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I think the one thing that bothers me most about Real is their belief that NOTHING is free.

Even in the free player you are paying for it through advertising.

I mean comon, $20 for a visulization plugin for RealPlayer?

Well, if Real is listening, they'll hopefully make a big prominent link to the free version on their front page.
They do
Which leads you here

I remember four years ago when I had to dig through the site to find it; what a pain in the butt.
Fast forward four years to today. It's not a pain any more... Therefore I don't see the purpose of this article
..oh wait, its slashdot.

-dk

Well, if Real is listening, they'll hopefully make a big prominent link to the free version on their front page.
They do
Which leads you here

I remember four years ago when I had to dig through the site to find it; what a pain in the butt.
Fast forward four years to today. It's not a pain any more... Therefore I don't see the purpose of this article
..oh wait, its slashdot.

-dk

There is a Windows Media Player for Mac OS X and 9 that, like its RealPlayer for OS X counterpart, has few annoying "features' that appear in their Windows counterparts. Generally speaking, Mac users can use the streams from the major sites like NPR unless the streaming site has intentionally identified the Macintosh browser or player and refuses access, whether the stream is compatible or not.

WMP for Mac's streaming ability works fine. But this player, unlike the one built-in with Windows, only plays WMA streams and files, and lacks the iTunes-ish MP3 player features.

Of course, aside from the free RealPlayer (which, if you look at this link on a Mac browser that IDs itself as a Mac browser shows a simple link in the right corner to the free RealPlayer), there is QuickTime, which also plays streams well, but there are few sites that use it (one is Cartoon Network's Star Wars: Clone Wars site).

Although I understand the BBC had strong reasons to twist Real's arm in negotiations, I don't understand why MPR cannot wrangle something along the lines of BBC's relation to Real?

Oh, wait. MPR pretty much does ...

MPR Homepage > How To Listen > You can manually download the newest version here.

Am I missing something?

(Real seems to provoke the same thread topics on /. regardless of story context, it seems. This post is no different.)

What I don't understand is:

You run a company. You know people need the link to d/l your software.

HOW HARD IS IT TO GRAB THE LINK YOURSELF?

Seriously, my company had this problem a couple years back. They said, it's too hard to find the free browser. So I linked to the free broswer download page. It's was that freaking simple. Deep-linking is LEGAL, people.

Go here and click on the "Free RealPlayer" link on the right. Should start your download automatically.

Sorry, I wasn't being dishonest; simply uninformed. I was under the assumption that RealMedia was a proprietary format that could only be played by RealPlayer, which RealNetworks, Inc. does not make for Linux. Thanks for pointing out that there is a 3rd-party player for RealMedia.

Try to find it on the UK website. They are still using the old format over there. If you can find the first link inside of 30 seconds, I'll be surprised.

They do keep them available, however hidden they are.

I went to the Real website, and clicked on three fairly obvious links, and Firefox asked me where to save the installer for the free version. (I chose to cancel, BTW)

I don't see how it's difficult to find:

First click from the main page to the download or buy RealOne. (The link was cunningly hidden in the top-right corner. I admit the choice of location here is a little unfriendly, but I saw it within 2 seconds of the page rendering)
Second click to specify 'Download the free player'. (Bottom-right, large obvious letters, spotted instantly)
Third click to specify the mirror site to use. (Hmm.. no .au site, ok, just pick one at random)

Are the people who had to 'hunt for 10 minutes' blind?
(If so, then maybe the time was spend waiting for the text-to-speech to read out the whole page?)

Real might have a lot of bloat in their software, but don't blame them for your inability to click on three easy to see links.

You can download previous versions of RealPlayer at the Real Legacy Software Archive. The previous versions should still play 95% of RealMedia content because they don't change around the codec, and the old versions don't have the bloat of the new ones. Plus they include versions of the player for Linux(TM), Solaris, IRIX, AIX and others at their community-supported UNIX download center.

You can download previous versions of RealPlayer at the Real Legacy Software Archive. The previous versions should still play 95% of RealMedia content because they don't change around the codec, and the old versions don't have the bloat of the new ones. Plus they include versions of the player for Linux(TM), Solaris, IRIX, AIX and others at their community-supported UNIX download center.

