CrunchBang Linux

Blaise

Member

Registered: 2009-03-05

Posts: 15

Firefox and video plugins

Hi there,

I'm having trouble with Firefox playing videos embedded in websites, I'm talking mov's, mpg's and m4v's.

When I first opened a page with a video it asked me to select the plugin I wanted to use, I remember from experience that some plugins work better than others, unfortunately I couldn't remember which ones they were, so I went with VLC as this is the generic media player in #!

Unfortunately it didn't work as I wanted, I have since tried to change to mplayer (not as a plugin but as a launched application) using the applications menu in preferences, but this doesn't work either.

I am basically left with a black area where the video should be, if I right click sometimes I get a message in the video saying Video is loading, but it never does.  changing back to the VLC plugin doesn't work either. it asks me to install missing plugins, but then can't find any plugins when I follow the prompts through.

Is there a way I can get Firefox to ask me the initial question again, where I can choose form a list of plugins available?

Has anyone got any good recommendations on how to play and stream video through Firefox on #!, specifically not Flash, Flash works fine.

Cheers,

Blaise.

flicck

#! Member

Registered: 2008-12-26

Posts: 88

Re: Firefox and video plugins

I have had great luck with using mplayer-plugin. No issues yet, and I watch a lot of porn, I mean,  harmless videos of innocent stuff.

sudo apt-get install mozilla-mplayer

or if you use aptitude for package management :

sudo aptitude install mozilla-mplayer

Hope that helps.

Blaise

Member

Registered: 2009-03-05

Posts: 15

Re: Firefox and video plugins

hmm, it works but it's damn fugly!

Also I had to remove the vlc plugin before mplayer would take over

sudo apt-get remove mozilla-plugin-vlc

It seems a bit querky at the moment, I'm not sure if I have to click the play button to get things moving or if it should play itself once it's buffered, but in any case, it's better than what I had before, and it works on the Apple trailers website which seems to be the real acid test on Linux.

Cheers,

Blaise.

ewj1976

#! Member

From: Harpers Ferry, West Virginia

Registered: 2009-02-08

Posts: 53

Website

Re: Firefox and video plugins

You could use the Gecko Media Player plugin. It uses mplayer and in my opinion is less "fugly", as it's been put in the prior post.

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install gecko-mediaplayer

And again, remove any other players /plugins that might be installed. You can check to make sure all are removed by typing about:plugins in Firefox. Hope this helps.

Blaise

Member

Registered: 2009-03-05

Posts: 15

Re: Firefox and video plugins

Thanks ewj1976, I don't suppose there is a list of compatible plugins I can try out?  Gecko Media Player is certainly an improvement.

ewj1976

#! Member

From: Harpers Ferry, West Virginia

Registered: 2009-02-08

Posts: 53

Website

Re: Firefox and video plugins

I'm glad it's an improvement. I'd prefer a VLC plugin that actually is user friendly though.

By plugins do you mean codecs? Or do you mean plugins for Firefox for various tasks (such as viewing pdfs, flash, etc.). I'll check back later. Apart from embedded video, I believe #! handles most things either inline or with appropriate means to play/view things which are downloaded. Acroread will allow you to view pdfs, flash is installed, etc.; anything in particular that you're looking for?

Oh, and as far as java is concerned, I use sun-java6-plugin because I use pogo and play games there. It's the ONLY plugin that works properly for that site. There are obviously other alternatives (such as icedtea), but that is a must for me.

anonymous

The Mystery Member

From: Arch Linux Forums

Registered: 2008-11-29

Posts: 9,418

Re: Firefox and video plugins

Another plugin you can try is totem-mozilla.

If you dont like any of the plugins, you could just use the MediaPlayerConnectivity extension to open online videos directly into your preferred media player.

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Blaise

Member

Registered: 2009-03-05

Posts: 15

Re: Firefox and video plugins

Yes I do mean plugins for Firefox, I've found that #! hasn't had any trouble getting the right codecs for video and audio files, thank goodness

These other plugins seem to work well, I wonder why I have such trouble with the VLC plugin, when VLC the application works so well for me.

Last edited by Blaise (2009-03-11 09:36:30)

brumey

Member

From: efading ciddy/austria

Registered: 2009-02-09

Posts: 23

Website

Re: Firefox and video plugins

vlc-plugin   featored on lifehacker.com recently...  opens media out of the browser with vlc-media-player

works like a charm for me.....

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need a master that is teaching me proper linux-commandline-kungfu