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Quicktime Under Linux With MPlayer
Sark writes: "The latest version of the controversial MPlayer program for
Linux supports Quicktime .mov files with the latest codecs.
Apart from the closed source program Crossover, this is the first
open source program that seems to work. Check out the Mplayer
homepage for more info." According to
formats page, Sorenson
Quicktime is still not gonna happen any time soon.
Argg, sorrenson is the one codec that we all really want and still no opensource way to use it... Oh well, atleast we have crossover.
huh!?
Whats the point?
[shamelessly lifted from a post in a different article]
Quicktime is a wrapper format for a number of codecs, just like AVI. An actual Quicktime file is almost invariably encoded in the Sorenson file format, which is is exclusively licensed to Apple. MPlayer can probably never play this format!
Don't Panic
Xanim's supported Quicktime .mov files forever, just not the Sorensen codec. Of course, many of Xanim's modules don't have source code available either, due to IP issues. Also, its mpeg capabilities are questionable at best. Since I got the DSL line in, I usually just look for mpegs anyway and play them with gtv or plaympeg.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I have to say MPlayer and the folks working on it have done a great job, It is really nice stuff, although I think the project would benifift from a refined build process, building it with all the dependencies can be a bit of fun the first time around, divx, dvd, blah blah blah. I dont know if there is a simpole method of doing this with all the complie options.
I really love the GCC 2.96 RedHat warning, if you havent built it yet, HEED that warning.
Is there no chance the RIAA et al can shut this down being out of hungary? I hope not its becoming a wonderful piece of software.
Congrats to the guys making MPlayer happen !!
Sig went tro...aahemmm.....fishing........
It is APPLE's fault that only Quicktime(tm)(c)(r) can play Sorenson codec files. They are keeping it totally proprietary in a petty attempt to be relevant. Please please petition Apple to release the specs and then we will write a player for Linux!
Why r these guys controversal? I read up on their site, they are trying to do the best they can to make a good movie app for linux... should they not include features b/c they are not fully opensource?? Dont let you politics about open/closed source keep linux out of the video world.
"All I can tell the "lesser of two evils" folks is that if they keep voting for evil, they'll keep getting evil."-Lp.org
When Apple finally decides to get its head out of the sand and build a Linux version of Quicktime then I'll stop bad mouthing them about stealing BSD because they couldn't write a good OS if they fell over it.
'Taco's real up on things, can't you tell? I've been playing .mov files (not the sorenson codec) for quite a while now using xanim. Try http://xanim.va.pubnix.com/home.html
Politics, Culture, Food?
You know, if Linux video software would come as Debian packages, I would be really happy. Currently, if I want anything with avifile or something, I need to compile it myself - and I don't want to mess with the source because avifile API isn't exactly solid yet and source that compiled yesterday doesn't work today. Linux video support Isn't Here, dammit.
The mplayer author seems to be aware of the Marillat's unofficial .debs... and now whines that people are violating his "thou shalt not distribute Binaries" lisence.
I don't want to compile the package myself. I want binaries.
Source-only distribution is fine, as long as you let somebody make the pre-built binaries available so that we lazy bastards can use the program. I know I can compile mplayer if I'm positively motivated, but I know my mother couldn't.
This is why I'm considering using VideoLanClient instead of mplayer - at least it's under GPL and I'm able to get "official" Debian packages for it.
What exactly is supposed to be so controversial about this program? I've been using it for a month and a half now and I think it is great. The addition of quicktime support means fewer reboots into windows just to watch some silly movie or another. As for the sorenson business, I'd like to think that eventually MPEG-4 (DiVX) will overtake whatever hold this compression codec has. Open standards tend to win out over proprietary ones, even when the proprietary one is technically superior. Just look at what happened with Betamax vs. VHS.
Lee
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
Mpeg is greated than all. Forget Quicktime. It's a lame proprietary and non-friendly format. Hell, i'd rather use AVI over Quicktime. Sorry if this comes off as a troll, but it's true, and im sick of seeing people complain about it. Just use something BETTER like MPEG.
It would be news if it supported Sorenson at all. We already have a number of applications to chose from that will play non-Sorenson quicktime back, xanim being the first that I ever knew of. Quicktime for Linux project has all sorts of stuff that is non-Sorenson. Sorenson playback has always been the gotcha that matters.
The only thing I can see is if they can use the Windows binary code to decode the Sorenson without the huge performance hit of running the entire player within a Wine context, and having the added benefit of XVideo availability for Sorenson playback. But it doesn't look like this will be the case.
More noteworthy is the VIVO support and xanim support, the VIVO support is a first (AFAIK) under linux natively, and the xanim support really helps bridge the gap between new and old-school media playback, xanim gets a lot of those files that have been overlooked in the "new wave" of media players for linux...
