Installing Flash Player 10 in Slackware 12.2, a few tries as of yet no luck.

fullmetalgerbil · 03-23-2009, 04:36 PM

Installed Slackware last night, things are moving along except I don't know how to get Flash 10 installed. Tried a couple of different ways with no luck, and even the blunt instrument approach does not work.
Any pointers would be much appreciated.
Thanks

sahko · 03-23-2009, 04:39 PM

If you only use firefox the simpler way is to download the tarball from the Adobe website and extract it to ~/.mozilla/plugins.
Its very simple really.

ppr:kut · 03-23-2009, 04:42 PM

http://www.slackbuilds.org/howto/

Afterwards:
http://slackbuilds.org/repository/12...player-plugin/
or
http://slackbuilds.org/repository/12...er-standalone/

depending on your needs.

Good luck

jrecortel · 03-23-2009, 05:03 PM

1. download install_flash_player_10_linux.tar.gz from adobe website(http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/)
2. extract the file
3. go to the the directory created and type in the command prompt:

Code:

$ ./flashplayer-installer

fullmetalgerbil · 03-23-2009, 05:51 PM

Ah-ha, it worked! Thanks everybody. I'm still getting used to doing things the Slack way, having spent my first nine months on Ubuntu and the last six on Debian. Slackware definately kicks the learning curve up a couple of notches but I started using Linux in the first place to learn stuff so it's all good.
Thanks again.

SwissHeritage · 04-02-2009, 08:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jrecortel

1. download install_flash_player_10_linux.tar.gz from adobe website(http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/)
2. extract the file
3. go to the the directory created and type in the command prompt:

Code:

$ ./flashplayer-installer

It said "Please enter the installation path of the Mozilla, Netscape, or Opera browser (i.e., /usr/lib/mozilla)," and I was lost for a while. I had no idea what "installation path" meant or how to find it, and did I really have to choose from one of those three, or should I use the Firefox installation path? I googled "installation path," and found some discussions about it, but no clear answer. "whereis firefox" gave me "firefox: /usr/bin/firefox /usr/lib/firefox /usr/X11R6/bin/firefox /usr/bin/X11/firefox /usr/X11/bin/firefox," and "which firefox" gave me, "/usr/bin/firefox." Still no clear answer. After ten or fifteen more minutes of research, I decided to try "/usr/lib/mozilla," and got the error message "WARNING: Please enter a valid installation path." Then I tried "/usr/lib/firefox" and it worked. I still had some doubts, so I searched around in the subfolders of "/usr/lib/firefox" and found libflashplayer.so in the plugins folder. The only other plugin in that folder is libnullplugin.so. I looked in /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins and saw some plugins there. From some of the discussions I had found I thought Firefox might look there for plugins, and I didn't want my Flash Player plugin to get lonely, so I moved it from /usr/lib/firefox/plugins to /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins. I went back to Firefox and loaded a page with a Flash Player video, and it worked!

I have two questions. Before I start exploring other possibilities, I'm trying to learn what I can do with the Slackware distribution, with the least possible change from its defaults and with the least possible amount of packages from outside the distribution, using the ways that work best for Slackware. This is the second time I've decided to use a package outside the distribution since I started using it a week ago. Here are my questions:

1. Am I right that I can't view Flash Player videos without using a package from outside the distribution?

2. Did I choose the best place to put the plugin? Could I have left it in /usr/lib/firefox/plugins? If so, would that be better, if I were only using Firefox and nothing else from Mozilla?

3. I see SeaMonkey and Thunderbird in the Xfce Menu. For now I don't plan to use them, but I want to allow for the possibility that I will. In that case, is it best to put the Flash Player plugin in /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins? Will SeaMonkey find them there? I see that Seamonkey has its own plugins folder.

jrecortel · 04-02-2009, 11:40 PM

Quote:

It said "Please enter the installation path of the Mozilla, Netscape, or Opera browser (i.e., /usr/lib/mozilla)," and I was lost for a while. I had no idea what "installation path" meant or how to find it, and did I really have to choose from one of those three, or should I use the Firefox installation path? I googled "installation path," and found some discussions about it, but no clear answer. "whereis firefox" gave me "firefox: /usr/bin/firefox /usr/lib/firefox /usr/X11R6/bin/firefox /usr/bin/X11/firefox /usr/X11/bin/firefox," and "which firefox" gave me, "/usr/bin/firefox." Still no clear answer. After ten or fifteen more minutes of research, I decided to try "/usr/lib/mozilla," and got the error message "WARNING: Please enter a valid installation path." Then I tried "/usr/lib/firefox" and it worked. I still had some doubts, so I searched around in the subfolders of "/usr/lib/firefox" and found libflashplayer.so in the plugins folder. The only other plugin in that folder is libnullplugin.so. I looked in /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins and saw some plugins there. From some of the discussions I had found I thought Firefox might look there for plugins, and I didn't want my Flash Player plugin to get lonely, so I moved it from /usr/lib/firefox/plugins to /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins. I went back to Firefox and loaded a page with a Flash Player video, and it worked!

