[linux-minidisc] Google Summer of Code 2011 - Students wanted

[Adrian Glaubitz <glaubitz@physik.fu-berlin.de>]

Dear linux-minidisc mailing list followers,

as you've might read on your favorite news website for IT news, Google is organizing
another Google Summer of Code this year. For all of you who don't know what
GSoC is, you might be interested to read the respective article on Wikipedia [1].

The linux-minidisc project is applying for a sponsorship for this years' GSoC like
we did last year, however, we have little hope that we will be chosen as a participating
project since we didn't have any luck last year. The reason is probably the lack
of popularity of MiniDisc among Linux and open source software users.

However, there is still a way this years' GSoC can make a contribution to the MiniDisc
support on Linux. It's actually about VLC, the free and open source media player
developed by the VideoLAN project [2]. VLC, through ffmpeg, currently supports
playback of ATRAC-SP and ATRAC3 audio, ATRAC3+ is currently work-in-progress.

The current problem with playback of ATRAC audio files in VLC is the fact, that ATRAC
audio files (*.oma) can be encrypted. A well-known problem among the users of
the infamous original Sony software SonicStage [3]. SonicStage stores all your
audio content as encrypted *.oma files on your hard disk. These encrypted audio
files can only be played back in SonicStage and only if a set of keys which SonicStage
stores in it's program folder are present. These keys can very easily get lost and once
they are, one usually has no means of playing back the encrypted *.oma files. The
real irony about this encryption is that it is even used for your own recordings made
with a MiniDisc Walkman and transferred to the computer using SonicStage. So
one has to be very careful not to lose these keys. Unfortunately that happens
very often to users of SonicStage, especially when they had to reinstall their
Windows or bought a new computer and backed up the *.oma files only (most
people don't actually know about the keys). So, after a hard disk crash or
reinstallation of Windows, the *.oma files are usually lost, since they cannot be
decrypted anymore.

Luckily, we have recently discovered a way to decrypt all *.oma audio files with a generic
key. We have a proof of concept using some commands in the Linux command
shell (bash) which will eventually decrypt an encrypted *.oma file. We have shown
this technique to the guys at VideoLAN and they happen to be interested in
getting this code into VLC so that VLC will always be able to decrypt and playback
any *.oma audio file, independent of the fact whether the keys from SonicStage
were backed up and are available or not.

For this reason, the VideoLAN project is now looking for an endowed student programmer
who'd be willing to implement that decryption algorithm with the help of a mentor
for VLC. In order to qualify as a student for Google Summer of Code, you
have to be enrolled as a regular student at a university, otherwise Google will
not pay you and the mentor for the project. Of course, you should have sufficient
skills in C/C++ programming and also have some experience in writing code
for larger projects, especially free and open source software.

The reward upon completing the task for VideoLAN, thus creating a working
decryptor for VLC, will be rewarded by Google with US$ 5000.

If interested, drop me an email directly and I will get you into contact with
the VideoLAN developers so we can discuss the details.


Regards,

Adrian

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GSoC
[2] http://www.videolan.org/
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SonicStage