Is c or c ++ my language for this task... Or is it Python?

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Hi guys.

I have just recently purchased for myself a Pioneer DVD-Rom drive.  I
was hoping that there would be a piece of software available that
would give me some added info about movie titles that I placed in it.

Information such as the encoding method, whether it is RSDL or what.. 
If it is RSDL, where the layer changes (this is the vital thing!), 
possibly a layer indicator as seen on Sony DVD players (a little
graphic that indicates whereabouts on the side the laser is pointing
at any moment) what compression methods/levels are used for video and
audio, whether it has been 16x9 enhanced or not.

I can't think of anything else right now, but I am sure I will one day
soon.

Anyways, I can't seem to see a piece of software out there that
provides this data for me and so undaunted I am going to write it for
myself.

The biggest problem for me is that I am pretty much a total newbie as
a programmer.   I have used python to write a few scripts to automate
some of the more boring tasks required to maintain a unix based apache
server (such as adding virtualhost entries to the httpd.conf or
creating users with chrooted ftponly access) and I did one semester of
c++ (where I got full marks in a year that failed over 50% of
students*) but apart from that, nothing.

What I want to know is what language I am going to have to learn to
accomplish what I need.

I should imagine that it will require some relatively low level stuff,
probably the creation of a dll file that can talk to the driver,  as
well as some nice gui front end stuff later on.  I am thinking that I
can use c or c++ for the low level driver communication and maybe
python to create a pretty gui.

Perhaps I can do the lot in C.  Perhaps I should use something
different.  Perhaps you guys could suggest a better method to begin
planning from...   Really,  any help would be great.

TIA

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nemir at hot mail dot com