Also, another nit-pick, the crossover plugin, as such is not so much a player, but a nicely done wine modification within which the Windows Quicktime player runs... You can use the latest Wine CVS repository in much the same way (outside a browser at least).
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Have you built MPlayer , RECENTLY with ALL the options under 2.96 (All updated) ????
.....hmmmm.......
I have TWICE 2 DIFFERENT Machines, Its SCREWY as hell, SCREWEY is a technical term that means just plain act strange, crashed, skitters, all kinds of wierdness, on occasion, sometimes its fine,
I built it with 3... and guess what NO PROBLEMS that I had with the RH 2.96 on the SAME MACHINE.
Work great with one, work schitzy with the one they warn you about
Have you even read the MPlayer warning ?
Sig went tro...aahemmm.....fishing........
I love ramen noodles, they're so great they even remind me to use Windows Update
I have given up on playing .mov and most other multimedia on my linux box. My wife still has win98 on her machine. If I want to watch something on the web, I just use the win98 box. When it comes to things like this, Linux apps are in the dark ages. Sorry, but its true. Its just too much of a pain in the ars to get working.
Have you built MPlayer , RECENTLY with ALL the options under 2.96 (All updated) ????
:)
Yup. Works like a charm, thanks. On two different machines.
BTW, when it gives that asinine prompt to type "gcc 2.96 is broken" or whatever, you can type "gcc 2.96 works just fine and the mplayer developers don't have a clue what they're talking about" and it'll go through. Makes me feel a bit better when building it
- fader
I can think of several programs that run under Linux/Unix which will play QuickTime .mov files -- xanim and xmms (plus the QuickTime-xmms plugin) will both play non-sorenson QuickTime files. The problem is, almost nothing worth watching (in the world of things QuickTime) is available in anything other than a Sorenson-encoded version.
.asf, .wmv, and .mpeg files with a variety of options (such as double-size and full-screen), and it will play VideoCDs quite nicely -- I have several movies that were dragged back from China on VCD that look great when run through mplayer. It's a great little video player, but it having the ability to play non-sorenson QuickTime is hardly news.
Sorenson, of course, is owned by Apple, and they are as likely to make it open-source as Microsoft is to release the next Office under the GPL.
Now, mplayer will play
If you want QuickTime under Linux, with the Sorenson codec, your only option is Crossover (which works quite nicely, and has given me many minutes of movie-trailer viewing bliss).
--
I Hit the Karma Cap, and All I Got Was This Lousy
Yeap, I build mplayer all the time with 2.96 and haven't had any problems with it. Build it on both RedHat and Mandrake boxes. I also use it all the time to play things under Linux, including playing (S)VCD's and DVD's. Then again, I build from cvs and not the releases so that might explain things also. And yeah, I read it and ignore it cause they're full of it. Sorry, but I haven't had problems with 2.96 that you're experiencing.
Linux may be "superior" to Windows in one or more ways -- but what matters is being able to get the job done. And if I can't view a client's QT movie under Linux, Linus doesn't get the job done. And that's why it's important that Linux support QT...
All about me
Xine does Quicktime to, has done for quite some time. Doesn't do Sorenson either, but they do support win32 codecs, so dropping in the Quicktime dlls isn't impossible futher down the line.
This post will enter the public domain 70 years after my death, unless Disney buys another extension.
Too bad today is Wednesday...
:-)
uhm, I've been able to play non-sorenson .movs with aktion for over two years now.. what gives?
LOL
I'm just kidding, i would never do that.
eww. but diapers do look nice on a nice young high school student (i'm still in high school)
Still waiting for the Vorbis/OpenDivx combination to get officially supported. Even though OpenDivx is non functional on 64 bit processors it's still easier to run on powerpc than Microsoft's DLL.
xine.sourceforge.net
Same thing goes with nuvplayer. The guy who wrote it integrated some "optimized" MMX code which doesn't work on AMD boxes anymore; gcc-2.96 has NOTHING to do with it. Granted, 2.96 has its issues but blaming the compiler for "not being able to compile MMX correctly" is ridiculous when the code being compiled is utterly broken!
I just finished reading that linuxworld article and I have a few thoughts.
