Opensuse 11, Media Players, And Repositories

I haven't yet had a chance to try out a beta, I will when RC1 comes out, but I have a question/comment about media player issues, etc.

I am anxious about potential media player/package issues like those that plagued 10.3. I'm talking about the purposeful crippling of xine, etc with SUSE's own libs that would not support adding other libs to playback WMV, DVD(css), etc.

While I understand the choice to release only true open-source with a release, part of the guiding principles of openSUSE is supposed to be choice. Choice was certainly lacking with 10.3 and the crippled libs. Not including the libs is one thing, purposefully writing a SUSE specific lib that is incompatible with most of the other lib extensions was just plain rude. I love SUSE, but having to work around that issue and do a complete package makeover just because someone decided they wanted to hinder those of us who might choose to use "questionable" libs really, really p***** me off. I cannot count how many posts and people I know in person dealt with this issue. I can count at least 10 personal acquaintances that waded through the morass of undoing the damage the custom lib did.

Competitors like Ubuntu don't seem to have this issue. If you want to install the DVD libs, you type in DVD, the lib shows up, you select it, you download it. I couldn't believe how much more work it was to get media playing in openSUSE.

The short of this is that I applaud the desire and conviction to stay open source and legal. Unfortunately though, for some things, there just doesn't exist an alternative. If I want my nVidia card to work well, I have to use proprietary drivers at this point in time. If I want to playback DVDs, I have to use a DVD lib of questionable legality. I don't like it, but that's where it stands for now.

So in short, I'm begging, pleading, please, for the love of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, don't let openSUSE 11 be as short sighted on issues like this. Give us the choice this time.

That said (phew!), how is the beta progressing with issues like this?

P.S.- In case you're wondering why media is so important to me, it's because it's what I do. I use my laptop, etc, often to output media to projectors, etc, where it's on display to the public. So I need to be able to playback DVDs and have a huge array of codecs available to me in a snap. I chose openSUSE as my base because it came by default with a lot of the general packages I need day to day, as well as the fact that it doesn't scare clients that i'll be using it to present their media with. It may be a little bit evil to have to use proprietary drivers and questionable libs at times, but it's certainly a lot less evil (and more stable!) than being locked into a proprietary OS (yes, even Apple is becoming evil to me very quickly), or worse, an OS that crashes in the middle of a client presentation (*cough micropoop* been there, done that!).

Umh. Why don't you just install libxine1, mplayer, w32codecs and all the other multimedia packages you need from packman repository.

Haven't had any issues with packman repo's packages

While I understand the choice to release only true open-source with a release, part of the guiding principles of openSUSE is supposed to be choice. Choice was certainly lacking with 10.3 and the crippled libs. Not including the libs is one thing, purposefully writing a SUSE specific lib that is incompatible with most of the other lib extensions was just plain rude. [/b]

Its not intended to be rude. Rather its necessary to prevent Novell from being hit with a massive law suit. Novell (more than just SuSE-GmbH) has deep financial pockets, and Novell is currently a big juicy target (much much more than Ubuntu) when it comes to a law suit. Its argueably not legal for Novell to include the codecs ... Ubuntu takes a chance of getting sued.

Instead Novell packages the multimedia apps to play multimedia that is not proprietary.

Novell won't take the chance of being sued. Its simply not worth it (even if they win, as the legal expenses could be enormous). This is especially true when there is a superb work around available for openSUSE users.

It incredibly fast and simple to play multimedia with openSUSE, by simply adding Packman packagers repository to your software Package Manager (yast/zypper or smart or whatever) and do a very fast update, replacing the apps that Novell was forced to "cripple" due to legal reasons. ... but if you wish to stay legal, make certain its legal in your country before you do this.

Now you mention Ubuntu. I have friends who use Ubuntu, and they think Ubuntu is great, but they have to concede (and they do concede) that the multimedia that I have setup on openSUSE is superior to their setup on Ubuntu. And it takes me next no time to set this up after a fresh install. ... Just a bit of knowledge and a good internet connection.

If you wish to avoid these issues, then go with an older version of openSUSE, packaged as a different distribution (but can still open openSUSE rpms), called JAD:
http://jacklab.org/

And before I forget, WELCOME to suseforums.net.

So in short, I'm begging, pleading, please, for the love of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, don't let openSUSE 11 be as short sighted on issues like this. Give us the choice this time.[/b]

Not so sure about the "flying Spaghetti Monster" nor indeed who the "fly Spaghetti Monster" might be ? :unsure: (maybe there is a generation gap here) :blink: but maybe they did listen to you to a certain extent. B) If one goes to the YaST software management in 11.0, there is a area where one can check off to use the Packman repository, and that will conveniently provide one access to the non-crippled Packman packaged multimedia applications.