That's why Rhapsody is cool. I agree... Why get 10 songs when I can play 29272 if I want for the same price?

You're absolutely right in that the "personal taxes" category for linux software is very vacant. However, while not quite geared to the home user, there are quite a few high-end financial app suites targeted at the real bean-counters. One I recently ran across is OSAS.

When you buy the software you get the source, and they do allow customizations & modifications to the source as well, just no releasing of the code to the public. [note: this is all to the best of my understanding. If someone out there knows more about this app, please correct me.]

As to your other concerns:
Kazaa: There are several re-implementations of the Kazaa client for linux. I've also heard that you can run the real thing under WINE.
Real Player: Click Here. Nuff said.
ICQ/AIM: Gaim.

You can use more then just Apple's media format on the Mac. You can even get Windows Media Player 9 for Mac OS X and RealOne for Mac OS X.

Apple does not have a monopoly of home computer users, Microsoft does. Most things MS "integrates" into their OS will become a monopoly simply because they have a monopoly on the home computer user market.

The Listen/Real Rhapsody service model is possibly the best digital music model for these times. It is surprising how little it is advertised - every single user that I have come across loves the service and feel that the 10 bucks they pay per month is a phenomenal value. Targetted primarily at connected/broadband users its a buffet of music. Of course, it doesn't do as well when you start looking at how to get the music to go with you on the road. Here's a link to a recent review: Rhapsody Review
Here is the link to the service itself: Rhapsody

Real Networks posted the instructions on dealing with security flaws.

A better way to deal with these security flaws (and the bloated piece of crap that is RealPlayer) is to uninstall RealPlayer and download Real Alternative.

What are you talking about? They have an exhaustive Legacy Software Archive that goes all the way back to 16-bit versions for Windows 3.1 and OS/2.

Look again.

They fixed up your complaints to my satisfaction, at least.

http://www.real.com/freeplayer/?rppr=slashdot

I still use Real Player 8 (on XP :)

I get reminded to upgrade every now and then, but as far I'm concerned, this was the last player that was even remotely bearable from Real. And, finally, they've made the page static so it can be linked to (I wonder how long that will last?):

Real Legacy Players

Don't forget to check out EVERY option on install, and scroll down to see hidden checked checkboxes and other crap. Then go to preferences and Nuke everything. But apart from that, it's not too bad when you've got everything stripped out :)

.02

cLive ;-)

You won't find the older players by navigating their website, you just have to know the link http://forms.real.com/real/player/blackjack.html

1. Go here to download a previous version of Real Player. I recommend Real Player 9, which is what this guide is written for. Don't bother with that Real One shit. Choose the most basic player that's available.

2. Choose the custom install option. Uncheck all the boxes for the desktop icons and file associations.

3. Start Real Player. Go to View->Preferences and disable anything else that you don't want. Do this for StartCenter, since it eats up memory.

4. Go to Program Files\Common Files\Real\Update_OB. Delete or rename realsched.exe, which will still run even if you've disabled everything else.

5. Run msconfig to take out realsched from win.ini, as well as any other program you don't want loading at startup.

Some of the info came from here. Use this info at your own risk!

Enjoy!

Defending RealMedia doesn't seem very popular around here, but I could find their free player with two clicks and in under 30 seconds. Just click the gigantic orange button on their front page and then click the link on the left side of the next page. Obviously the $20 player is more prominently featured (yes, RealMedia is trying to make money--imagine that!), but it's hardly difficult to find the free player.