... well, to put it bluntly, I often feel exactly the same way that they do when people ask me incessant questions. The only difference is I force myself not to put my true feelings in the FAQ. Devs are humans and they lose patience and get annoyed. Let's face it, should they really be responsible for answering questions about installing shared libraries when it is a more general linux issue and not something specific to MPlayer? In fact, on a more broader scope, should they really be responsible for answering anyone's questions at all? If you said yes, then I invite you to think about why you said yes. Probably the only reason you can come up with is because "If they are mean to their users, than their users will leave and they won't have any users anymore." Fair enough.. but do the MPlayer devs really care if anyone uses their stuff? They probably don't frankly. Any dev who works on free software for the sake of providing a quality product for Mr. Newbie quickly becomes depressed and stops working on the project. Only those devs who work on free software for their own amusement, interest, needs, etc. are those who can endure for long periods of time. The bottom line is, that users of free software often create more headaches for developers of free software than benefits. If that statement shocks you, I'd encourage you to think about it for a while ...
1 - The MPlayer developers' apparently find it irresponsible for companies like Redhat to include gcc 2.96 (or whatever it is). By making it difficult for their users to compile MPlayer with this version of gcc, they are using their power and influence (indirectly) to twist Redhat's arm into changing its behavior. I actually approve of this behavior (causing change by writing code) and I applaud MPlayer devs' courage to do this in the face of the heat they will get from people like Joe Barr.
As for Joe Barr, he seems to be exhibiting the typical Microsoft attitude of "if enough people use it, everyone should support it." He says that gcc 2.96 must be supported because it comes installed by default on his Mandrake box. That's like a Windows user telling me that my project has to work perfectly on Windows XP or that it has to work perfectly on an ATI card (since they are so popular). Think about it. Should developers allow popularity to dictate what they do? My answer is no. Do what you think is right, don't allow the dominant software to control your actions. Joe Barr's argument that gcc 2.96 should be embraced because it is installed by default on distribution only makes sense if the devs are in the business of pleasing customers. But as Joe has obviously forgotten, these devs don't have customers. And they probably don't care about annoying potential users either.. and why should they?
2 - Regarding the devs' inflammatory comments in their FAQ
I hate Mplayer, i tryed to install it. And no
program should complain about my version of
gcc when it was just written, not to mention
the other dependents it needed. I am not upgrading or downgrading my gcc, which makes no sense, a program that you can either upgrade or
downgrade to get it to run. Its just because they are arrogant bastards. And their FAQ pisses me off more. Ill be happy with crossover and
xine.
MPlayer is the fastest player i have ever used. I tried a lot of others (xine is really good) but kept going back.
/confiture; make; make install it
Its the first player i got DVDs to play with
and now its got QuickTime support.
These guys kick ass, quit your bitchin, and go
Apologies for being off topic.. but everyone seems to think that you need crossover to run quicktime when wine works fine to run quicktime.
hmmm, I compiled 0.50 some weeks ago with gcc 2.96 (I think the warning is a bit overblown, having to do a --ignore-gcc-whatever *and* having to type 'yeah, gcc 2.96 sucks' or something seems a bit redundant) and it's been working just fine...
While I do not doubt that gcc 2.96 has bugs, in my experience it's not worse than most gcc versions I used during the years, and much better than quite some of them, especially in C++.
I also did a bit of google-ing about this warning in mplayer, and AFAIK some people were a bit angry that 2.96 has been singled out (probably just because it's a RH release) I wonder if the reasons for so prominently warning people about 2.96 are at least in part political...
-- the cake is a lie
The sort of childish behavior which is reported to have come from this project is exactly the ammunition desired by those trying to label all of us as "fanatical zealots". In short, this project is a disgrace to the greater community.
Let me quickly point out something: Red Hat Software has done a hell-of-a-lot more for free/OSS (and particularly Linux) than the developers in question have ever done.
-- Thomas Corriher
Does it infringe anyone's intellectual property? Not as far as I can tell, mplayer most of it's codec modules as seperate .dlls. (I suppose if apple has a patent on the quicktime format as a whole, they could come after mplayer, but that seems unlikely, and it certainly would'nt involve the RIAA/MPAA).
I've lost count of the amount of times I've seen someone on slashdot make some misinformed comment about the RIAA/MPAA/DMCA, they seem to be considered as the generic bad guys, who will spoil ALL your fun, even if it's not in any way related to them.
</rant>RIAA break your glowstick, RIAA eat your candy.
http://allmacintosh.xs4all.nl/preview/206564.html
http://www.afterdawn.com/software/video_software/
Your mouth is like Columbus Day.
One of the very useful (to me) aspects of MPlayer is that it can run console-only. This is very useful on a slow machine with a hardware decoder: I have a P5-133 with a Hollywood+ MPEG2 decoder which can actually playback video, including DVDs. Not bad for a machine that was 'slow' about four or five years ago.
Even if someone built binary packages, Debian would never distribute them. OpenDivX is open-source, but it is not under a GPL-compatible license. That means distributing a product that has linked OpenDivX to GPL code (like the rest of Mplayer) is a violation of the GPL.
