Hi,

I'm currently viewing all my video and DVD stuff on two different desktops (CentOS and Kubuntu), each with a combination of MPlayer and VLC.

Now I'm considering doing everything only with an "MPlayer-on-steroids" build for Slackware 13.37. Basically, I like the one-app-per-task approach. But first things first.

1) I'm basically using this script here as a starting point for my build:
http://slackware.org.uk/people/alien...MPlayer/build/

What libs (from slackbuilds.org) would be reasonable to include before the build to support playback of the most common - and the odd exotic - video formats? The thing with MPlayer is that ./configure --help spits out a gazillion of options

2) Until now I've only used the no-GUI version of MPlayer, since the default interface seems to me almost unusable. Now I understand there are several new frontends available for MPlayer. Is there one that works OK for DVD playback, e. g. enables you to select chapters, languages and subtitles without having to jump through burning loops?

Cheers,

Niki

One of the means used to limit freedom of software is to channel people into a particular algorithm and then patent that algorithm. Another example of this was gif translation, but fortunately that patent has run out. I believe dvd content listing to be a dangerous area for that reason.

There is another issue: In the US, there's 52 states to sue someone in. Imagine you are the small guy who has made something unpopular (I know of a commercial case of this, where the multinational was a lift company). The multinational can just sue and sue, because they have deep pockets. They may lose in court, but how long could you keep going if they were after you?

mplayer config has huge numbers of options. Download it, open the source, and write down the ones that say --with-something(about 1/3 of them). Then get/compile/install each 'something' you want which usually are libraries. THEN compile mplayer --with-everything. Some clearly conflict; You might find options for pulse audio player, jack, esound, and a few others, but clearly you want what plays your sound. Likewise, if you have dri, you don't need framebuffer. You don't need all the nutty half-assed ways of driving video either. You may want xvid, opengl, sdl, and a few others but not the whole kit & caboodle.

Just get the one from AlienBob's restricted repository (based outside USA) and you're good to go. Why waste your time. For that matter, use his VLC too. It's the most awesome build possible.

I'll second that.
http://slackware.org.uk/people/alien...d_slackbuilds/

Nope, theres only 50 states in the US.

Best is to get the SVN version ( see the mplayer site for details ), just do a normal configure and it will tell you what formats have been compiled in and what havn't, it's less confusing than using configure --help, then if you need something that hasn't been compiled in just get the relevent code ( usually librarys ) and reconfigure, then to update mplayer just do an svn update and rebuild and install.
As for the gui I seem to recall seeing something on their site about stopping official support for a gui as there are a number of 3rd party guis available.

OK, I spent a few hours of experimenting, but right now, I'm enthusiastic about the results: a lean and fast video player with a nice and functional GUI and MPlayer under the hood, playing just every video format that I throw at it, without any hiccups of freezes or the likes. Oh yes, and DVD navigation works nice too. Frankly, this is the best video player I've ever used in ten years of Linux. Here's a short abstract of what I did.

1) uninstall the vanilla MPlayer package

2) Install the following libs/codecs from slackbuilds.org (some aren't strict requirements, some are built-in anyway, but I use them for other things... YMMV):

- lame
- a52dec
- xvidcore
- libdvdcss
- opencore-amr
- x264
- libdv
- faac
- live555
- speex
- libvpx
- orc
- schroedinger
- dirac
- libdca
- gsm
- openjpeg
- twolame

Hint: use sbopkg, which is a very nifty tool.

3) Build and install libmpcdec (missing in slackbuilds.org, I'll volunteer for maintenance as soon as I have a little more time).

4) Now build MPlayer starting with Eric Hameleers' SlackBuild from the restricted_slackbuilds repository. Here, the only thing I changed was --disable-gui (since we're using something else than the stock GUI that comes with MPlayer) and comment out the GUI-relevant bits in the SlackBuild script.

5) Install 'smplayer' from slackbuilds.org (again, using sbopkg).

6) Serve hot

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Hmmmm.... build and install 20 packages to get a working MPlayer, versus download and install a single package with the same functionality (my VLC package)... I know what I'd choose!

Eric

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Did they ever get VDPAU working for VLC with less hassle? It was possible in the past, but what a pain in the butt it was to setup.

VDPAU is one of the main reasons why I use Mplayer more than VLC.

Of course I've given this thought consideration, Eric. I know the great work you did on VLC. But I often get to make installs on machines with as little RAM as 512 MB, and in my past experience, MPlayer would allow playback when VLC would refuse to work without some serious hiccups. There's also some sort of Murphy's Law for the desktop, that goes somehow like this: if a certain video/audio/document format is unsupported, users will sure as hell try to open said format, preferably on a sunday morning while I'm still asleep, and ask me why they can't play or view their {ACE,DOCX,MPC,MP4,WMA,WMV,$ROTTENFILEFORMAT} file.

I can sense your sarcastic grin, Eric. The best explanation I can offer is invite you to visit our "salle multimédia", where I installed a network of presently six publicly accessible Linux desktops (CentOS/GNOME). I've spent a few weeks just observing the users and then polishing up the details, thinking about supported formats, file associations, one-app-per-task, menu entries, etcetera. The result is that since 2007 (when I installed the room), I get called something like once or twice a year (to replace some broken hardware).

As for the customized builds (multimedia libs, "KDE Light", etc), it's something I plan to do once per release, put it on a server, and then deploy it easily (as in installpkg *.tgz) on many desktops.

Aside from that, MPlayer is a personal favourite of mine, since after all the years, I managed to learn most of the console startup options and shortcuts, which I wouldn't miss

Just as a sidenote, you might be interested in a fork of SMPlayer called UMPlayer which is taking off from where SMPlayer left off. You will need to cobble together your own slackbuild for this one but it is well worth the effort.

Well, I failed geography. I thought hawaii & alaska or somesuch places were in there? who went missing?

None went missing. Hawaii and Alaska are states. I have no idea where you got 52 from.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._state#List_of_states

None of them went missing. I've heard various reasons why some people think there is 52 states, the most likely reason being confusion over the status of Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico (neither are states). Hawaii and Alaska are another possible reason, I've heard somebody say at some point that 'there are 52 states but only 50 stars on the flag because the government didnt want to change the flag when Hawaii and Alaska were incorporated as states' (which is wrong actually, the US flag was last changed after Hawaii was incorporated)

BTW, just for fun there are actually less than 50 states...some of the 'states' are actually commonwealths (Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Virginia)

http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=aftermin...alth&csid=Eoaf

That is starting to get into mind games, word play, semantics and politics though.

Good idea.
I have built packages for UMPlayer and tonight when I get back home I will check if they work. if they do, I will upload them to my repository.

Eric

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