Defending RealMedia doesn't seem very popular around here, but I could find their free player with two clicks and in under 30 seconds. Just click the gigantic orange button on their front page and then click the link on the left side of the next page. Obviously the $20 player is more prominently featured (yes, RealMedia is trying to make money--imagine that!), but it's hardly difficult to find the free player.

no they did not. they are still playing games.

go to http://www.real.com/.
the headline reads: Introducing RealPlayer 10
subheadline: New Powerful Free
with a big image with a big, bright "Free" logo.

click on the free logo takes you here:
http://www.real.com/realplayer.html?pp=home&src=01 2904realhome_1_3_2_1_1_1

there are two big "Download Now" buttons on this site. both lead to the non-free premium player. in the margin on the right, with grey text over a grey background, there is a link to the free player.

that is bullshit. i know the free player is there, and that real plays tricks, so i specifically look for it. the average internet user, on the other hand, may not be that aware.

real are still assholes, and i am glad cartalk is moving away from their format because of their shitty tactics.

no they did not. they are still playing games.

go to http://www.real.com/.
the headline reads: Introducing RealPlayer 10
subheadline: New Powerful Free
with a big image with a big, bright "Free" logo.

click on the free logo takes you here:
http://www.real.com/realplayer.html?pp=home&src=01 2904realhome_1_3_2_1_1_1

there are two big "Download Now" buttons on this site. both lead to the non-free premium player. in the margin on the right, with grey text over a grey background, there is a link to the free player.

that is bullshit. i know the free player is there, and that real plays tricks, so i specifically look for it. the average internet user, on the other hand, may not be that aware.

real are still assholes, and i am glad cartalk is moving away from their format because of their shitty tactics.

Yes - RealPlayer has always been free, and versions for Linux/UNIX, Mac, Windows, and Mobile devices here.

Free.

I'm sure there's a windows counterpart.

...about the prevailing consensus about Real on /.

By the way, here's the /. article about the launch of the Helix player contest.

(Wonder where 2-9 went?)

I work for RealNetworks, and I am the first to admit RealPlayer is not my favorite media player. For video, Media Player Classic (MPC) is, and yes, I use MPC to play my RV9-EHQ aka RV10 content.

Previous RealPlayers have been pretty impolite to put it mildly, and along with so many other computer users, I have been ticked off by its behaviour in many ways. It has been possible to make it well mannered, but it has included being forced to delete certain files to prevent that annoying Message Center. However, it has not been spyware in a long time, even though one old player did send back some usage information. That's long gone, but it's hard to be forgiven for that mistake.

Considering how past players have created such a bad reputation, this post is probably futile, but anyway... Thanks to those few positive posts though, especially for the Linux and OS X players. It is nice to see someone taking the time to give it a another chance.

This RealPlayer 10 is better than before, it is fast, small, and does not run +10MB services in the background, like one well known example, name withheld. However, this post is not really about performance, even though a lot could be said about improvements in this area. More importantly in this discussion, it is also better in terms of its behaviour, albeit less better than me, many of my co-workers, and all of you, had hoped for.

Here's what you need to do when installing:

• Choose Custom Install
• Uncheck all the boxes you don't like for stuff on the desktop and quicklaunch bar. There is nothing hidden by a scroll bar, at least not with my computer screen size.
• Check only the media types you want it to play. This is the only time you will be asked this, it will never try to take back any media types. Now, is this really so bad compared to other software, in regards to media types? It's not as polite as MPC, but I have other media players which take over media types, and there is not even an option to customize this..
• Start RealPlayer, you may have to create an account. Everybody hates this, and wish it would go way. Agreed, but RealNetworks has to make money somehow, and the number of users is a needed measure to document. So use fake information if you like.
• Then go to Tools->Preferences->Automatic Services, Click Configure Message Center, then uncheck "Check for new messages". Click OK on the "warning" that comes up. Now you will never be bothered by the Message Center. In previous versions, you could not disable the Message Center completely, without deleting certain files. Minor improvement, it's still opt-out, but at least it's possible. Check or uncheck Auto-update in its sub-menu as well.
• Go to Tools->Preferences->General and set On startup display to "Player only". That way, no browser, and it starts much quicker.

So to summarize, a few clicks are needed to opt-out, you have to "sign in" the first time. Yes, somewhat annoying, but that's about it. It could have been better, but compared to many other examples, it's not that terrible. Since it has been so very bad in the past though, it clearly should have changed more to make a shining example, but since it is RealNetworks' main vehicle for generating revenue, there is a lot of nervousness about changing things too quickly.