Also, Mplayer configures itself based on what libraries you have installed on your system (ffmpeg, OpenDivX, SDL, win32 codecs, etc). Including all these libraries would be redundant, including none would build an Mplayer that can't play movies ( which would be worthless). This could be overcome if Mplayer built video decoders as plugins that could be loaded at run-time, but it doesn't.
Lastly, all the decoding and video output is optimized at compile time for MMX, 3D-now, SSE or whatever CPU-specific speedups it detects. If the build host has an Intel chip and you have an AMD, the player would crash and burn on your machine. This could probably be overcome by adding CPU-detection code, but including a different version of every decoder for every CPU would add unnecessary bloat.
0 1 - just my two bits
I think, I may see what the problem for ME with 2.96 is , a person down in this thread states theres some MMX code incompatible with AMD , any of this ring a bell, both systems are Athlons, could this be the cause of the abbohrent behavior on my machines with RH 2.96 VS gcc3 ? Or are all you on Atholns too ?
As did I. I love how they were using profanity more than Jay and Silent Bob, and making punchy comments about RH and their business intrest. Like they said, "It compiles bash on a s390!" Sheesh, RH did get their compiler stuff straightened out, and they will act in their best business intrest, which isn't making x geek happy, but focusing on the profits that can be made by migrating companies to RH.
No need to HEED the gcc 2.96 warning. --disable-gcc-checking will take care of that.
It works fine for me on Redhat 7.1 with gcc-2.96-85. Really, they just have a problem with Redhat period, and I don't think they think much of anyone using Redhat linux. I wonder what real consequences derive from using this version of gcc. I've had no problems with mplayer.
It's a great program once its up and running, though. Best video playback on linux.
I do like the fact that this gives Linux yet another avenue for media. This added in with xmovie, gtv, quicktime under wine, xaniam, and now mplayer. I love choices..
Only 'flamers' flame!
I've ignored that warning for a long time and have had no problems. Intersting that it didn't get mentioned, but mplayer plays .asf and divx 3.11 movies too.
When the FAQ writer says "read the documentation" as much as they do then they don't seem to understand that an FAQ is _part_ of the documentation too.
If it is beta software then I think they should be more up front about the beta-ness than simply having a sub 1.0 number and disuade non-coders from trying it before being as insulting as they can be _after_ they suffer through all this.
A direct quote of something else:
"Q: I'd like to compile MPlayer on Minix !
A: Me too."
What is the point of doing that? They could either be less terse or not have such a worthless item. I know it looks like a dumb request but they don't have to respond with dumb answers.
Actually the reason I query is , MPlayer CAN use the DeCSS lib and some other niceties theat the MPAA/RIAA consider violations of the DCMA , Sites have been forced to remove content and links to that same code, here is a program that usess, and links (In more ways than one) to that very code they would like removed from the face of the earth, no you and I both know that is impossible.....hm what to do........Hey I got it target the projects that make use of the code !,
.hu realm, No need to rant I am aware of EXACTLY what the legal issues involved here are, I was mainly curious about juridiction.
If you think the MPAA/RIAA are ONLY concerned about stopping piracy you are the one who is misinformed, yes it is a concern to them and a main one, its about making MONEY period and the Artists themselves know this. BEYOND piracy are ownership issues that are being fought out even no. The RIAA/MPAA is a party to this as well. CONTROL is another issue the RIAA is driven twoard, the DeCSS, (or POSSIBLE use of that code MUST be unacceptable to them) otherwise why go to the lengths in cutting links and removing code thus far ?
That is why I was curios, if they had any legal flak as of yet or if they are even succeptable , MPlayer being in
Sig went tro...aahemmm.....fishing........
To the guys in this thread who have mplayer running... I downloaded and compiled .50 a while back and it compiled just fine with the gcc 3.0.1 on my RH7.2 box. (I also installed the supporting files in my home directory as the instructions say). However, when I tried to run it with a test mpeg file from the command line, the output seems to indicate that it's detecting the codec just fine, but look at the last 2 lines:
/dev/fb0: No such device
$ mplayer test.mpg
(about 11 lines of output snipped)
Detected video codec: [mpeg12] drv:1 (MPEG 1 or 2)
fbdev: Can't open
Sorry, selected video_out device is incompatible with this codec.
I would suppose this has something to do with the framebuffer? What do I need to do to get this going on a fairly stock RH install? Thanks.
If Sorenson codec is an issue, lets all send mail to Sorenson Labs and ask them to support Linux. At the least, release a DLL for one of the players.
