+
(Note: simply copied from + www.matroska.org.)
+ +Matroska aims to become THE Standard of Multimedia Container + Formats. It was derived from a project called MCF, but differentiates + from it significantly because it is based on EBML (Extensible Binary + Meta Language), a binary derivative of XML. EBML enables the Matroska + Development Team to gain significant advantages in terms of future + format extensibility, without breaking file support in old + parsers.
+ +If you need any more info please head over to Matroska's homepage.
+ +mkvmerge and mkvmerge GUI (or just mmg) are + two programs created by Moritz + Bunkus. They're part of the mkvtoolnix + package. mkvmerge can read a lot of different multimedia files + and put their contents into Matroska files. Unfortunately this is a + command line program, and not everyone is comfortable working on the + command line. This is where mkvmerge GUI comes into play. It is + a GUI that provides the user with an intuitive but powerful interface + to mkvmerge.
+ +Both programs are available for both Windows and GNU/Linux and + other Unix derivatives. The program is licensed under the GPL, so the + source code is available to anyone interested.
+ +You can always find the latest version of mkvtoolnix on + Moritz Bunkus' + website. Windows users will have to download the runtime DLLs as + well as the mkvtoolnix binaries. Linux/Unix users will probably + download the sources and compile mkvtoolnix themselves.
+ +This guide only focusses on the GUI part of these tools. All + command line options are explained in detail in mkvmerge's man + page/HTML page.
+ +(Note: This section does not cover compilation and
+ installation. mkvmerge's own documentation and the
+ README files that are included in the mkvtoolnix
+ package.)
The only thing that mmg needs to know is the location of the + mkvmerge binary. Under normal circumstances it will be found + automatically. But if not then you can select the binary to use on the + Settings tab.
+ +mkvmerge strictly differentiates between files and + tracks. An input file usually contains one or more + tracks. mkvmerge needs at least one input file and the + file name of the Matroska file it should create before it can do any + work. Starting with this minimal set of options the user can add more + input files, select advanced options for each track, apply some more + global options etc.
+ +The typical basic steps are:
+
When mmg starts up it shows the first and probably most + important tab: the input tab. Here you see four different + elements. The topmost input box lists all input files. Directly + under this box are options that apply to the currently selected input + file.
+ +The two buttons to the right of the upper list box can be used to + add files to the list box with the + button and to remove the + selected entry with the - button.
+ +Once the user selects an input file in the upper list box + the second list box will contains all tracks that can be read + from this file. For each of these tracks the user can select + track specific options with the input boxes and check boxes below the + track listing. These options will be described in the following + sections.
+ +Once the user has added and selected an input file he can set
+ options that apply to this specific file. At the moment only one such
+ option has been implemented: No chapters. If this option
+ is checked then mkvmerge will not try to copy chapters from
+ this source file. More information about chapters can be found in the
+ section about the chapter
+ editor in this document and in mkvmerge's own
+ documentation.
Depending on the type of the currently selected track (audio,
+ video, subtitles) and even depending on the contents of the track only
+ a subset of all the track specific options are availbale. The options
+ are:
+
+
Language: The user can select the language for each
+ track regardless of its type. This language is coded in the ISO639-2
+ language code. The drop-down box contains all ISO639-2 codes so the
+ user does not have to worry about selecting the wrong language
+ code.Track name: The user can set a name for the current
+ track. This name is a free-form string. Practical examples could be
+ 'director's comments' or 'aeriel view of Seattle'. Note that these
+ names are not meant to contain the movie title!Cues: The cues are for Matroska what the
+ index is for AVI files. They contain links to the key
+ frames. Usually this option should be left on the value
+ 'default'. mkvmerge will automatically chose the best method
+ for any given track type. A full explanantion of tracks can be found
+ in mkvmerge's documentation.Aspect ratio: With this option the user can set the
+ aspect ratio that should be used upon playback. It defaults to the
+ aspect ratio that the movie was encoded with but can be changed,
+ e.g. for anamorphic encodings. The GUI expects the format to be
+ either a floating point number (e.g. '2.33') or a fraction
+ (e.g. '16/9').
+ FourCC: Matroska does not normally store the FourCC
+ which is used in other containers to identify the codec
+ used. Matroska has its own format, called CodecID, but it
+ also has an AVI compatibility mode. In thise mode the FourCC is also
+ stored. With this option the FourCC can be forced to a different
+ value. However, you cannot change the CodecID used by
+ mkvmerge.
+ Delay (in ms): In some cases audio and video are
+ not synchronized properly. With this option the user can offset the
+ audio track by a given amount, either positive or
+ negative. mkvmerge will either remove samples at the
+ beginning or insert silence at the beginning to adjust the track.
+ Stretch by: In some cases audio and video slowly
+ drift apart during playback. This can be fixed by supplying a factor
+ of how much the timecodes should be stretched by mkvmerge. If
+ nothing is given then '1.0' is assumed which does not alter the
+ timecodes. Please note that this option has not been implemented for
+ all audio track types yet.
+ Subtitle charset: Some text subtitle formats do not
+ store the charset that they were creted with. This is important
+ because text subtitles are auomatically converted to the UTF-8
+ charset during muxing. mkvmerge will normally assume that the
+ system's current charset is the same that the subtitle file was
+ written in. But in case this is not true the user can select the
+ correct charset.
+ Make default track: Matroska knows a flag which
+ tells the player that a specific track should be preferred upon
+ playback if the user does not chose another one. Of course each
+ track type has its own default track - e.g. the default audio
+ track is the English one, and the default subtitle track is the
+ French one. If no track is set to be the default track then
+ mkvmerge will promote the first track of each type that it
+ finds to be the default track. This is consistent with the behaviour
+ of various media players.AAC is SBR/HE-AAC/AAC+: The new technology called
+ 'high efficiency AAC' has some drawbacks when it is being stored in
+ .AAC files: it is not possible to detect the HE-AAC
+ part for these files. Therefore the user has to check this option
+ manually if it applies. Please note that this problem does not exist
+ for HE-AAC stored in .MP4 files.