Umh. Why don't you just install libxine1, mplayer, w32codecs and all the other multimedia packages you need from packman repository.

Haven't had any issues with packman repo's packages
[/b]

Already did a long time ago, but that's not really the issue i'm takling about. The workaround in 10.3 wasn't really that hard or anything... once you figured out that you had to remove the SUSE libs first. Key issue there was figuring out you had to first remove the SUSE-specific xine libs. Packman's libs (DVD, etc) didn't work with xine when you had SUSE's original versions installed. This essentially crippled the player because you couldn't simply add on the codecs you needed- it just wouldn't let you without completely first removing the oddball version. I would just rather have a player with limited functionality that I can later addon the codec libs I want, rather than one that's tied to a developer specific version that won't recognize the codec libs that xine, etc normally recognize. It was really frustrating the first time I did it an install trying to add libs from packman to xine and have them be ignored for no obvious reason.

I completely understand Novell not including the questionable libs for legal reasons. Ubuntu doesn't even include them with their distro, but they definitely made it a heck of a lot easier than SUSE did to find them. In fact, I can't really think of a distro that includes anything that's not open format.

My point isn't so much to gripe, but to hopefully encourage this version to not be as difficult about this. As I said, i'd rather have a bare minimum player than one that actually hinders codec installs. I'm still not sure that the hindering was intentional, but it certainly worked out that way.

... once you figured out that you had to remove the SUSE libs first. Key issue there was figuring out you had to first remove the SUSE-specific xine libs[/b]

Actually, this is out of date. It was once for 9.x, but it has not been since 10.0.

I have not "first removed" the crippled Novell software since 9.x, and my multimedia on my openSUSE is first rate. Instead I have just selected the Packman packaged version to install, and they have replaced the Novell/SuSE packaged versions. And the Packman packages have worked.

As you note, this was not always the case (back in the 7.x, 8.x, 9.x days) but it is the case for 10.x. Simply update to the Packman packages.

As I said, i'd rather have a bare minimum player than one that actually hinders codec installs. I'm still not sure that the hindering was intentional, but it certainly worked out that way.[/b]

This is more the opensource philosophy. The Novell packaged players will play audio and video with opensource codecs.

packman's your answer

I can confirm what HalaVar is saying in 10.3. After adding the packman repos and trying to install some of the gstreamer packages from the packman repos, Yast goes crazy and starts telling you it has to remove a ton of stuff. Some of the stuff in the packman repos are not compatible with the opensuse repos, hence the problem. You basically have to completely remove all of opensuse's gstreamer packages to get packman's installed. That in turn causes unresolvable dependency conflicts. It may be as oldcpu said, and I just don't have the knowledge, but as HalaVar pointed out, it doesn't take this much trouble with Ubuntu. It is there if you dare, and it is all compatible.

After adding the packman repos and trying to install some of the gstreamer packages from the packman repos, Yast goes crazy and starts telling you it has to remove a ton of stuff. Some of the stuff in the packman repos are not compatible with the opensuse repos, hence the problem.[/b]

I used Smart and not YaST/zypper with 11.0 beta3, but I definitely did NOT have this trouble. Honestly, I don't' think I would have had the trouble with zypper/yast either. ... and if I did, I think I would have been able to read the exact dependency message, and sort it quickly.

You basically have to completely remove all of opensuse's gstreamer packages to get packman's installed. [/b]

Packman provides their own packaged gstreamer packages. This makes perfect sense, although I don't think removal should be necessary, ... it definitely was NOT necessary using smart. I simply told smart to install packman's gstreamer packages, it sorted the dependencies, and automatically removed the openSUSE versions while it installed the packman versions.

That in turn causes unresolvable dependency conflicts.[/b]

No, it doesn't. ... at least not on my 11.0 beta3 pc. Nor did it happen with 11.0 beta2. ....

... as HalaVar pointed out, it doesn't take this much trouble with Ubuntu. It is there if you dare, and it is all compatible.[/b]

... comparing a beta release to another distribution strikes me as inapprpriate. ... stay away from beta release if you can't sort the problems. I also used SuSE/openSUSE for 7 years before I started playing with Beta releases.

Self Edit by oldcpu to tone down inappropriate initial reply

No problems here using the packman rpm's with 10.3 or (today) with rc1 11. I don't use smart just yast.

With regard to the comments about usability I think the one-click facility goes along way to making the whole process that more straight forward for someone new to opensuse. (As a reasonably experienced opensuse user) I had never used this until recently when I installed kde4 to a 10.3 installation and was really impressed.