Something about 2.96 (while 2.4.x was still in -pre) not compiling the kernel correctly, in particular screwing up the filesystem code ...
... and that GCC 2.96 does not even officially exist, according to GNU?
Yes you heard it right. This seems to be good news for Linux users. According to Frank Casanova, the head honcho of Quicktime, Quicktime 6 will de-emphasise Sorenson for MPEG-4. In an interview with Creative:Mac he says
... you'll see our file format of QuickTime is the file format for MPEG-4. As you may remember, [ISO has] selected the QuickTime format as the basis for MPEG-4. And then what we're doing is we're building our own audio and video CODEC, but based on the recipe as published by this standard body, by ISO, for ... video and audio for music and speech. There's a few different CODECs in there. And that's what we're doing going forward. And you can expect to see incredible video quality using these new MPEG-4 CODECs.
... was great for CD-ROM distribution. MPEG-2 ... was targeted at a much higher data rate, much higher quality, and it found its way into areas like DVD playback and for HDTV and for some of the satellite communications where bandwidth is really not constrained. But MPEG-4 is the MPEG for the Internet. It takes lower than MPEG-1 data rates and practically MPEG-2 quality and makes it available for people to stream over the Internet, which is high and to the right, exactly where you want to see this go.
... you can do incredibly good jobs with audio at a much smaller file size and lower data rate and get even better sounding quality than MP3 is providing. I think, over time, we'll see AAC supplant MP3 as the digital audio standard. That's the direction we're headed.
/ ap plequicktimelive0112172.htm
CASANOVA: It's the center of our universe. The Sorenson video CODEC has been an integral part of QuickTime since we had QuickTime 3. Sorenson is exclusive to QuickTime, a proprietary format, that has just produced incredible quality both for download of movie trailers and real-time streaming over the Internet. They've done incredibly well. And we're going to continue working with the Sorenson guys. We're not shutting that off. And people will probably opt to use Sorenson in some cases. But certainly the center of the work we do is going to be around standards.
Everything Apple does--from the Unix bases of OS X, to FireWire being IEEE 1394, to USB to all the various facets of what we do, from AirPort being 802.11--we want to make sure that every piece of our architecture and infrastructure are based on industry standards. QuickTime is no different. Our streaming protocols are RTP/RTSP as defined by the IETS; and now
MPEG-4 continues the lineage of the MPEG family. MPEG-1
And the AAC audio component for music will likely replace MP3 as the default and brand new audio standard on the Web because I'll tell you what,
Earlier [last] week, with Real Networks announcing their support for MPEG-4, we found that to be a sudden and abrupt change in direction for them, but nonetheless a welcome one. We're really happy here at Apple, and as members of the Internet Streaming Media Alliance--the ISMA--we're really happy that Real had decided to make this change in course. Real is a big company, at least from an Internet media streaming perspective, and their stamp of approval on MPEG-4 gives the whole space more momentum.
The rest of the interview can be found here...
http://www.creativemac.com/2001/12_dec/features
I did, ignoring that stupid warning, and it worked just fine. My guess is that when 2.96 first arrived, their code wouldn't compile under it so they put that crap in there. Over time they have fixed their code to the point where it works fine under 2.96, but still blame the compiler so as not to lose face.
I wonder how many people, after being told that the FAQ is hostile and rude and nasty, are now combing the thing re-interpreting every bit of humour as being nasty? It's amazing the effect an unfair change of context can have...
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Remember that when the application doesn't run correctly, it is not obvious to most people whether it is an application-specific problem or one that requires general knowledge of their operating system, so they weren't being completely unreasonable to think to ask the people who wrote the app, they just happened to be wrong.
In other words, the users don't have to create "headaches" for developers because the developers are not obligated to help them for free, just to be civil. Being rude is especially inexusable in the FAQ since that's not an email that was fired off without thinking when someone was in a bad mood and can't be taken back, it's something they can easily remedy at any time, but haven't had the decency to change. I think they need to grow up.
I'd rather be lucky than good.
Perhaps you should demand a refund. Or maybe there should be some sort of law that requires people to be polite.
-- My comment is above.
To me a video player should play video AND sound. Over the course of the weekend I have tried avifile, mplayer, xmovie and a shitload of other programs with mixed results. So much for trying to have one player to play my various movies. Xmovie doesn't play anything, xanim does ok with avis, avifile won't compile, mplayer gives me sound but no video. The only media player that works on my system is quicktime with wine. I have xine which handles DVD just fine but it crashes when I try to play anything else. I don't care to hear more about ogg-vorbis and OpenDivx formats either. It will be years before those formats begin to make inroads and as far as I'm concerned they are a step backwards. Don't bother e-mailing the developers either. They write shit software with shit documentation and when you ask a question you get RTFM. My question to them is: "Where IS the fucking manual?"
