mkvtoolnix/doc/mkvmerge.1

.TH MKVMERGE "1" "August 2005" "mkvmerge v1.5.5" "User Commands"


.SH NAME
mkvmerge \- Merge multimedia streams into a Matroska file


.SH SYNOPSIS
.B mkvmerge
[\fIglobal options\fR] \-o \fIout\fR [\fIoptions1\fR] <file1> [[\fIoptions2\fR] <file2> ...] [@optionsfile]


.SH DESCRIPTION
.LP
This program takes the input from several media files and joins
their streams (all of them or just a selection) into a Matroska file.
.UR http://www.matroska.org/
<http://www.matroska.org/>
.UE


.LP
Global options:
.TP
\fB\-v\fR, \fB\-\-verbose\fR
Increase verbosity.
.TP
\fB\-q\fR, \fB\-\-quiet\fR
Suppress status output.
.TP
\fB\-o\fR, \fB\-\-output\fR \fIout\fR
Write to the file '\fIout\fR'.
If splitting is used then this parameter is treated a bit differently.
See the \fB\-\-split\fR parameter discussion for details.
.TP
\fB\-\-title\fR <\fItitle\fR>
Sets the general title for the output file, e.g. the movie name.
.TP
\fB\-\-global\-tags\fR <\fIfile\fR>
Read global tags from the XML \fIfile\fR. See the section about tags
below for details.
.TP
\fB\-\-default\-language\fR <\fIlng\fR>
Sets the default language code. Unless overridden with the \fB\-\-language\fR
option this language code will be used. The default language code is 'und'
for 'undefined'.

.LP
Chapter handling: (global options)
.TP
\fB\-\-chapter\-language\fR <\fIlanguage\fR>
Sets the ISO639-2 language code that is written for each chapter entry. Applies
only to simple chapter files. Defaults to "eng". See the section about chapters
below for details.
.TP
\fB\-\-chapter\-charset\fR <\fIcharset\fR>
Sets the charset that is used for the conversion to UTF-8 for simple chapter
files.
Defaults to the current system locale.
This switch does also apply to chapters that are copied from an Ogg/OGM file.
See the section about chapters below for details.
.TP
\fB\-\-cue\-chapter\-name\-format\fR <\fIformat\fR>
\fBmkvmerge\fR supports reading CUE sheets for audio files as the input for
chapters. CUE sheets usually contain the entries \fIPERFORMER\fR and
\fITITLE\fR for each index entry. \fBmkvmerge\fR uses these two strings
in order to construct the chapter name. With this option the format used
for this name can be set. The following meta characters are supported:
.br
\fB%p\fR is replaced by the current entry's \fIPERFORMER\fR string,
.br
\fB%t\fR is replaced by the current entry's \fITITLE\fR string,
.br
\fB%n\fR is replaced by the current track number and
.br
\fB%N\fR is replaced by the current track number padded with a leading zero if
it is < 10.
.br
Everything else is copied as-is.
.br
If this option is not given then \fBmkvmerge\fR defaults to the
format '\fI%p - %t\fR' (the performer, followed by a space, a dash,
another space and the title).
.TP
\fB\-\-chapters <\fIfile\fR>
Read chapter information from the \fIfile\fR. See the section about chapters
below for details.

.LP
General output control (advanced global options):
.TP
\fB\-\-track\-order\fR <\fIFID1:TID1\fR[,\fIFID2:TID2\fR,...]>
This option changes the order in which the tracks for an input file are
created. The argument is a comma separated list of pairs IDs. Each pair
contains first the file ID which is simply the number of the file on the
command line starting at 0. The second is a track ID from that file.
If some track IDs are omitted then those tracks are created after the
ones given with this option have been created.
.TP
\fB\-\-cluster\-length \fR \fIn[ms]\fR
Put at most \fIn\fR data blocks into each cluster. If the number is
postfixed with 'ms' then put at most \fIn\fR milliseconds of data into
each cluster. The maximum length for a cluster is 32767ms. Programs will
only be able to seek to clusters, so creating larger clusters may lead to
imprecise seeking and/or processing.
.TP
\fB\-\-no\-cues\fR
Tells \fBmkvmerge\fR not to create and write the cue data which can be compared
to an index in an AVI. Matroska files can be played back without the cue
data, but seeking will probably be imprecise and slower. Use this only if
you're really desperate for space or for testing purposes. See also option
\fB\-\-cues\fR which can be specified for each input file.
.TP
\fB\-\-no\-clusters\-in\-meta\-seek\fR
Tells \fBmkvmerge\fR not to create a meta seek element at the end of the file
containing all clusters. See also the section about \fBMATROSKA FILE LAYOUT\fR.
.TP
\fB\-\-disable\-lacing\fR
Disables lacing for all tracks. This will increase the file's size, especially
if there are many audio tracks. This option is not intended for everyday use.
.TP
\fB\-\-enable\-durations\fR
Write durations for all blocks. This will increase file size and does not
offer any additional value for players at the moment.
.TP
\fB\-\-timecode\-scale\fR <\fIn\fR>
Forces the timecode scale factor to \fIn\fR.
Valid values are in the range 1000..10000000 or the value -1.
Normally \fBmkvmerge\fR will use a value of 1000000 which
means that timecodes and durations will have a precision of 1ms.
For files that will not contain a video track but at least one audio
track \fBmkvmerge\fR will automatically chose a timecode scale factor so
that all timecodes and durations have a precision of one sample.
This causes bigger overhead but allows precise seeking and extraction.
If the magical value -1 is used then \fBmkvmerge\fR will use sample precision
even if a video track is present.

