G2 (3GPP2 ...
, 3G2,
AVI
Avi is a given name, usually masculine, often a diminutive of Avram, Avraham, etc. It is sometimes feminine and a diminutive of the Hebrew spelling of Abigail.
People with the given name include:
* Avi (born 1937), Newbery award-winning Americ ...
,
ASF
* Description formats:
SMIL,
SDP
* Image formats:
JPEG
JPEG ( ) is a commonly used method of lossy compression for digital images, particularly for those images produced by digital photography. The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and imag ...
,
GIF
The Graphics Interchange Format (GIF; or , see pronunciation) is a bitmap image format that was developed by a team at the online services provider CompuServe led by American computer scientist Steve Wilhite and released on 15 June 1987. ...
,
PNG
* Protocols:
RTSP,
RTP,
HTTP,
Multicast,
RDT
Helix DNA Client for Android
Helix DNA Client for Android provides an HLS, MPEG-DASH, Verimatrix DRM and Microsoft PlayReady DRM media player for Android 2.2 to latest devices. Supporting H.264 and AAC codecs with Adaptive Bit Rate support (H.264 / AAC) including audio only. Armv7 and Armv6 supported using Stagefright media platform. Helix SDK is supplied as a library which is included within Android Java applications for over the air installation.
Helix DNA client contains support for the following media formats:
* Audio formats:
AAC
AAC may refer to:
Aviation
* Advanced Aircraft, a company from Carlsbad, California
* Alaskan Air Command, a radar network
* American Aeronautical Corporation, a company from Port Washington, New York
* American Aviation, a company from Cleveland, ...
,
RealAudio
* Video formats:
H.264,
RealVideo
RealVideo, or also spelled as Real Video, is a suite of proprietary video compression formats developed by RealNetworks – the specific format changes with the version. It was first released in 1997 and was at version 10. RealVideo is supported ...
and container formats RealMedia file format,
3GP
3GP (3GPP file format) is a multimedia container format defined by the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) for 3G UMTS multimedia services. It is used on 3G mobile phones but can also be played on some 2G and 4G phones.
3G2 (3GPP2 ...
* Protocols:
HLS (Version 4),
MPEG-DASH (
ISO BMFF MP4)
Helix DNA Server
The Helix DNA Server, first released on 22 January 2003, supports streaming of following formats:
* RealVideo, RealAudio (.rm, .ra, .rv)
* MP3
It supports streaming to any device or application that supports
HTTP,
RTSP/
RTP, TCP, UDP
unicast and UDP
multicast streaming protocols.
There is also a commercial version called Helix Server, which has more features and supports more media formats.
It was originally called the Helix Universal Server when it was announced in or before 2002.
Helix Player
It is based on the Helix DNA Client. It is available for Linux, Solaris, Symbian and FreeBSD. Users of Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X can use RealPlayer, which has similar capabilities.
Helix DNA Producer
It is a media encoding engine for creating streaming broadcasts, on-demand streaming content, and downloadable audio video files. The Helix DNA Producer runs on MS Windows, Linux and Mac OS X.
[Helix Community]
Helix Producer Category FAQ
Retrieved on 2009-08-02
The Helix DNA Producer contains output support for the following data types:
* RealAudio 10, 8, G2
* RealVideo 10, 9, 8, 7, G2
*
Ogg Vorbis
Developers who want
MP3 encoding can license the code from RealNetworks for a fee.
There is also an add-on package for Helix DNA Producer SDK with
AAC
AAC may refer to:
Aviation
* Advanced Aircraft, a company from Carlsbad, California
* Alaskan Air Command, a radar network
* American Aeronautical Corporation, a company from Port Washington, New York
* American Aviation, a company from Cleveland, ...
or
aacPlus encoding support.
Helix DNA Producer is also available in a commercial, closed-source version - RealProducer Plus for MS Windows and Linux.
RealProducer Plus Specifications
, Retrieved on 2009-08-02
See also
* Comparison of video player software
The following comparison of video players compares general and technical information for notable software media player programs.
For the purpose of this comparison, ''video players'' are defined as any media player which can play video, even ...
* RealNetworks
RealNetworks, Inc. is a provider of artificial intelligence and computer vision based products. RealNetworks was a pioneer in Internet streaming software and services. They are based in Seattle, Washington, United States. The company also p ...
* RealPlayer
References
External links
*
{{Compression software
Free media players
Linux media players
Multimedia frameworks
Symbian software
RealNetworks