MPlayer + Quicktime = schweeetttt
No, MPlayer + Quicktime = ehhhhhh. Lots of stuff in Linux supports Quicktime, but until MPlayer (or whatever else) supports the Sorenson codec, it's not really all that "schweet."
Mozilla's a nice operating system, but it needs a better browser.
When I saw that the new mplayer supported quicktime, I sprang into action, downloading and building the new version. I then find out it won't play the one movie I want, american jedi All I get is a black box. Oh well, I'll be waiting for the release that has real quicktime support.
Anyways, the movie is worth a look, even if you have to boot into windows.
=================
Unix is very user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are.
I just recently started using mplayer... so far its been able to play every buffy and Angel episode I've manged to find except one (and .asf)
This is a great program. The first media player that has worked well for me in FreeBSD/XFree.
I Hope these guys keep up the great work.
-M
It's INCREDIBLY easy to make debs from mplayer source.
.deb package.
If I remember correctly, all one has to is a dpkg-buildpackage from the main source directory and you get a nice
Only thing is is that it's illegal to distribute these.... =)
Yes. Many people are considering it a better compiler than most gcc:s in the past because it is less sucky and less buggy in a lot of areas. Also, it still (AFAIK) has an edge over gcc 3 in that it compiles glibc and such.
I also did a bit of google-ing about this warning in mplayer, and AFAIK some people were a bit angry that 2.96 has been singled out (probably just because it's a RH release) I wonder if the reasons for so prominently warning people about 2.96 are at least in part political...
They are only political. There used to be problems with the Mplayer code but those have been corrected, but the warning wasn't removed (most likely because of the Mplayer developers' own political agendas and so that they would not looose too much face).
GNU/Linux. The Freshmaker.
Xine can now do DivX, OpenDivX, DVD, MPEG 1/2, Windows Media Video 8 and 8, and most of the formats MPlayer can. So can Avifile. They're open source, Mplayer isn't - read their documentation sometime, specifically the part on packaging. And no, not just the codecs, but the project itself.
Non-Sorenson Quicktime in only useful for people making movies under Linux.
Many people put in a bloody large amount of time and effort into getting newcomers to the platform. Telling someone they're an idiot because they don't know how ldconfig works undoes that hard work and pisses me off. Its possible to answer newbiew questions withotu being a fuckwit, but the mplayer team would rather serve their own egos. Especially if mplayer was packaged like most Linux programs (the mplayer team forbid this) the postinstaller would do that anyway.
Ogle, Xine and Avifile are also more well designed, with most options avaliable via the GUI and command line switches rather than compile time options.
The MPlayer team have also yet to respond to Bero's response re: their GCC 2.96 claims, leaving something on their web page which has seemingly been proven to be technically false.
Furthermore, telling me in captial letters that MY SYSTEM IS TO SLOW TO PLAY THIS MOVIE when I'm fairly sure a 900 Mhz Athlon with 640MB of RAM is capable of playing a VGA res DivX is worth a laugh or two.
When there's a billion better players out there which don't go out of their way to be rude to people and Open Source licensing, why use Mplayer?
Judging from all people I know that have compiled Mplayer with gcc-rh 2.96, that seems to be the general trend. The Mplayer warning seems to be misleading at best and a blatantly false accusation at worst.
GNU/Linux. The Freshmaker.
Seems to me that Sorenson should charge for the compressor, and give away (binary at least) the decompressor. The $$$ value of the video creation module would be enhanced by the ubiquity of the playback module.
The goal of content providers is to hit as many eyeballs as possible. They, IMNSHO, should use technology which fits that model.
BTW, Mplayer 0.5 and 0.6 build/work great on my Mandrake box despite the gcc warning.
There are a few reasons behind that. Firstly, MPlayer has many options with regard to what kind of output it should use. These are bese selected during compilation.
GFair enough, but that's an architecture problem that the team should hopefully fix soon.
Secondly, to be really useful, MPlayer requires several dlls, and codecs. These codecs either come from the windows dlls, or from closed source projects like the DivX(tm) MPEG-4 Codec.
So? Many (read most) Linux players do this: Avifile, Xine, etc. They can still be packaged - stick freshrpms.net in your sources.list on your redhat box and APT away. They just separate the DLLs from the software if necessary.
Unlike the Open Source players, though, Mplayer uses non Open Source code in its actual binaries apparently. So yeah, ignore the web page claiming its open source and read this Mplayer therefore does not meet the Open Source Definition or the Free Software Freedoms list and shouldn't bother claiming to be Open Source.
