Windows Media Player really ticks me off. Of course MS will never release a version of it for Linux. 99% of sites on the net with embedded movies wont work unless you have WMP. Am I plain screwed, or is there some solution?

99% of the sites on the net with embedded movies work just fine on Linux with mplayer and mplayerplug-in in Firefox. The 1% of DRM protected media can be ignored.

Could someone please help me with mplayer. I have tried to get it running numerous times and it never works. I am on slackware. I download the slackware packages (.tgz) and 'installpkg' mplayer, mplayer codecs, and mplayer plugin. Then I try to launch mplayer and I always get a library error, so then I search for the library in question on google to find the program name. Then I try to launch again and same deal, but another library. It doesnt take long before the library cant be found on google either. I have truly tried many times, even on different computers and slackware systems (9.1, 10, 10.1, 10.2). Has anyone gotten mplayer to work? I dont know why its impossible for me.

I must get this problem solved. Is there a Linux distro that has it running out of the box? Otherwise I must go back to evil windows.

Dang. Mplayer still doesnt startup from terminal but it loads up in embedded webpages in firefox!!!! That is crazy. After it loads, it doesnt play tho

When you compile MPlayer, you have to:
./configure --enable-gui
(well, you don't have to, but I advise it)

and from the console/command launcher/icon/whatever type:
gmplayer (Gui MPlayer)
then right click --> open --> play file

mplayer itself is for launching videos via the command line.
(example)
mplayer filename.mpg

As for the browser plugin... did you have the codecs in the
right place when you configured mplayer?
Extract the file "all-20050412.tar.bz2" and copy its contents
into the directory /usr/local/lib/codecs/ . Do this BEFORE compiling
and installing MPlayer.

Good luck and let us know.
-tw

What library does it complain about that you are unable to find?

Regards,
Jacob

Well, I fixed a few, but right now it complains about libpolyp-0.7.so.0

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