Download the free RealPlayer 10 Beta here, with no re-direction or sales tricks:

http://www.real.com/freeplayer/?rppr=slashdot

And you can find me the forum below with more information about all the gory technical details about what's new with the Real 10 Platform, including RV 10, and RA 10 (AAC!):

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid= 68245

Some people have been posting about RealAlternative, which normally isn't a bad way to go. But it's probably not a good idea in your case -- it includes the Real codec .DLLs to play Real media files, which are illegal to distribute seperately from the player. Probably not a good idea to give to your legal team.

here

Well, a few months ago, someone from Real contacted me and told me that I could just use the above link to go straight to the free player. Note that just "http://www.real.com/freeplayer/" doesn't work; you have to have the referrer code "?rppr=wrek" after it -- "wrek" being my organization and presumably replaced by other strings in other cases. If you leave it off you get thrown into the regular obfuscation queue.

I'd have to agree with those that say that Real appears to genuinely be trying to be better about all this.

Simple, RealPlayer may be free but RealServer is expensive.

False

You can visit their site, and download Helix(TM) Universal Server Basic for free.

It has a fair amount of features and such. My friends and I used it on linux to stream live television at one point.

Sunny Dubey

Make the application skinnable while you're at it.

According to the free basic player (Windows and Linux), v10 player is still in beta.

RealPlayer v8 Basic for windows download link No jukebox, no Plus crap.

Just use the non-"One" version. RealPlayer v8 works fine and once you uncheck all the right things in preferences and delete it from startup it's well-behaived in that it only runs when you start it and closes when you kill it.

download link

Uhhhh... dumass... real player is reals media player........... it was invented in the nineties, mebbe u havening heard of rm filez? real player plays rm files....... but teh real player i think its just ox shit.

Starting in 1993, shortly after moving to Seattle, I more-or-less-consulted for a previous employer, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. At the time I lived alone, and I did find it hard to get motivated in the morning. Telecommuting via transcontinental telnet over a 14.4kbps modem was a hassle. The time difference from my employer was also a problem; starting work when they did (5am my time...) was not an option. Fortunately I lived in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle, which is very pedestrian-oriented, and I discovered that walking to Espresso Vivace every morning for a latte allowed me to "come to work" afterwards in a psychologically helpful way. Yes, I invented a commute for myself, but it was a very pleasant one!

In 1994 I took a job with Progressive Networks (later renamed RealNetworks. That took me out of my studio apartment and back into the workplace for a year. It wasn't a bad place to work during my time there, especially by mid-nineties tech company standards, but I felt I'd done most of my best work during the early months when I was the only programmer on staff. Back then I was a lot better at innovation than at maintenance, and I wasn't crazy about taking direction or meeting the often perfectly reasonable demands of my supervisor, either. I decided it was time to strike out on my own.

Meanwhile there was a lot of interest in the Mapedit imagemap editor, a web statistics package called Wusage, the old WWW FAQ list, and the GD library. But neither Mapedit nor Wusage was set up as a proper revenue-earning product, and I didn't have enough time to work on GD or the FAQ, either. I wanted to start my own company and make an independent living at it, but I didn't want to starve in the process. In 1995 I landed a deal for a book on CGI programming with Addison-Wesley, which provided me with an advance to live on, and I went back to working at home.

I set Boutell.Com up in partnership with my wife Michele. Another person in the living room/office was a helpful motivator to get a reasonable amount of work done. During those first nine months or so I completed the book, wrote a version of Mapedit that (a) was easy to use and (b) expired unapologetically when not registered after 30 days, and created the first commercial version of Wusage.

Fortunately, just as my checking account was scraping the bottom of the book advance, the software started to sell. Shortly after I was able to rescue my sister from temping for Microsoft and put her to work as my office manager. Filling the room with sensible women helps keep a guy on track.

In 1997 or so, my sister moved to Oakland with my soon-to-be brother-in-law, and we needed a new office manager. Michele and I hired Chris, an old friend from college. These were the fattest years for the company, and I was also able to employ Stephen, another old friend. Unfortunately I didn't provide Stephen with much guidance and support; one of his projects should have been recognized as too late in the gaming marketplace he wanted to enter, and the other needed more timely help from me or possibly outside investment to make it as a web-based calendaring solution. These days I can admit that his second project would have been better off with a larger company.

