html5 video tag codecs attribute

Question

I am trying to specify a specific video/audio codec in the video tag using

Answer 1

mark4o gives by far the best explanation I've seen of how to decipher codec information. Excellent.

One piece which may require a little more detail is how to break out the specific audio object type from the decSpecificInfo value. Finding the "mp4a.40" part is very clear, the ".2" section can be a little tricky.

We start with a sequence of single byte hexadecimal values: "11 90" in mark4o’s example or "12 08" in my case. Both of those are a total of 2 bytes... there may be more values but only the first 2 matter for finding the object type (and usually only the first byte). We're looking for individual bits so convert each digit in the hexadecimal values to binary; there should be 4 binary digits for each hexadecimal digit. Take the first 5 binary digits — 4 from the first hex digit, 1 from the next — and convert that binary value to decimal. Here are the steps:

Example 1 (11 90):
Starting value:                     11                90
Separate the hex digits:         1      1          9      0
Convert each digit to binary:   0001   0001       1001   0000
Take the first 5 bits:          0001   0
Combine into binary value:      00010
Convert to decimal:             2


Example 2 (12 08):
Starting value:                     12                08
Separate the hex digits:         1      2          0      8
Convert each digit to binary:   0001   0010       0000   1000
Take the first 5 bits:          0001   0
Combine into binary value:      00010
Convert to decimal:             2   

They are the same object type in spite of having different decSpecificInfo values.