Packman/VLC seriously fouled up, or is it me? Help or fix requested

I am encountering serious malfunctions of the VLC Media Player in Tumbleweed KDE, and I am considering (1) my own mistakes or (2) flaws in the current Packman repositories as potential reasons. In any case, I should like to ask for your help in case of reason 1 and ask for bug fixes to Packman in case of reason 2.

What is happening? VLC Media Player doesn’t give me any video when replaying a video file, just the audio.

Track 1: I have posted this in another thread here

https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/525886-vlc-Media-Player-No-video-only-audio-when-replaying-a-video-file-dir

without receiving any answer. In this case , I had installed the multimedia capabilities for openSUSE via the one-click

http://opensuse-community.org/codecs-kde.ymp

I had installed the regular vlc version 2.2.6-5.3 from Packman at this time.

Track 2: Getting no answer to my a.m. post caused me to go to Deano Ferrari’s guide to multi-media for Tumbleweed,

https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/523476-Multimedia-Guide-for-openSUSE-Tumbleweed

I withdrew the previous Packman repository (mirror server as specified by the a.m. ymp), did add the Packman and libdvdcss repositories as per Deano’s recipe, and did try to install the multi-media packages as given by Deano. The latter threw a couple of errors: All gstreamer-0_10-plugins.xy not found, k3b-codecs not found (just the k3b app). The other codecs like h264enc, x264, ffmpeg, lame were found in Packman and installed properly. The most serious failure, however, was the installation of vlc-beta version 3.0.0 throwing the error 'libfreerdp.so.2()(64-bit) as needed by vlc-beta-noX-3.0.0+git-12282-6.8-x86_64 not available anywhere". So I quit installing vlc-beta. Then, installing and running vlc 2.2.6 from this Packman repo does give me the same malfunction as before, no video, just audio.

At this point I am left without a clue. Am I doing something very wrong? Or are there some flaws in Packman for Tumbleweed? Thanks in advance for any feedback - outright help and solution to some error on my own, an acknowledgment by the repo managers regarding current bugs in T’s Packman (I suppose), or just a feedback from the community that others do experience the same issues as I do.

Remarks:

  1. As mentioned in the other post of mine, I have an NVIDIA Quadro 1000M grapics card (CPU Intel without integrated graphics), the driver is nouveau.
  2. On the very same machine, vlc 2.2.x runs just fine under openSUSE Leap 42.2 and Linux Mint 18.1, both using the same nouveau graphics as my Tumbleweed.

First of all, SORRY for using the HTML Code button to enclose a URL - should have used the Link button.

Second, I have compiled a list of what multi-media packages are being called for by the various ways mentioned in my previous post (columns 2-4), and of what my installation looks like now (column 1):

                                                 My installation     Unofficial Guide    One-Click Installer oS Forums
                                                 from repo           by Martin Schlander oS-Community.org    Deano Ferrari
                                                                     to oS Leap 42.2     codecs-kde.ymp      03/01/2017
                                                                                         for Tumbleweed      for Tumbleweed

libxine2-codecs                                  P                                                           x
ffmpeg                                           P                   x                   x                   x
lame                                             P                   x                   x                   x
 
gstreamer-plugins-base                           oS                                                          x
gstreamer-plugins-good                           oS                                      x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-bad                            P                   x                   x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-ugly                           P                   x                   x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-good-extra                     M                                                           x
gstreamer-plugins-bad-orig-addon                 P                                                           x
gstreamer-plugins-ugly-orig-addon                P                   x                   x                   x

gstreamer-0_10-plugins-good                      e                                                           x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-bad                       e                                                           x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ugly                      e                                                           x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-good-extra                e                                                           x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-bad-orig-addon            e                                                           x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ugly-orig-addon           e                                                           x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ffmpeg                    e                                                           x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-fluendo_mpegdemux         e                                                           x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-fluendo_mpegmux           e                                                           x

k3b-codecs                                       e                   x                   x                   x

vlc-beta                                         quit                                                        x
h264enc                                          P                                                           x
x264                                             P                                                           x
gstreamer-plugins-libav                          P                                       x                   x
vlc-beta-codecs                                  quit                                                        x

libdvdcss2                                       L                   x                                       x
dvdauthor07                                      M                                                           x


Repos: oS = openSUSE
       P  = Packman
       L  = libdvdcss
       M  = Multimedia
e = zypper or YaST software installer error
quit = quitted vlc-beta due to th error described in previous post

This is my current status, FWIW. Your installations will look different.

Post:

zypper lr -d
zypper se -si vlc

Please use Code-Tags.