AFAIK, gcc-rh 2.96 has compiled all released, stable kernels just fine, from kernel 2.4.x and up. What's the point? What does it have to do with Mplayer and why does Mplayer need to issue a warning about this compiler? Why doesn't it have a warning for gcc 3, which also has had kernel compilation problems?
You are free to call it anything you like... gcc2.96, gcc 2.96, gcc-rh 2.96, rh-gcc 2.96, gcc 2.96-rh, and so on. Pick anyone you like. It's still an excellent compiler (maybe currently the best free one) and one that is used by at least two major GNU/Linux distributions. It still doesn't answer the question why the Mplayer developers would need to issue a warning and refuse compilation unless you pass a special flag and type in a lie?
http://www.bero.org/gcc296.html has some relevant facts regarding gcc 2.96, I really recommend that page.
GNU/Linux. The Freshmaker.
International Intellectual Property (IIP) issues might arise when Hungary gets around to applying to join the European Union (or NATO). But the EU politicians haven't AFAIK been quite as corrupt as US congress-critters about pandering to Big Music and Hollywood, so there's some hope that they'll maintain First Sale and (noncommercial) Fair Use types of consumer media rights. The EU is fairly tough about protecting consumers' privacy rights, so one can hope the RIAA/MPAA won't prevail there. (Vivendi owning Universal is a worry, but they're in France and can't buy laws one hopes.)
In any case, it won't matter. The horse is out of the barn already. The RIAA/MPAA can close the barn door (in the US, maybe), but they won't ever catch the horse again. To paraphrase someone's famous quote about the Internet, open source software interprets authoritarian oppression as damage... and routes around it.
"The latest version of the controversial MPlayer program for Linux supports Quicktime .mov files with the latest codecs."
.mov files.
:)
...
"According to formats page, Sorenson Quicktime is still not gonna happen any time soon."
Dude, Sorenson is *the* format for
Distribution of Quicktime media has become such that if your player doesn't do Sorenson, it is misleading to say that it does Quicktime, as nearly all QT media (movie trailers anyone?) is in Sorenson format.
The article should read "MPlayer now supports older Quicktime formats", but it does *NOT* support Quicktime. Neither do I
We all know that nobody has any good reason to encode in such horrible closed formats anymore, but poeple still do it. Maybe what we need is a good sorenson2divx command-tool.
While others on this site will be content to sit on their hands saying "it ain't gonna happen", I'm helping make it happen: All free media (movies, music, etc) distributed by myself and associates are only done so with open formats. (ie divX, ogg vorbis, png)
.
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"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
d00d, fix yer .sig........
/.: why the hell am I here?
-Mark
It's not just about Mplayer versus Joe Barr, it's about a lot of annoyed Mplayer users on major GNU/Linux platforms versus a few Mplayer developers with their own political agenda (anti-gcc-2.96-rh) and their desire to use the software project for false statements and pure FUD to support said agenda. Whatever they are using their power and influence for, it's certainly not about fair play.
As for Joe Barr, he seems to be exhibiting the typical Microsoft attitude of "if enough people use it, everyone should support it." He says that gcc 2.96 must be supported because it comes installed by default on his Mandrake box. That's like a Windows user telling me that my project has to work perfectly on Windows XP or that it has to work perfectly on an ATI card (since they are so popular). Think about it. Should developers allow popularity to dictate what they do? My answer is no. Do what you think is right, don't allow the dominant software to control your actions.
Your argument is flawed. This is not about not working flawlessly on all configurations and systems, this is about spreading blatant lies and FUD.
Joe Barr's argument that gcc 2.96 should be embraced because it is installed by default on distribution only makes sense if the devs are in the business of pleasing customers. But as Joe has obviously forgotten, these devs don't have customers. And they probably don't care about annoying potential users either.. and why should they?
Maybe because no contributor/developer is born as a contributor? Most of them start as users, and the Mplayer project's attitude towards users is rude, to say the least.
2 - Regarding the devs' inflammatory comments in their FAQ ... well, to put it bluntly, I often feel exactly the same way that they do when people ask me incessant questions. The only difference is I force myself not to put my true feelings in the FAQ. Devs are humans and they lose patience and get annoyed.
Yes, but by putting their rude remarks towards users asking questions on their web page, they are showing their arrogance towards all users, not just the one(s) that asked a particular question. Even if a rude remark on a mailing list is bad to begin with, putting the same attitude everywhere on the home page is making it many times worse.
Let's face it, should they really be responsible for answering questions about installing shared libraries when it is a more general linux issue and not something specific to MPlayer?
