Sustainability of Digital Formats
 Planning for Library of Congress Collections

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Identification and description

Full name	Indeo Video Codec, Version 3
Description	Bitstream encoding for video, originally developed by Intel. John McGowan states that Indeo 3 employs vector quantization. Before being supplanted by later versions, Windows implementations were distributed by Ligos Corporation and Mac versions by Apple. Versions 3.1 and 3.2 are both covered by this document. Indeo versions 4 and 5 (Indeo_5) compress by means of wavelet transforms rather than vector quantization; nevertheless, they are listed as later versions below. As of December 2007, only version 4.4 (limited to OS 9) was being offered by Apple.
Production phase	Generally used as an end-user delivery format.
Relationship to other formats
Used by	AVI_Indeo, AVI, Indeo Codec
Used by	QuickTime, Indeo Codec (not documented at this time)
Has later version	Indeo Video Codec, Version 4 (not documented at this time)
Has later version	Indeo_5, Indeo Video Codec, Version 5

Local use

LC experience or existing holdings
LC preference

Sustainability factors

Disclosure	Proprietary standard with some public documentation
Documentation	Documentation
Adoption	Apparently widespread.
Licensing and patents	Indeo codecs and software may be licensed from Ligos Corporation; some information in Ligos Indeo FAQ.
Transparency	Depends upon algorithms and tools to read; will require sophistication to build tools.
Self-documentation	Not applicable; provided by wrapper formats.
External dependencies	None.
Technical protection considerations	Ligos Corporation FAQ states that developers can assign access keys to video files to protect them. These or additional protections may [also?] be provided by wrapper formats.

Quality and functionality factors

Moving Image
Normal rendering	Not applicable
Clarity (high image resolution)	Moderate, given this is a compression format.
Functionality beyond normal rendering	Not applicable.

File type signifiers

Tag	Value	Note
Filename extension	n/a
Internet Media Type	n/a
Magic numbers	n/a
Microsoft FOURCC	IV31, IV32	Used when this codec is wrapped in Microsoft file formats, e.g., AVI and ASF; see the Microsoft registry, which also lists a number of additional IV FOURCCs. John McGowan states that IV32 is generally used for Indeo 3; IV41 for Indeo 4, and IV50 for Indeo 5.

Notes

General
History

Format specifications

• See Disclosure under Sustainability factors.

Useful references

URLs

• Indeo product information (http://www.ligos.com). from the Ligos Corporation
• FAQ (http://ligos.com/pdf_docs/Indeo_FAQ.pdf). from the Ligos Corporation
• Documentation (http://ligos.com/pdf_docs/Indeo_doc.pdf). from the Ligos Corporation
• John McGowan's AVI Overview: Audio and Video Codecs (http://www.jmcgowan.com/avicodecs.html). .
• Microsoft registry (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa372553.aspx). of FOURCC codes and WAVE format indicators dated 2003. The archived 2001 version of this registry is at http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/archive/fourcc.mspx.