.LP
File splitting and linking (more global options):
.TP
\fB\-\-split\fR size:<\fId[k|m|g]\fR> or shorter \fB\-\-split\fR <\fId[k|m|g]\fR>
.TP
\fB\-\-split\fR duration:<\fIHH:MM:SS.nnnnnnnnn\fR|\fIn\fRs> or shorter \fB\-\-split\fR <\fIHH:MM:SS.nnnnnnnnn\fR|\fIn\fRs>
.TP
\fB\-\-split\fR timecodes:\fIA\fR[,\fIB\fR[,\fIC\fR...]]
Splits the output file after a given size or a given time.
At the moment \fBmkvmerge\fR supports three different modes.
.br
1. Splitting by size.
.br
The parameter \fId\fR may end with \fBk\fR, \fBm\fR or \fBg\fR to indicate
that the size is in KB, MB or GB respectively.
Otherwise a size in Bytes is assumed.
After the current output file has reached this size limit a new one will
be started.
The \fBsize:\fR prefix may be omitted for compatibility reasons.
.br
2. Splitting after a duration.
.br
The paramter must have the form \fIHH:MM:SS.nnnnnnnnn\fR for specifying the
duration in up to nano-second precision or a number \fIn\fR followed by the
letter 's' for the duration in seconds.
"HH" is the number of hours, "MM" the number of minutes, "SS" the number
of seconds and "nnnnnnnnn" the number of nanoseconds.
Both the number of hours and the number of nanoseconds can be omitted.
There can be up to nine digits after the decimal point.
After the duration of the contents in the current output has reached this limit
a new output file will be started.
The \fBduration:\fR prefix may be omitted for compatibility reasons.
.br
3. Splitting after specific timecodes.
.br
The parameters \fIA\fR, \fIB\fR etc must all have the same format as the ones
used for the duration (see above).
The list of timecodes is separated by commas.
After the current file has reached the current split point's timecode a new
file is created.
Then the next split point given in this list is used.
The \fRtimecodes:\fR prefix must not be omitted.
.br
For this splitting mode the output filename is treated differently than for
the normal operation. It may contain a printf like expression '%d' including
an optional field width, e.g. '%02d'. If it does then the current file number
will be formatted appropriately and inserted at that point in the filename.
If there is no such pattern then a pattern of '-%03d' is assumed right before
the file's extension: '-o output.mkv' would result in 'output-001.mkv' and
so on. If there's no extension then '-%03d' will be appended to the name.
.TP
\fB\-\-split\-max\-files\fR <\fIn\fR>
Create at most \fIn\fR files, even if the last file will be longer or larger
than indicated by \fB\-\-split\fR.
.TP
\fB\-\-link\fR
Link files to one another when splitting the output file. See the
section \fBFILE LINKING\fR below for details.
.TP
\fB\-\-link\-to\-previous\fR <\fISID\fR>
Links the first output file to the segment with the given \fISID\fR. See the
section \fBFILE LINKING\fR below for details.
.TP
\fB\-\-link\-to\-next\fR <\fISID\fR>
Links the last output file to the segment with the given \fISID\fR. See the
section \fBFILE LINKING\fR below for details.

.LP
Attachment support (more global options):
.TP
\fB\-\-attachment\-description\fR <\fIdescription\fR>
Plain text description of the following attachment. Applies to the next
\fB\-\-attach\-file\fR or \fB\-\-attach\-file\-once\fR command.
.TP
\fB\-\-attachment\-mime\-type\fR <\fIMIME type\fR>
MIME type of the following attachment. Applies to the next
\fB\-\-attach\-file\fR or \fB\-\-attach\-file\-once\fR command.
A list of officially recognized MIME types can be found e.g. at
.UR ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/iana/assignments/media-types/media-types
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/iana/assignments/media-types/media-types>
The MIME type is mandatory for an attachment.
.TP
\fB\-\-attach\-file\fR <\fIfile name\fR>
.TP
\fB\-\-attach\-file\-once\fR <\fIfile name\fR>
Creates a file attachment inside the Matroska file. The MIME type must have
been set before this option can used. The difference between the two forms
is that during splitting the files attached with \fB\-\-attach\-file\fR are
attached to all output files while the ones attached with
\fB\-\-attach\-file\-once\fR are only attached to the first file created.
If splitting is not used then both do the same.
.br
\fBmkvextract\fR can be used to extract attached files from a Matroska file.
.br
\fBNote:\fR If an input file is a Matroska file then the attached files will
not be copied to the output file(s). This may change in the future.


