The problem with the solutions mentioned on that page is that there are warnings such as “This will switch ALL packages that exist in the Packman repository to use Packman”.
And I don’t understand the implications after doing that: it sounds like switching to an alternate repository of packages that are maintained by a totally different third-party team. So my reaction is to be reluctant to do this switch to packman . It is unclear what would happen when later trying to go back to the normal repositories … i am afraid that there is a significant risk to break the system by installing incompatible packages.
Hopefully can someone enlighten me : is it ok to follow the solutions presented on that page? Are there alternative ways to install the missing codecs without switching the whole system to this “Packman” ?
The only thing I ever did after any openSUSE installation for far more then 10 years is the vendor switch. Either through YaST, or using zypper dup --from <packman> --allow-vendorchange. I never had a problem playing sound or video, but it maybe that I never tried to play the types of them that some have problems with.
In any case, when you check the threads here over the years: in almost 100% of the cases people report"problem solved" after they did the switch.
That page lists general solutions applicable to most users. If your problem is just with vlc, I think that you just need to install vlc-codecs(and its associated 25 dependencies) from Packman and not switching the whole system packages.
That way, for instance, you avoid switching the Mesa packages (if you don’t need them) that occasionally cause problems with upgrades.
Please, to make the pieces of computer code in your posts better consumable by technical oriented people:
And post as complete as possible. That is starting with the line with the prompt and the command, then all output, and ending with the new prompt line.
When you really feel you need to change anything in such a copy, then add that in a comment, else we take all characters literally.
When the text is very long, then you can upload to https://paste.opensuse.org/ .
Or you can use the tool susepaste by piping the output to it ind posting the URL you get.
Adding a 3rd party, unofficial repository to your system should not be recommended or even considered. If you need applications that require codecs use flatpaks. You can install these directly from Gnome Software or Discover if you prefer the gui, or with the flatpak command if you prefer the cli:
Thanks for the suggestions. Probably installing the vlc flatpack would be the best option, although other applications (openshot installed from standard repo) would probably be unable to take advantage of the newer codecs installed as flatpack.
I have given up and switched to a different distribution.
Also had other problems already, for ex : an update that broke the login screen, and the network printer was not working until I’ve discovered that I have to disable the firewall. When using a rolling distribution one would expect some issues. But the advantage is supposed to be the availability of wide variety of new versions of the applications. So sorry, but it feels like enjoying the disadvantages of going ‘bleeding edge’ but without having a basic functionality such as the support for video playback .
Make that sudo zypper in opi && opi codecs && sudo zypper rm opi. People should not use opi at all ( home: repos ) but will. Exception maybe the codecs.
It is either official - meaning that it is using the openSUSE infra, served from the openSUSE infra, ships with the system on install - or not. Packman - being an unofficial repository that the user has to add manually, not to mention that we legally can’t ship it - can cause some issues since packman repos are out of sync with the official repos.
I would argue that opi should be also removed since it has packman support, here again, legality.
Anyhow, the use of flatpaks in systems where users require certain packages for applications to work correctly has greatly improved system stability and reliability as well. Simply you don’t get conflicts with the host packages ^-^