No. There's a major difference between answering "I'm sorry, installing shared libraries is a general Linux topic and is thus out of the scope of this documentation. Please read the manuals for your distribution or other documentation on the Internet" instead of calling users stupid and lusers.
In fact, on a more broader scope, should they really be responsible for answering anyone's questions at all? If you said yes, then I invite you to think about why you said yes. Probably the only reason you can come up with is because "If they are mean to their users, than their users will leave and they won't have any users anymore." Fair enough.. but do the MPlayer devs really care if anyone uses their stuff? They probably don't frankly.
Quite obviously not. The problem is that all contributors are beginners at some point. Thus there's certainly no need to call users names or being otherwise unpolite, even if you don't want to answer all questions yourself.
Any dev who works on free software for the sake of providing a quality product for Mr. Newbie quickly becomes depressed and stops working on the project.
That's not necessarily the case. One doesn't have to answer all users' questions. In my experience, a good FAQ is a good start. If you don't want to answer all questions a short pointer to where the information could be found is a good start to make people "go away". Being rude is not a part of this, it's perfectly possible to give an "look for information elsewhere" answer without being rude.
Only those devs who work on free software for their own amusement, interest, needs, etc. are those who can endure for long periods of time.
In my experience, there's usually no conflict in creating software that you like yourself and that can also be usable by others without insulting them, or continuing to spread information that many people have already pointed out is very untruthful.
The bottom line is, that users of free software often create more headaches for developers of free software than benefits. If that statement shocks you, I'd encourage you to think about it for a while ...
Only if you divide the world into a "we developers", "them users" mindset. This is usually far from true, in particular it doesn't take into account that a person can be both at the very same time, and that noone is born as a contributor/developer.
GNU/Linux. The Freshmaker.
uhh, okay, i guess... why not just go with Egg Drool?
/.: why the hell am I here?
"The latest version of the controversial MPlayer program for Linux"
Mplayer is controversial for three things:
Their attitude towards users
The mplayer devs seem to take pleasure in responding "RTFM" to any question that could have been partially answered in the past 100 years... whether it's actually in their docs or not. They view ordinary users who don't know some technical things as inferior people who shouldn't be using linux, yet they seem only concerned in building mplayer's "reputation".
Their stance towards GCC 2.96
It is of the Mplayer's opinion that 2.96 is bug ridden and unworthy of use, and they feel the need to press that opinion on others. When presented with views that 2.96 is nowhere near as buggy as claimed(and in fact, quite good), they resort to it not being "official". Of course, they have admitted GCC 3 to be buggy, but because it's "official", they neglect to "warn" others like they have with 2.96.
Their mixture of licenses
Mplayer contains both GPLed and proprietary code in the same source tree, and when compiled... the same executable. Mplayer's wishy-washy license(except for "no binaries") has led people to doubt that it's even open source.. even to the point of questioning if mplayer might be in violation of the GPL.
I just got a response from Crossover's customer support.
Very helpfull!
-Mark
I think people should go easy on the mplayer developers. Thanks to their never ending hard work (I update the CVS version everyday to a plethora of updates), Linux users have what is probably the best video player out there (though Xine is still number one for DVD playback).
And yes, I do use GCC 2.96 (from Mandrake 8.0), and there are no problems associated with it.
It'll be a cold day in hell before AAC usurps MP3.
using apt is one way of simplifying the installation process of mplayer. just edit /etc/apt/sources.list and (after searching through the unofficial apt sources web site for the mplayer distribution site), add the entry for mplayer. the unofficial site has frequently updated compiled versions of mplayer with up-to-date versions of all its dependencies. all the options are compiled in by default, including lirc, divx, DVD support, mpeg support, all that.
....
if you still like compiling and configuring such things, apt-get source
whooo! go debian!
I subscribed to the mailing list for a while, and the reason it got singled out is because every couple of days someone would complain that mplayer didn't compile. And the reason for that? Because they were using gcc 2.96.
Who reads warnings from 'configure'? That's right, not many people at all. So having the luser type in a statement that they know what they are doing is far better than letting them "click-thru" something you can be sure they didn't read.
I've been watching Sorenson clips using the quicktime player under wine for several months now. I had to tell it to use only the basic windows GDI(?) calls, but it works fine.
Being pretty much a Linux newb, I was looking for a way to play divx movies on my new Mandrake 8.1 installation. Reading this story on slashdot, I thought MPlayer sounded great and went to their site for info. First I found out I had to compile the app myself, not a big deal. The sucky thing was that I have gcc 2.96, but I went ahead and gave it a shot anyway. Installed perfectly in 30 minutes, with a GUI and different skins. Played my movies perfectly. I'd love full quicktime support, but the current version is impressive as is.