.LP
Options that can be used for each input file:
.TP
\fB\-a\fR, \fB\-\-atracks\fR <\fIn\fR,\fIm\fR,...>
Copy the audio tracks \fIn\fR, \fIm\fR etc. The numbers are track IDs which
can be obtained with the \fB\-\-identify\fR switch. They're \fBnot\fR simply
the track numbers (see section \fBTRACK IDS\fR). Default: copy all audio
tracks.
.TP
\fB\-d\fR, \fB\-\-vtracks\fR <\fIn\fR,\fIm\fR,...>
Copy the video tracks \fIn\fR, \fIm\fR etc. The numbers are track IDs which
can be obtained with the \fB\-\-identify\fR switch (see
section \fBTRACK IDS\fR). They're \fBnot\fR simply
the track numbers. Default: copy all video tracks.
.TP
\fB\-s\fR, \fB\-\-stracks\fR <\fIn\fR,\fIm\fR,...>
Copy the subtitle tracks \fIn\fR, \fIm\fR etc. The numbers are track IDs which
can be obtained with the \fB\-\-identify\fR switch (see
section \fBTRACK IDS\fR). They're \fBnot\fR simply
the track numbers. Default: copy all subtitle tracks.
.TP
\fB\-b\fR, \fB\-\-btracks\fR <\fIn\fR,\fIm\fR,...>
Copy the button tracks \fIn\fR, \fIm\fR etc.
The numbers are track IDs which can be obtained with the \fB\-\-identify\fR
switch (see section \fBTRACK IDS\fR).
They're \fBnot\fR simply the track numbers.
Default: copy all button tracks.
.TP
\fB\-A\fR, \fB\-\-noaudio\fR
Don't copy any audio track from this file.
.TP
\fB\-D\fR, \fB\-\-novideo\fR
Don't copy any video track from this file.
.TP
\fB\-S\fR, \fB\-\-nosubs\fR
Don't copy any subtitle track from this file.
.TP
\fB\-B\fR, \fB\-\-nobuttons\fR
Don't copy any button track from this file.
.TP
\fB\-\-no\-chapters\fR
If the source is a Matroska file then don't copy chapters from it.
.TP
\fB\-\-no\-attachments\fR
If the source is a Matroska file then don't copy attachments from it.
.TP
\fB\-\-no\-tags\fR
If the source is a Matroska file then don't copy tags from it.
.TP
\fB\-y\fR, \fB\-\-sync\fR <\fITID\fR:\fId\fR[,\fIo\fR[/\fIp\fR]]>
Synchronize manually, delay the audio track with the id \fITID\fR by \fId\fR
ms. The track IDs are the same as the ones given with \fB\-\-identify\fR (see
section \fBTRACK IDS\fR).
.br
\fId\fR > 0: Pad with silent samples.
.br
\fId\fR < 0: Remove samples from the beginning.
.br
\fIo\fR/\fIp\fR: adjust the timestamps by \fIo\fR/\fIp\fR to fix
linear drifts. \fIp\fR defaults to 1000 if omitted. Both \fIo\fR and
\fIp\fR can be floating point numbers.
.br
Defaults: no manual sync correction (which is the same as \fId\fR = 0 and
\fIo\fR/\fIp\fR = 1.0).
.br
This option can be used multiple times for an input file applying to several
tracks by selecting different track IDs each time.
.TP
\fB\-\-delay\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIx\fR>
The delay to apply to the packets of the track by simply adjusting the
timecodes.
The argument \fIx\fR must be postfixed with \fBs\fR, \fBms\fR, \fBus\fR or
\fBns\fR to specify seconds, milliseconds, microseconds and nanoseconds
respectively.
.TP
\fB\-\-cues\fR <\fITID\fR:\fInone\fR|\fIiframes\fR|\fIall\fR>
Controls for which tracks cue (index) entries are created for the given track
(see section \fBTRACK IDS\fR). \fInone\fR inhibits the creation of cue entries.
For \fIiframes\fR only blocks with no backward or forward
references ( = I frames in video tracks) are put into the cue sheet. \fIall\fR
causes \fBmkvmerge\fR to create cue entries for all blocks which will make
the file very big.
.br
The default is \fIiframes\fR for video tracks and \fInone\fR for all others.
See also option \fB\-\-no\-cues\fR which inhibits the creation of cue
entries regardless of the \fB\-\-cues\fR options used.
.br
This option can be used multiple times for an input file applying to several
tracks by selecting different track IDs each time.
.TP
\fB\-\-default\-track\fR <\fITID\fR>
Sets the 'default' flag for the given track (see section \fBTRACK IDS\fR).
If the user does not explicitly select a track himself then the player should
prefer the track that has his 'default' flag set. Only one track of each kind
(audio, video, subtitles, buttons) can have his 'default' flag set.
.br
This option can be used multiple times for an input file applying to several
tracks by selecting different track IDs each time.
.TP
\fB\-\-blockadd\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIlevel\fR>
Keep only the BlockAdditions up to this \fIlevel\fR for the given track.
The default is to keep all levels.
This option only affects certain kinds of codecs like WAVPACK4.
.TP
\fB\-\-track\-name\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIname\fR>
Sets the track name for the given track (see section \fBTRACK IDS\fR) to
\fIname\fR.
.TP
\fB\-\-language\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIlanguage\fR>
Sets the language for the given track (see section \fBTRACK IDS\fR). Both
ISO639-2 language codes and ISO639-1 country codes are allowed. The country
codes will be converted to language codes automatically.
All languages including their ISO639-2 codes can be
listed with the \fB\-\-list\-languages\fR option.
.br
This option can be used multiple times for an input file applying to several
tracks by selecting different track IDs each time.
.TP
\fB\-t\fR, \fB\-\-tags\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIfile\fR>
Read tags for the track with the number \fITID\fR from the \fIfile\fR. See
the section about tags below for details.
.TP
\fB\-\-aac\-is\-sbr\fR <\fITID\fR>
Tells \fBmkvmerge\fR that the track with the ID \fITID\fR is SBR AAC (also
known as HE-AAC or AAC+). This options is needed if a) the source file is an
AAC file (NOT for a Matroska file) and b) the AAC file contains SBR AAC data.
The reason for this switch is that it is technically impossible to
automatically tell normal AAC data from SBR AAC data without decoding a
complete AAC frame. As there are several patent issues with AAC decoders I
won't implement this decoding stage. So for SBR AAC files this switch is
mandatory. The resulting file might not play back correctly or even not at
all if the switch was omitted.
.br
If the source file is a Matroska file then the CodecID should be enough to
detect SBR AAC. However, if the CodecID is wrong then this switch can be used
to correct that.
.TP
\fB\-\-timecodes\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIfilename\fR>
Read the timecodes to be used for the specific track ID from \fIfilename\fR.
These timecodes forcefully override the timecodes that \fBmkvmerge\fR
normally calculates. Read the section about \fBEXTERNAL TIMECODE FILES\fR.
.TP
\fB\-\-default\-duration\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIx\fR>
Forces the default duration of a given track to the specified value.
The argument \fIx\fR must be postfixed with \fBs\fR, \fBms\fR, \fBus\fR or
\fBns\fR to specify the default duration in seconds, milliseconds,
microseconds and nanoseconds respectively.
.br
This argument is mainly useful for debugging purposes and should normally
not be used.
If the default duration is not forced then mkvmerge will try to derive the
track's default duration from the container and/or codec used.
.TP
\fB\-\-append\-to\fR <\fISFID1:STID1:DFID1:DTID1\fR[,...]>
This option controls to which track another track is appended.
Each spec contains four IDs: a file ID, a track ID, another file ID and
a second track ID.
The first pair, "source file ID" and "source track ID", identifies the track
that is to be appended.
The second pair, "destination file ID" and "destination track ID", identifies
the track the first one is appended to.
.br
If this option has been omitted then a standard mapping is used.
This standard mapping appends each track from the current file to a track
from the previous file with the same track ID.
This allows for easy appending if a movie has been split into two parts
and both file have the same number of tracks and track IDs with the
command
.br
\fBmkvmerge -o output.mkv part1.mkv +part2.mkv\fR

