avformat/aviobuf: Improve readability of aviobuf (Add comments and docs)

Signed-off-by: Michael Niedermayer <michael@niedermayer.cc>

2 files changed, 52 insertions, 2 deletions

diff --git a/libavformat/avio.h b/libavformat/avio.h
index 06dd7f5ef8..abe13b2719 100644
--- a/libavformat/avio.h
+++ b/libavformat/avio.h
@@ -122,6 +122,53 @@ typedef struct AVIOContext {
      * to any av_opt_* functions in that case.
      */
     const AVClass *av_class;
+
+    /*
+     * The following shows the relationship between buffer, buf_ptr, buf_end, buf_size,
+     * and pos, when reading and when writing (since AVIOContext is used for both):
+     *
+     **********************************************************************************
+     *                                   READING
+     **********************************************************************************
+     *
+     *                            |              buffer_size              |
+     *                            |---------------------------------------|
+     *                            |                                       |
+     *
+     *                         buffer          buf_ptr       buf_end
+     *                            +---------------+-----------------------+
+     *                            |/ / / / / / / /|/ / / / / / /|         |
+     *  read buffer:              |/ / consumed / | to be read /|         |
+     *                            |/ / / / / / / /|/ / / / / / /|         |
+     *                            +---------------+-----------------------+
+     *
+     *                                                         pos
+     *              +-------------------------------------------+-----------------+
+     *  input file: |                                           |                 |
+     *              +-------------------------------------------+-----------------+
+     *
+     *
+     **********************************************************************************
+     *                                   WRITING
+     **********************************************************************************
+     *
+     *                                          |          buffer_size          |
+     *                                          |-------------------------------|
+     *                                          |                               |
+     *
+     *                                       buffer              buf_ptr     buf_end
+     *                                          +-------------------+-----------+
+     *                                          |/ / / / / / / / / /|           |
+     *  write buffer:                           | / to be flushed / |           |
+     *                                          |/ / / / / / / / / /|           |
+     *                                          +-------------------+-----------+
+     *
+     *                                         pos
+     *               +--------------------------+-----------------------------------+
+     *  output file: |                          |                                   |
+     *               +--------------------------+-----------------------------------+
+     *
+     */
     unsigned char *buffer;  /**< Start of the buffer. */
     int buffer_size;        /**< Maximum buffer size */
     unsigned char *buf_ptr; /**< Current position in the buffer */
diff --git a/libavformat/aviobuf.c b/libavformat/aviobuf.c
index 1b3d5f5b80..691bdaa9ad 100644
--- a/libavformat/aviobuf.c
+++ b/libavformat/aviobuf.c
@@ -213,6 +213,7 @@ int64_t avio_seek(AVIOContext *s, int64_t offset, int whence)
         return AVERROR(EINVAL);
 
     buffer_size = s->buf_end - s->buffer;
+    // pos is the absolute position that the beginning of s->buffer corresponds to in the file
     pos = s->pos - (s->write_flag ? 0 : buffer_size);
 
     if (whence != SEEK_CUR && whence != SEEK_SET)
@@ -227,7 +228,7 @@ int64_t avio_seek(AVIOContext *s, int64_t offset, int whence)
     if (offset < 0)
         return AVERROR(EINVAL);
 
-    offset1 = offset - pos;
+    offset1 = offset - pos; // "offset1" is the relative offset from the beginning of s->buffer
     if (!s->must_flush && (!s->direct || !s->seek) &&
         offset1 >= 0 && offset1 <= buffer_size - s->write_flag) {
         /* can do the seek inside the buffer */
@@ -545,7 +546,8 @@ int avio_read(AVIOContext *s, unsigned char *buf, int size)
         if (len > size)
             len = size;
         if (len == 0 || s->write_flag) {
-            if((s->direct || size > s->buffer_size) && !s->update_checksum){
+            if((s->direct || size > s->buffer_size) && !s->update_checksum) {
+                // bypass the buffer and read data directly into buf
                 if(s->read_packet)
                     len = s->read_packet(s->opaque, buf, size);
                 if (len <= 0) {
@@ -560,6 +562,7 @@ int avio_read(AVIOContext *s, unsigned char *buf, int size)
                     s->bytes_read += len;
                     size -= len;
                     buf += len;
+                    // reset the buffer
                     s->buf_ptr = s->buffer;
                     s->buf_end = s->buffer/* + len*/;
                 }