Suggestion: new Opus subforum in Lossy Codecs Options

[jensend]

A few of the reasons for a dedicated Opus subforum:

• The vast majority of the posts in "Other Lossy Codecs" over the past year have been Opus-related.
• Across the forums, overall, Opus-related posts clearly outnumber those related to several other codecs which have their own dedicated forums (Vorbis, MPC, WavPack), and the post traffic is comparable to that for the most popular codecs (MP3, AAC, FLAC).
• Due to the RFC, the WebRTC MTI, the organizations backing it, etc it's clear Opus is not just a fad-of-the-day but is going to have some staying power.
• NullC &co have had to keep repeating instructions and caveats for prospective testers and for those making and distributing builds. Collecting these in a sticky thread in an Opus forum would make these much more visible, lessen the need to keep repeating material and keep correcting the same misconceptions, and thus alleviate frustrations.
• With a dedicated subforum, I think people would be more inclined to start new threads for new Opus-related discussions, which is more manageable than when tons of tangentially-related discussions are all packed into one >500 post thread.

[CiTay]

I'll discuss this with some of our team, it doesn't seem like a bad idea. Feel free to come up with a sticky thread if/when we add the subforum. Probably the easiest way to have an up-to-date sticky is by linking to the Wiki page, which needs some work first.

In the same instant, I don't see the point for subforums like "MPC Musepack" which see very little traffic. Back in the day this might've been different. I'd suggest to merge those threads together with "other lossy codecs".

The MPC section was kept mostly for archival reasons, since the official Musepack forum opened in 2008. It's more or less deliberately inactive since then. Deleting it would be a shame, for there is much knowledge hidden in there (not just MPC-related), and dissolving it into "other lossy" would make no sense. I moved it to the bottom of the list now though.

[Dynamic]

I'll discuss this with some of our team, it doesn't seem like a bad idea. Feel free to come up with a sticky thread if/when we add the subforum. Probably the easiest way to have an up-to-date sticky is by linking to the Wiki page, which needs some work first.

I've updated the Wiki / Knowledgebase page subtantially, and although it's not fully backed up TOS#8 style, it's in accord roughly with published listening test and sources and the tables included may be a useful starting point for users to do their own tests for their own purposes and look at competitive rival codecs.

Any improvements are welcome.

I notice that there's no automation in the Knowledgebase index articles, so the Opus article (like many others) does not appear under Technical/Codecs or Lossy/Codec or similar menus. In fact there seem to be a number of articles that aren't easily found by browsing unless you search for them (I think lossyWAV is another)