.LP
Options that only apply to video tracks:
.TP
\fB\-f\fR, \fB\-\-fourcc\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIFourCC\fR>
Forces the FourCC to the specified value. Works only for video tracks in the
\'MS compatibility mode'.
.TP
\fB\-\-display\-dimensions\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIwidth\fRx\fIheight\fR>
Matroska files contain two values that set the display properties that a
player should scale the image on playback to: display width and display height.
These values can be set with this option, e.g. '1:640x480'.
.br
Another way to specify the values is to use the
\fB\-\-aspect\-ratio\fR or the \fB\-\-aspect\-ratio\-factor\fR
option (see below).
These options are mutually exclusive.
.TP
\fB\-\-aspect\-ratio\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIar\fR|\fIw\fR/\fIh\fR>
Matroska files contain two values that set the display properties that
a player should scale the image on playback to: display width and
display height.  With this option \fBmkvmerge\fR will automatically
calculate the display width and display height based on the image's
original width and height and the aspect ratio given with this option.
The ratio can be given either as a floating point number or as
\'width/height', e.g. 16/9.
.TP
\fB\-\-aspect\-ratio\-factor\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIar\fR|\fIw\fR/\fIh\fR>
Another way to set the aspect ratio is to specify a factor. The original
aspect ratio is first multiplied with this factor and used as the target
aspect ratio afterwards.
.br
Another way to specify the values is to use the
\fB\-\-aspect\-ratio\fR option (see above). These options are mutually
exclusive.
.TP
\fB\-\-cropping\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIleft\fR,\fItop\fR,\fIright\fR,\fIbottom\fR>
Sets the pixel cropping parameters of a video track to the given values.
.LP
Options that only apply to text subtitle tracks:
.TP
\fB\-\-sub\-charset\fR <\fITID\fR:\fIcharset\fR>
Sets the charset for the conversion to UTF-8 for UTF-8 subtitles for the given
track ID. If not specified the charset will be derived from the current locale
settings. Note that a charset is not needed for subtitles read from Matroska
files as these are always stored in UTF-8.
.br
This option can be used multiple times for an input file applying to several
tracks by selecting different track IDs each time.
.LP
Options that only apply to VobSub subtitle tracks:
.TP
\fB\-\-compression\fR <\fITID\fR:\fImethod\fR>
Selects the compression method to be used for the VobSub track. Note that the
player also has to support this method! Valid values are 'none' and 'zlib'.
The default is 'zlib' compression.
.LP
Other options:
.TP
\fB\-i\fR, \fB\-\-identify\fR <\fIfilename\fR>
Will let \fBmkvmerge\fR probe the single file and report its type, the tracks
contained in the file and their track IDs. If this option is used then the
only other option allowed is the filename.
.TP
\fB\-l\fR, \fB\-\-list\-types\fR
Lists supported input file types.
.TP
\fB\-\-list\-languages\fR
Lists all languages and their ISO639-2 code which can be used with the
\fB\-\-language\fR option.
.TP
\fB\-\-priority\fR <\fIpriority\fR>
Sets the process priority that \fBmkvmerge\fR runs with. Valid values are
"lowest", "lower", "normal", "higher" and "highest". If nothing is given then
"normal" is used. On Unix like systems \fBmkvmerge\fR will use the nice(2)
function. Therefore only the super user can use "higher" and "highest". On
Windows all values are useable for every user.
.TP
\fB\-\-command\-line\-charset\fR <\fIcharset\fR>
Sets the charset to convert strings given on the command line from. It defaults
to the charset given by system's current locale. This settings applies to
arguments of the following options: \fB\-\-title\fR, \fB\-\-track\-name\fR and
\fB\-\-attachment\-description\fR.
.TP
\fB\-\-output\-charset\fR <\fIcharset\fR>
Sets the charset to which strings are converted that are to be output.
It defaults to the charset given by system's current locale.
.TP
\fB-r\fR, \fB\-\-redirect\-output\fR <\fIfilename\fR>
Writes all messages to the file \fIfilename\fR instead of to the console.
While this can be done easily with output redirection there are cases in which
this option is needed: when the terminal reinterprets the output before
writing it to a file.
The charset set with \fB\-\-output-charset\fR is honored.
.TP
\fB@\fR\fIoptionsfile\fR
Reads additional command line arguments from the file \fIoptionsfile\fR.
Lines whose first non-whitespace character is a hash mark (#) are treated
as comments and ignored. White spaces at the start and end of a line will
be stripped. Each line must contain exactly one option.
There is no meta character escaping.
.br
The command line \fBmkvmerge \-o "my file.mkv" -A "a movie.avi" sound.ogg\fR
could be converted into the following option file:
.br
# Write to the file "my file.mkv".
.br
\-o
.br
my file.mkv
.br
# Only take the video from "a movie.avi".
.br
\-A
.br
a movie.avi
.br
sound.ogg
.TP
\fB\-h\fR, \fB\-\-help\fR
Show usage information.
.TP
\fB\-V\fR, \fB\-\-version\fR
Show version information.


.SH USAGE
.LP
For each file the user can select which tracks \fBmkvmerge\fR should take.
They are all put into the file specified with '-o'. A list of known
(and supported) source formats can be obtained with the '-l' option.