have you tried to open the firefox at least once before you tried to install the flash player?i think the flashplayer-installer put the libflashplayer.so in your /home/<user>/.mozilla/plugins directory.

brianL · 04-03-2009, 04:59 AM

Use the SlackBuild, as ppr:kut suggested.

SwissHeritage · 04-03-2009, 09:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jrecortel

have you tried to open the firefox at least once before you tried to install the flash player?i think the flashplayer-installer put the libflashplayer.so in your /home/<user>/.mozilla/plugins directory.

Thanks. That helped a lot. I ran flashplayer-installer as root the first time, and it said that because I was running it as root, it would be installed system-wide. Then it asked me to enter the installation path of the Mozilla, Netscape, or Opera browse.

After I read your post, I tried running flashplayer-installer as user, and got this:

Code:

Copyright(C) 2002-2009 Adobe Macromedia Software LLC.  All rights reserved.
Adobe Flash Player 10 for Linux
Adobe Flash Player 10 will be installed on this machine.
You are running the Adobe Flash Player installer as a non-root user.
Adobe Flash Player 10 will be installed in your home directory.
Support is available at http://www.adobe.com/support/flashplayer/
To install Adobe Flash Player 10 now, press ENTER.
To cancel the installation at any time, press Control-C.

NOTE: Please exit any browsers you may have running.
Press ENTER to continue...


----------- Install Action Summary -----------
Adobe Flash Player 10 will be installed in the following directory:
Mozilla installation directory  = /home/jim/.mozilla

That answers my question about which directory to use. Thanks!

SwissHeritage · 04-03-2009, 09:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by brianL

Use the SlackBuild, as ppr:kut suggested.

Thanks, Brian. I'm glad to know about SlackBuild.

tommcd · 04-03-2009, 01:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SwissHeritage

I'm trying to learn what I can do with the Slackware distribution, with the least possible change from its defaults and with the least possible amount of packages from outside the distribution, using the ways that work best for Slackware.

For packages that are not part of a default Slackware install you can safely use any of the build scripts from slackbuilds.org. They are thoroughly tested and work well. They can easily be uninstalled using Slackware pkgtools as well.

cwwilson721 · 04-03-2009, 03:31 PM

I always extract the tarball, and copy the lib*.so to /usr/lib/firefox/plugins (as root).

this way, all users have access to it.

SwissHeritage · 04-03-2009, 07:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cwwilson721

I always extract the tarball, and copy the lib*.so to /usr/lib/firefox/plugins (as root).

this way, all users have access to it.

Yes. I decided to put the lib*.so in the /usr/lib/ tree for that reason, just for learning purposes, even though I imagine I'll always be the only user on this computer, but I put it in /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins, and it's working. Earlier I wasn't sure whether to put it in /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/ or /usr/lib/firefox/plugins/. For learning purposes, can anyone tell me if it makes any difference?

I'm imagining that only firefox will find it in /usr/lib/firefox/plugins/, and that in /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/ it will be used by a wider range of applications.

SwissHeritage · 04-03-2009, 07:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tommcd

For packages that are not part of a default Slackware install you can safely use any of the build scripts from slackbuilds.org. They are thoroughly tested and work well. They can easily be uninstalled using Slackware pkgtools as well.

Thanks.

It isn't so much a question of reliability. Mostly I want to become more familiar with the capacities of the distribution and thoroughly explore all its possibilities, before I branch out to other sources. I'm imagining that if I start adding things from outside of the distribution, I won't learn as much about what I can do with the distribution itself.

The only thing I've added so far is the MPlayer codecs and the Flash Player plugin, but I don't really need them. For learning purposes I'm going to run slackpkg clean-system and see if it removes the plugin. If not, I'll leave it.

Does slackpkg clean-system remove SlackBuilds packages?

(later)

I ran slackpkg clean-system and it did not remove the Flash Player plugin, so I'll keep that. I noticed that when it removed the MPlayer codecs it removed an empty slackbuilds directory. I didn't realize I was already using something from SlackBuilds!

For learning purposes I might try using packages from SlackBuilds and other sources, then running slackpkg clean-system. That way I can learn more about building packages and using other sources, and learn more about what I can do with a clean distribution, at the same time.