But back to what my workday looked like: make that agonizing commute all the way up the stairs, start the coffee, go out and fetch bagels, come back and sit down... and some weeks I worked hard, others I played way too much Quake. I was still getting the hang of maintaining a good thing if that's what is profitable for you; I kept pushing out new projects that were

garageband.com looks like an interesting music web site. Unfortunately, they are mostly RealAudio oriented. Yes, they do have mp3 downloads for many tunes, but not all. Also their radio station is real audio only. This effectively makes garageband.com a non starter for me.

• Visit the "Real for Unix" page
• Under drop down "1", select "Linux 2.x (libc6 i386)", fill in the rest appropriately.
• Hit submit, scroll to the bottom of the page, there's a "Download Now" button underneath the heading "RealOne Player for Unix - Preview Release"

A few days after I first updated to RealOne (when it first came out), I realized what crap it was. Since then, I've been using RealPlayer 8, which can handle all of the files, but with less hassle. Rather than go for illegal (?) alternatives, you can just go to their Legacy page (which they keep moving around - for a long time the only way to get there was to act like you couldn't get RealOne to work on your machine in the Help pages). For now, the "BlackJack" page is still there.

So?

Download RealOne.

Software I think deserves to be on your list:

• Mozilla Seamonkey Suite Your "classic" mozilla install
• Mozilla Firebird. The smaller Mozilla browser, but still damn good
• Mozilla Thunderbird. Mozilla mail, smaller yet. Complete with built in spam filtering :)
• Winamp 2.x. Can't beat a classic
• Sun J2RE 1.4.2 Probably not necessary, but best to get it installed and out there.
• RealOne Player BASIC. Despite what you think about Real, RealOne isn't such a horrible player, and RV9 isn't a bad codec. Their marketing department needs to be hit with a giant stick though, so make sure you disable all the "automatic options" in realone. Link is to a direct download of the Realone basic player, no hunting for the free version :) CDex Damn good ripping software for windows, and one of the easiest ways to get Ogg on windows.

These are some of the free (speech or beer) software I'd install on a family, non-gaming machine:

• Web Browser: Mozilla or Mozilla Firebird
• E-mail: Mozilla (cross-platform), Mozilla Thunderbird (cross-platform), Evolution (Gnome), or KMail (KDE)
• Office Suite: OpenOffice.org
• Media Player: QuickTime (Windows), Zinf (cross-platform), RealPlayer (cross-platform), WinAmp (Windows), MPlayer (Windows), XMMS (Linux)
• Image Viewer: IrfanView (Windows)
• Instant Messaging: Gaim (cross-platform)
• Personal Information Management: Palm Desktop Software (great PIM suite even if you don't own a Palm)
• Other: Acrobat Reader (although I'm weary of their DRM), Java 2 Runtime Environment, Macromedia Flash and Shockwave players, Ad-Aware (spyware remover for Windows), ZoneAlarm, Sygate Personal Firewall (firewall, alternative to ZoneAlarm), Grisoft AVG Anti-Virus, FileZilla, WinRAR (not free, shareware with nag window), Ofoto desktop software (basic photo album and touch-ups, even if you don't use Ofoto's online services)

Some other software I'd install on my own desktop (dev), in decreasing order of importance:

• Cygwin, bascially all packages
• UltraEdit32 (45-day trial shareware)
• TightVNC
• Ghostscript and GSView
• Java 2 SDK
• Eclipse
• Borland JBuilder Personal
• ActiveState Perl, Python, Tcl/Tk (yes, even though they are in Cygwin), Jython
• GIMP
• POV-Ray
• At least one of Apache, Tomcat, or Plone (Zope)
• HTTrack (a website copier)

You're (obviously) not the only one... I started using Courier a few years back when one of my sysadmin friends mentioned that his company was switching over all of their mail systems to courier. And though people may not all like them, Real Networks it a big company, and it says a lot that they gave courier the vote of confidence over Postfix or QMail.

P.S.: Those things that sound like commercials in the NPR broadcast can't be commercials, because public radio doesn't have commercials by definition. They must be "sponsorship acknowledgements."