.SH EXAMPLES
.LP
Let's assume you have a file called \fIMyMovie.avi\fP and the audio track in a
separate file, e.g. \fIMyMovie.wav\fP. First you want to encode the audio to
OGG:
.LP
$ \fBoggenc -q4 -oMyMovie.ogg MyMovie.wav\fP
.LP
After a couple of minutes you can join video and audio:
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -o MyMovie-with-sound.mkv MyMovie.avi MyMovie.ogg\fP
.LP
If your AVI already contains an audio track then it will be copied as well
(if \fBmkvmerge\fR supports the audio format). To avoid that simply do
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -o MyMovie-with-sound.mkv -A MyMovie.avi MyMovie.ogg\fP
.LP
After some minutes of consideration you rip another audio track, e.g.
the director's comments or another language to \fIMyMovie-add-audio.wav\fP.
Encode it again and join it up with the other file:
.LP
$ \fBoggenc -q4 -oMyMovie-add-audio.ogg MyMovie-add-audio.wav\fP
.br
$ \fBmkvmerge -o MM-complete.mkv MyMovie-with-sound.mkv MyMovie-add-audio.ogg\fP
.LP
The same result can be achieved with
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -o MM-complete.mkv -A MyMovie.avi MyMovie.ogg \\\fP
.br
  \fBMyMovie-add-audio.ogg\fP
.LP
Now fire up mplayer and enjoy. If you have multiple audio tracks (or even
video tracks) then you can tell mplayer which track to play with the
\&'\fB-vid\fP' and '\fB-aid\fP' parameters. These are 0-based and do not
distinguish between video and audio.
.LP
If you need an audio track synchronized you can do that easily. First find
out which track ID the Vorbis track has with
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge --identify outofsync.ogg\fP
.LP
Now you can use that ID in the following command line:
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -o goodsync.mkv -A source.avi -y 12345:200 outofsync.ogg\fP
.LP
This would add 200ms of silence at the beginning of the audio track with the
ID 12345 taken from \fIoutofsync.ogg\fP.
.LP
Some movies start synced correctly but slowly drift out of sync. For these
kind of movies you can specify a delay factor that is applied to all
timestamps - no data is added or removed. So if you make that factor too
big or too small you'll get bad results. An example is that an episode
I transcoded was 0.2 seconds out of sync at the end of the movie which
was 77340 frames long. At 29.97fps 0.2 seconds correspond to approx. 6
frames. So I did
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -o goodsync.mkv -y 23456:0,77346/77340 outofsync.mkv\fP
.LP
The result was fine.
.LP
The sync options can also be used for subtitles in the same manner.
.LP
For text subtitles you can either use some Windows software (like
\fBSubRipper\fR) or the \fBsubrip\fR package found in \fBtranscode(1)\fR's
sources (in \fBcontrib/subrip\fR). The general process is:
.TP
1.
extract a raw subtitle stream from the source:
.br
$ \fBtccat -i /path/to/copied/dvd/ -T 1 -L | \\
.br
    tcextract -x ps1 -t vob -a 0x20 | \\
.br
    subtitle2pgm -o mymovie\fP
.TP
2.
convert the resulting PGM images to text with \fBgocr\fP:
.br
$ \fBpgm2txt mymovie\fP
.TP
3.
spell-check the resulting text files:
.br
$ \fBispell -d american *txt\fP
.TP
4.
convert the text files to a SRT file:
.br
$ \fBsrttool -s -w -i mymovie.srtx -o mymovie.srt\fP
.LP
The resulting file can be used as another input file for \fBmkvmerge\fR:
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -o mymovie.mkv mymovie.avi mymovie.srt\fP
.LP
If you want to specify the language for a given track then this is easily
done. First find out the ISO639-2 code for your language. \fBmkvmerge\fR
can list all of those codes for you:
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge --list-languages\fR
.LP
Search the list for the languages you need. Let's assume you have put two
audio tracks into a Matroska file and want to set their language codes and
that their track IDs are 2 and 3. This can be done with
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -o with-lang-codes.mkv --language 2:ger --language 3:dut
without-lang-codes.mkv\fR
.LP
As you can see you can use the \fB--language\fR switch multiple times.
.LP
Maybe you'd also like to have the player use the Dutch language as the default
language. You also have extra subtitles, e.g. in English and French, and want
to have the player display the French ones by default. This can be done with
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -o with-lang-codes.mkv --language 2:ger --language 3:dut
--default-track 3 without-lang-codes.mkv --language 0:eng english.srt
--default-track 0 --language 0:fre french.srt\fR
.LP
If you do not see the language or default track flags that you've specified
in \fBmkvinfo\fR's output then please read the section about \fBDEFAULT
VALUES\fR.


.SH TRACK IDS
.LP
Some of the options for \fBmkvmerge\fR need a track ID to specify which track
they should be applied to.
Those track IDs are printed by the readers when demuxing the current input
file, or if \fBmkvmerge\fR is called with the \fB\-\-identify\fR option.
An example for such output:
.LP
$ \fBmkvmerge -i v.mkv\fR
.br
File 'v.mkv': container: Matroska
.br
Track ID 1: video (V_MS/VFW/FOURCC, DIV3)
.br
Track ID 2: audio (A_MPEG/L3)
.LP
Track IDs are assigned like this:
.TP
*
AVI files: The video track has the ID 0. All audio tracks get the ID 1, 2...
.TP
*
AAC, AC3, MP3, SRT and WAV files: The one 'track' in that file gets the ID 0.
.TP
*
Ogg/OGM files: The track's ID is its position in the Ogg stream.
The first stream encountered has the ID 0, the second one the ID 1 etc.
.TP
*
Matroska files: The track's ID is the track number as reported by \fBmkvinfo\fR
or \fBmkvmerge \-\-identify\fR. It is \fBnot\fR the track UID.
.LP
The special track ID '-1' is a wild card and applies the given switch to all
tracks that are read from an input file. This was the behavior of these
switches prior to version 0.4.4.
.LP
The options that use the track IDs are the ones whose description contains
\'TID\'.
The following options use track IDs as well: \fB\-\-atracks\fR,
\fB\-\-vtracks\fR, \fB\-\-stracks\fR and \fB\-\-btracks\fR.


.SH SUBTITLES
.LP
There are several text subtitle formats that can be embedded into Matroska.
At the moment \fBmkvmerge\fR supports only text subtitle formats.
These subtitles must be recoded to UTF-8 so that they can be displayed
correctly by a player.
.LP
\fBmkvmerge\fR does this conversion automatically based on the system's current
locale. If the subtitle charset is not the same as
the system's current charset then the user can use \fB\-\-sub\-charset\fR
switch. If the subtitles are already encoded in UTF-8 then you can use
\fB\-\-sub\-charset UTF\-8\fR.
.LP
The following subtitle formats are supported at the moment:
.TP
*
Subtitle Ripper (SRT) files
.TP
*
Substation Alpha (SSA) / Advanced Substation Alpha scripts (ASS)


.SH FILE LINKING
.LP
Matroska supports file linking which simply says that a specific file is the
predecessor or successor of the current file. To be precise, it's not really
the files that are linked but the Matroska segments. As most files will
probably only contain one Matroska segment I simply say 'file linking'
although 'segment linking' would be more appropriate.
.LP
Each segment is identified by a unique 128 bit wide segment UID. This
UID is automatically generated by \fBmkvmerge\fR. The linking is done
primarily via putting the segment UIDs (short: SID) of the
previous/next file into the segment header
information. \fBmkvinfo(1)\fR prints these SIDs if it finds them.
.LP
If a file is split into several smaller ones and linking is used then the
timecodes will not start at 0 again but will continue where the last file
has left off. This way the absolute time is kept even if the previous files
are not available (e.g. when streaming). If no linking is used then the
timecodes should start at 0 for each file. By default \fBmkvmerge\fR does not
use file linking. If you want that you can turn it on with the
\'\fB\-link\fR\' option. This option is only useful if splitting
is activated as well.
.LP
Regardless of whether splitting is active or not the user can tell
\fBmkvmerge\fR to link the produced files to specific SIDs. This is achieved
with the options '\fB\-\-link\-to\-previous\fR' and '\fB\-\-link\-to\-next\fR'.
These options accept a segment SID in the format that \fBmkvinfo(1)\fR
outputs: 16 hexadecimal numbers between 0x00 and 0xff prefixed with '0x' each,
e.g. \fI0x41 0xda 0x73 0x66 0xd9 0xcf 0xb2 0x1e 0xae 0x78 0xeb 0xb4 0x5e 0xca
0xb3 0x93\fR. Alternatively a shorter form can be used: 16 hexadecimal numbers
between 0x00 and 0xff without the '0x' prefixes and without the spaces, e.g.
\fI41da7366d9cfb21eae78ebb45ecab393\fR.
.LP
If splitting is used then the first file is linked to the SID given with
\'\fB\-\-link\-to\-previous\fR\' and the last file is linked to the SID given
with \'\fB\-\-link\-to\-next\fR\'. If splitting is not used then the one
output file will be linked to both of the two SIDs.


.SH DEFAULT VALUES
.LP
The Matroska specs say that some elements have a default value. Usually an
element is not written to the file if its value is equal to its default
value in order to save space. The elements that the user might miss in
\fBmkvinfo\fR's output are the \fIlanguage\fR and the \fIdefault track flag\fR.
The default value for the \fIlanguage\fR is English (\fIeng\fR),
and the default value for the \fIdefault track flag\fR is \fItrue\fR. Therefore
if you used \fB--language 0:eng\fR for a track then it will not show up
in \fBmkvinfo\fR's output.


.SH ATTACHMENTS
.LP
Maybe you also want to keep some photos along with your Matroska file, or
you're using SSA subtitles and need a special TrueType font that's really
rare. In these cases you can attach those files to the Matroska file. They
will not be just appended to the file but embedded in it. A player can then
show those files (the 'photos' case) or use them to render the subtitles
(the 'TrueType fonts' case).
.LP
Here's an example how to attach a photo and a TrueType font to the output
file:
.br
$ \fBmkvmerge -o output.mkv -A video.avi sound.ogg \-\-attachment\-description
"Me and the band behind the stage in a small get-together"
\-\-attachment\-mime\-type image/jpeg \-\-attach\-file me_and_the_band.jpg
\-\-attachment\-description "The real rare and unbelievably good looking font"
\-\-attachment\-type application/octet\-stream
\-\-attach\-file really_cool_font.ttf


.SH CHAPTERS
.LP
The Matroska chapter system is more powerful than the old known system used
by OGMs. The full specs can be found at
.UR http://www.matroska.org/technical/specs/chapters/index.html
<http://www.matroska.org/technical/specs/chapters/index.html>
.LP
\fBmkvmerge\fR supports two kinds of chapter files as its input. The first
format, called 'simple chapter format', is the same format that the OGM tools
expect. The second format is a XML based chapter format which supports all
of Matroska's chapter functionality.
.LP
\fBThe simple chapter format\fR

It looks basically like this:
.LP
CHAPTER01=00:00:00.000
.br
CHAPTER01NAME=Intro
.br
CHAPTER02=00:02:30.000
.br
CHAPTER02NAME=Baby prepares to rock
.br
CHAPTER03=00:02:42.300
.br
CHAPTER03NAME=Baby rocks the house
.LP
\fBmkvmerge\fR will transform every pair or lines (CHAPTERxx and CHAPTERxxNAME)
into one Matroska \fIChapterAtom\fR. It does not set any
\fIChapterTrackNumber\fR which means that the chapters all apply to all
tracks in the file.
.LP
The charset used in the file is assumed to be the same charset that the
current system's locale returns. If this is not the case then the switch
\fI\-\-chapter\-charset\fR should be used. If the file contains a valid
BOM (byte order marker) then all UTF styles are converted automatically.
In this case \fI\-\-chapter\-charset\fR is simply ignored. You can use
\fBmkvinfo\fR or \fBmkvextract\fR to verify that the chapter names have
been converted properly.
.LP
\fBThe XML based chapter format\fR

The XML based chapter format looks like this:
.LP
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
.br
<!DOCTYPE Chapters SYSTEM "matroskachapters.dtd">
.br
<Chapters>
.br
  <EditionEntry>
.br
    <ChapterAtom>
.br
      <ChapterTimeStart>00:00:30.000</ChapterTimeStart>
.br
      <ChapterTimeEnd>00:01:20.000</ChapterTimeEnd>
.br
      <ChapterDisplay>
.br
        <ChapterString>A short chapter</ChapterString>
.br
        <ChapterLanguage>eng</ChapterLanguage>
.br
      </ChapterDisplay>
.br
      <ChapterAtom>
.br
        <ChapterTimeStart>00:00:46.000</ChapterTimeStart>
.br
        <ChapterTimeEnd>00:01:10.000</ChapterTimeEnd>
.br
        <ChapterDisplay>
.br
          <ChapterString>A part of that short chapter</ChapterString>
.br
          <ChapterLanguage>eng</ChapterLanguage>
.br
        </ChapterDisplay>
.br
      </ChapterAtom>
.br
    </ChapterAtom>
.br
  </EditionEntry>
.br
</Chapters>

With this format three things are possible that are not possible with the
simple chapter format: 1) The timestamp for the end of the chapter can be
set, 2) chapters can be nested, 3) the language and country can be set.
.LP
The mkvtoolnix distribution contains some sample files in the \fIdoc\fR
subdirectory which can be used as a basis.
.LP
\fBGeneral notes\fR

.LP
When splitting files \fBmkvmerge\fR will correctly adjust the chapters as
well. This means that each file only includes the chapter entries that
apply to it, and that the timecodes will be offset to match the new timecodes
of each output file.
.LP
\fBmkvmerge\fR is able to copy chapters from Matroska source files unless this
is explicitly disabled with the \fI\-\-no\-chapters\fR option. At the
moment \fBmkvmerge\fR is limited to one 'bunch of chapters' globally. This means
that only the first chapter section found in all source files is used. If
the user specified chapters on the command line then these take precedence
over any chapters found in source files. \fBmkvmerge\fR does not merge
chapters. This must be done manually by using \fBmkvextract\fR to extract
the chapter information and editing the resulting files.
.LP
One shortcoming is that \fBmkvmerge\fR cannot parse chapter information found
in OGM files.


.SH TAGS
.LP
\fBIntroduction\fR

Matroska supports an extensive set of tags that is deprecated and a
new, simpler system like it is is used in most other containers:
\fIKEY=VALUE\fR. However, in Matroska these tags can also be nested,
and both the \fIKEY\fR and the \fIVALUE\fR are elements of their
own. The example file \fIexample-tags-2.xml\fR shows how to use this new
system.

.LP
\fBScope of the tags\fR

Matroska tags do not automatically apply to the complete file. They can,
but they also may apply to different parts of the file: to one or more
tracks, to one or more chapters, or even to a combination of both. The
aforementioned URL gives more details about this fact.

.LP

One important fact is that tags are linked to tracks or chapters with
the \fITargets\fR Matroska tag element, and that the UIDs used for
this linking are NOT the track IDs \fBmkvmerge\fR uses
everywhere. Instead the numbers used are the UIDs which \fBmkvmerge\fR
calculates automatically (if the track is taken from a file format
other than Matroska) or which are copied from the source file if the
track's source file is a Matroska file. Therefore it is difficult to
know which UIDs to use in the tag file before the file is handed
over to \fBmkvmerge\fR.

.LP

\fBmkvmerge\fR knows two options with which you can add tags to
Matroska files: The \fB\-\-global\-tags\fR and the \fB\-\-tags\fR
options. The difference is that the former option,
\fB\-\-global\-tags\fR, will make the tags apply to the complete file
by removing any of those \fITargets\fR elements mentioned above.  The
latter option, \fB\-\-tags\fR, automatically inserts the UID that
\fBmkvmerge\fR generates for the tag specified with the \fITID\fR part
of the \fB\-\-tags\fR option.

.LP
\fBExample\fR

Let's say that you want to add tags to a video track read from
an AVI. \fBmkvmerge -i file.avi\fR tells you that the video track's ID
(do not mix this ID with the UID!) is 0. So you create your tag file,
leave out any \fITargets\fR element and call \fBmkvmerge\fR:
.br
$ \fBmkvmerge -o file.mkv --tags 0:tags.xml file.avi\fR

.LP
\fBTag file format\fR

\fBmkvmerge\fR supports a XML based tag file format. The format is
very easy and closely connected to the Matroska tag specs found at the
URL mentioned above. Both the binary and the source \fBmkvtoolnix\fR
distributions come with a sample file called \example-tags-2.xml\fR
which simply lists all known tags and which can be used as a basis for
real life tag files.

.LP

The basics are:
.TP
*
The outermost element must be \fB<Tags>\fR.
.TP
*
One logical tag is contained inside one pair of \fB<Tag>\fR XML tags.
.TP
*
White spaces directly before and after tag contents are ignored.

.LP
\fBData types\fR

The new Matroska tagging system only knows two data types, a UTF-8 string
and a binary type. The first is used for the tag's name and the \fI<String>\fR
element while the binary type is used for the \fI<Binary>\fR type.

.LP

As binary data itself would not fit into a XML file \fBmkvmerge\fR
supports two other methods of storing binary data. If the contents of
a XML tag starts with '@' then the following text is treated as a
\fIfile name\fR. The corresponding file's content is copied into the
Matroska element.

.LP

Otherwise the data is expected to be \fIBase64\fR encoded. This is an
encoding that transforms binary data into a limited set of ASCII
characters and is used e.g. in email programs. \fBmkvtoolnix\fR comes
with a utility, \fBbase64tool\fR, that can be used to encode to and
decode from Base64. \fBmkvextract\fR will output Base64 encoded data
for binary elements.

.LP

The deprecated tagging system knows some more data types which can be
found in the official Matroska tag specs. \fBThe following two paragraphs only
apply to the deprecated tags\fR (an example file is still available and called
\fIexample-tags-deprecated.xml\fR):

.LP

The types \fIinteger\fR, \fIunsigned integer\fR, \fIfloat\fR, \fIstring\fR
and \fIUTF-8 string\fR look just like you expect them to: \fI4254\fR,
\fI-2\fR, \fI5.0\fR, \fIhello world\fR and \fIhello world\fR.

.LP

The date format used by both \fBmkvmerge\fR when reading XML tag files
and by \fBmkvextract\fR when outputting XML tag data is the \fIISO-8601\fR
format. It has the following structure:
\fIYYYY\fR-\fIMM\fR-\fIDD\fRT\fIHH\fR:\fIMM\fR:\fISS\fR\fI+TZTZ\fR.
\fIYYYY\fR is the year (four digits long), \fIMM\fR the month (two digits
long starting with 01), \fIDD\fR the day of the month (two digits long
starting with 01), \fIHH\fR the hour of the day (two digits long, range
00 - 23), \fIMM\fR the minute (two digits long, range 00 - 59), \fISS\fR
the seconds (two digits long, range 00 - 59). \fI+TZTZ\fR is the time zone,
e.g. +0100 or -0200. An example would be 2003-07-30T19:10:16+0200.



.SH MATROSKA FILE LAYOUT
.LP
The Matroska file layout is quite flexible. \fBmkvmerge\fR will render a file
in a predefined way. The resulting file looks like this:
.LP
[EBML head] [segment {meta seek #1} {attachments} {chapters}
[segment information] [track information] [cluster 1] {cluster 2} ...
{cluster n} {cues} {meta seek #2} {tags}]
.LP
The elements in curly braces are optional and depend on the contents and
options used. Some notes:
.TP
*
meta seek #1 includes only a small number of level 1 elements, and only if
they actually exist: attachments, chapters, cues, tags, meta seek #2. Older
versions of \fBmkvmerge\fR used to put the clusters into this meta seek
element as well. Therefore some imprecise guessing was necessary to reserve
enough space. It often failed. Now only the clusters are stored in meta
seek #2, and meta seek #1 refers to the meta seek element #2.
.TP
*
Attachment, chapter and tag elements are only present if they were added.
.LP
The shortest possible Matroska file would look like this:
.LP
[EBML head] [segment [segment information] [track information] [cluster 1]]
.LP
This might be the case for audio-only files.


.SH EXTERNAL TIMECODE FILES
.LP
\fBmkvmerge\fR allows the user to chose the timecodes for a specific track
himself. This can be used in order to create files with variable frame rate
video or include gaps in audio. A frame in this case is the unit that
\fBmkvmerge\fR creates separately per Matroska block. For video this
is exactly one frame, for audio this is one packet of the specific
audio type. E.g. for AC3 this would be a packet containing 1536
samples.
.LP
There are three formats that are recognized by \fBmkvmerge\fR. The first
line always contains the version number. Empty lines, lines containing only
whitespace and lines beginning with '#' are ignored.
.LP
\fBTimecode file format v1\fR
.LP
This format starts with this line:
.br
\fB# timecode format v1\fR
.br
The second line gives the default number of frames per second:
.br
\fBassume 27.930\fR
.br
All following lines contain three numbers separated by commas: the
start frame (0 is the first frame), the end frame and the number of
frames in this range. The FPS is a floating point number with the dot
'.' as the decimal point. The ranges can contain gaps for which the
default FPS is used. Example:
.br
\fB800,1000,25\fR
.br
\fB1500,1700,30\fR
.LP
\fBTimecode file format v2\fR
.LP
In this format each line contains a timecode for the next frame.
This timecode must be given in ms precision.
It can be a floating point number, but it doesn't have to be.
You \fBmust\fR give at least as many timecode lines as there are frames in
the track.
The timecodes in this file must be sorted.
Example for 25fps:
.br
\fB# timecode format v2\fR
.br
\fB0\fR
.br
\fB40\fR
.br
\fB80\fR
.br
etc.
.LP
\fBTimecode file format v3\fR
.LP
In this format each line contains a duration in seconds followed by an 
optional number of frames per second.
Both can be floating point numbers.
If the number of frames per second is not present the default one is used.
For audio you should let the codec calculate the frame timecodes itself.
For that you should be using 0.0 as the number of frames per second.
You can also create gaps in the stream by using the \fBgap\fR keyword followed
by the duration of the gap.
Example for an audio file:
.br
\fB# timecode format v3\fR
.br
\fBassume 0.0\fR
.br
\fB25.325\fR
.br
\fB7.530,38.236\fR
.br
\fBgap, 10.050\fR
.br
\fB2.000,38.236\fR
.br
etc.
.LP
\fBTimecode file format v4\fR
.LP
This format is identical to the v2 format.
The only difference is that the timecodes do not have to be sorted.
This format should almost never be used.


.SH EXIT CODES
.LP
\fBmkvmerge\fR exits with one of three exit codes:
.TP
0
This exit codes means that muxing has completed successfully.
.TP
1
In this case \fBmkvmerge\fR has output at least one warning, but muxing did
continue.
A warning is prefixed with the text \'Warning:\'.
Depending on the issues involved the resulting file might be ok or not.
The user is urged to check both the warning and the resulting file.
.TP
2
This exit code is used after an error occured.
\fBmkvmerge\fR aborts right after outputting the error message.
Error messages range from wrong command line arguments over read/write errors
to broken files.


.SH NOTES
.LP
What works (this list is probably outdated):
.TP
*
AVI as the video and audio source (only raw PCM, MP3 and AC3 audio tracks at
the moment)
.TP
*
OGG as the source for video, audio (Vorbis, raw PCM, MP3 and AC3 audio) and
text streams (subtitles).
.TP
*
WAV as the audio source
.TP
*
AAC audio files (ADTS AAC files and AAC from MP4)
.TP
*
AC3 audio files
.TP
*
DTS audio files
.TP
*
MP3 audio files
.TP
*
RealVideo and RealAudio from RealMedia files
.TP
*
FLAC audio files (both raw FLAC and OggFLAC)
.TP
*
Track selection
.TP
*
Manual audio synchronization by adding silence/removing packets for Vorbis
audio and for text streams by adjusting the starting point and duration.
.TP
*
Manual audio synchronization for AAC, AC3, DTS and MP3 audio by duplicating
or removing packets at the beginning.
.TP
*
Text subtitles can be read from SRT (SubRipper / subrip) files or
taken from other OGM files.
.TP
*
SSA/ASS subtitles from SSA/ASS files
.TP
*
Simple chapters.
.TP
*
Full tags support.
.LP
What not works:
.TP
*
Manual audio synchronization for PCM sound (who needs it anyway?)


.SH AUTHOR
.I mkvmerge
was written by Moritz Bunkus <moritz@bunkus.org>.
.SH SEE ALSO
.BR mkvinfo (1),
.BR mkvextract (1),
.BR mmg (1)
.SH WWW
The newest version can always be found at
.UR http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoolnix/
<http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoolnix/>
.UE