My repos:

zypper lr -d
Die Repository-Prioritäten sind ohne Effekt. Alle aktivierten Repositorys teilen sich die gleiche Priorität.
                                                                                                
#  | Alias                               | Name                            | Aktiviert | GPG-Überprüfung | Aktualisierung | Priorität | Typ    | URI                                                                             | Dienst                                                            
---+-------------------------------------+---------------------------------+-----------+-----------------+----------------+-----------+--------+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+-------                                                            
 1 | download.opensuse.org-non-oss       | Haupt-Repository (NON-OSS)      | Ja        | (r ) Ja         | Ja             |   99      | yast2  | http://download.opensuse.org/tumbleweed/repo/non-oss/                           |       
 2 | download.opensuse.org-oss           | Haupt-Repository (OSS)          | Ja        | (r ) Ja         | Ja             |   99      | yast2  | http://download.opensuse.org/tumbleweed/repo/oss/                               |       
 3 | download.opensuse.org-tumbleweed    | Hauptaktualisierungs-Repository | Ja        | (r ) Ja         | Ja             |   99      | rpm-md | http://download.opensuse.org/update/tumbleweed/                                 |       
 4 | http-download.opensuse.org-0d2a2045 | multimedia:apps                 | Ja        | (r ) Ja         | Ja             |   99      | rpm-md | http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/multimedia:/apps/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/ |       
 5 | http-download.opensuse.org-22396dbe | multimedia:libs                 | Ja        | (r ) Ja         | Ja             |   99      | rpm-md | http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/multimedia:/libs/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/ |       
 6 | http-download.opensuse.org-333cb74f | openSUSE:Tumbleweed             | Ja        | (r ) Ja         | Ja             |   99      | rpm-md | http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/openSUSE:/Tumbleweed/standard/        |       
 7 | libdvdcss                           | libdvdcss                       | Ja        | (r ) Ja         | Ja             |   99      | rpm-md | http://opensuse-guide.org/repo/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/                             |       
 8 | openSUSE-20170505-0                 | openSUSE-20170505-0             | Nein      | ----            | ----           |   99      | yast2  | cd:///?devices=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-hp_CDDVDW_TS-L633R_R82M6GFB796501            |       
 9 | packman                             | packman                         | Ja        | (r ) Ja         | Ja             |   99      | rpm-md | http://packman.inode.at/suse/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/                               |       
10 | repo-debug                          | openSUSE-Tumbleweed-Debug       | Nein      | ----            | ----           |   99      | NONE   | http://download.opensuse.org/debug/tumbleweed/repo/oss/                         |       
11 | repo-source                         | openSUSE-Tumbleweed-Source      | Nein      | ----            | ----           |   99      | NONE   | http://download.opensuse.org/source/tumbleweed/repo/oss/

As stated, I have no full vlc installation today:

zypper se -si vlc
Repository-Daten werden geladen...
Installierte Pakete werden gelesen...

S  | Name        | Typ   | Version   | Arch   | Repository
---+-------------+-------+-----------+--------+-----------
i+ | libvlc5     | Paket | 2.2.6-5.3 | x86_64 | packman   
i+ | libvlccore8 | Paket | 2.2.6-5.3 | x86_64 | packman

At the time of my other post vlc Media Player: No video, only audio when replaying a video file/dir - Multimedia - openSUSE Forums, I had the regular vlc 2.2.6 from Packman, cf. the corresponding zypper snippet over there. As stated, too, trying to install vlc-beta from Packman fails.

You have a mix of multimedia libs from various repos. Run

zypper dup --from packman

en report results.

And I would say to disable the multimedia:libs Repository…
Packman and multimedia:libs will not be the best…

Thanks for feedback! Will be back tomorrow.

Back again, hampered by the openSUSE servers being down for maintenance it seems.

First of all, I have done the vendor change to Packman for an (N+1)-th time now to no avail.

I have now thoroughly compared my Tumbleweed and Leap 42.2 installations regarding the multi-media / Packman stuff. Both are fully updated, stand-alone (not virtual) operating systems running on the same laptop (NVIDIA Quadro 1000M under nouveau, cf. above). In an expansion to yesterday’s post, I took the multi-media installation recipes from (1) Martin Schlander’s Unofficial Guide to Leap 42.2, (2) the openSUSE-Community.org codecs-kde.ymp as maintained by Martin Schlander et al., and (3) Deano Ferrari’s post “Tumbleweed Guide to Multi-Media” here as a guideline for capturing the “first-level” multi-media packages. Here’s the result:

                                                 Tumbleweed          Leap 42.2           Unofficial Guide    One-Click Installer oS Forums
                                                 My installation     My installation     by Martin Schlander oS-Community.org    Deano Ferrari
                                                 from repo           from repo           for oS Leap 42.2    codecs-kde.ymp      03/01/2017
                                                                                                             for Tumbleweed      for Tumbleweed

libxine2-codecs                                  P                   (P)                                                         x
ffmpeg                                           P                   P                   x                   x                   x
lame                                             P                   P                   x                   x                   x
 
gstreamer-plugins-base                           oS                  oS                                                          x
gstreamer-plugins-good                           oS                  oS                                      x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-good-extra                     oS                  (oS)                                                        x
gstreamer-plugins-bad                            P                   P                   x                   x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-bad-orig-addon                 P                   (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-plugins-ugly                           P                   P                   x                   x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-ugly-orig-addon                P                   P                   x                   x                   x
libgstreamer-1_0-0                               oS                  oS

gstreamer-0_10                                   n.a.                oS
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-base                      n.a.                oS
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-good                      n.a.                (oS)                                                        x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-good-extra                n.a.                (oS)                                                        x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-bad                       n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-bad-orig-addon            n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ugly                      n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ugly-orig-addon           n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ffmpeg                    n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-fluendo-mp3                       n.a.                oS
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-fluendo_mpegdemux         n.a.                n.a.                                                        x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-fluendo_mpegmux           n.a.                n.a.                                                        x
libgstreamer-0_10-0                              n.a.                oS

k3b                                              P                   P
k3b-codecs                                       n.a.                n.a.                x                   x                   x

vlc (includes vlc-noX, vlc-qt in Tmblwd YaST)    P, vid fail         P
vlc-lang (manual selection in Tmblwd YaSt)       P, vid fail         P
vlc-codecs (manual selection in Tmblwd YaSt)     P, vid fail         P
vlc-codec-gstreamer                              P, (oS), vid fail   oS, (P)
vlc-beta                                         (P), quit           (P)                                                         x
vlc-beta-codecs                                  (P), quit           (P)                                                         x
h264enc                                          P                   (P)                                                         x
x264                                             P                   (P)                                                         x
libx264-148                                      P                   P
gstreamer-plugins-libav                          P                   P                                       x                   x

libdvdcss2                                       L                   L                   x                                       x
dvdauthor07                                                          (P)                                                         x
dvdauthor                                        M, (oS)             (P, M)


Repos: oS = openSUSE (various versions, resp.)
       P  = Packman (Tumbleweed or Leap versions, resp.)
       L  = libdvdcss
       M  = Multimedia
       Repo in (.) = available, but not installed
       n.a. = not available anywhere in oS/P/M repos for Tumbleweed or Leap, resp.
vid fail = no video output from vlc, just the audio
quit = quit vlc-beta due to "libfreerdp.so.2()(64-bit) as needed by vlc-beta-noX-3.0.0+git-12282-6.8-x86_64 not available anywhere"

Please note that vlc 2.2.6 runs fine in this Leap 42.2 setup as well as in Linux Mint, but fails to output the video track / just has the audio in Tumbleweed. I think to have aligned vlc in both Leap and Tumbleweed as much as I can see now - doesn’t work! It seems to me that the one big difference between T and L is that all gstreamer-…-0_10-… things are missing from all Tumbleweed repositories (oS T’s, Packman). I have no idea, though, whether at all and what for they would be needed by vlc.

Of course, when involving the multimedia:apps and multimedia:libs repos (some time AFTER getting Packman/libdvdcss in!), I felt it might not be a good idea. What I can say is this:

  • On the first level of multi-media packages listed above, nothing is taken from the multimedia:libs/apps repos. Of course, I am not sure what is being taken on the levels going down the dependencies chains; I guess it would be extremely tough to find out.
  • My only reason for involving these two repos was the puddletag app (spreadsheet-type editor for audio tags). I installed this in May 2017 via 1-click-installer; at that time puddletag 1.2.0 was available only in multimedia:apps, and I vaguely seem to remember it pulled along multimedia:libs for its own dependencies. Plus, this package had a bug in its dependencies https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/524881-puddletag-1-2-0-doesn-t-start, which got fixed. I do see puddletag in the main OSS repository now, but with an earlier oS-internal version than in multimedia:apps.

Now, I could either

  1. uninstall puddletag and remove the multimedia:apps/libs repos, or
  2. I could go to a fresh test installation of Tumbleweed with just the main repos and Packman/libdvdcss and try to run vlc there.

Both steps would take a little bit of time, plus - unfortunately - this Tumbleweed where vlc malfunctions is my main production machine, and I wouldn’t like to be left with many orphaned packages when removing repos. puddletag uses Qt-4, which tells you it’s a messy install anyway.

Thus, I would like it much more if the flaw could be found without messing my production machine up too much. Time and again, I can only report that everything with vlc (from Packman) works fine under Leap 42.2, even though it also has puddletag installed from L’s Packman (!!!) and also has L’s multimedia:libs enabled. I am stuck for now, and I hope for some convincing reasoning what’s wrong with my vlc in Tumnbleweed. Of course, if all else fails, I probably will first resort to route (2) mentioned above…

Remark, 100% off-thread … sorry: I would still love to see good recipes for cleaning up Tumbleweed. This could be (1) cleaning older Kernel versions n-2 or n-3, (2) uninstalling an app including its dependencies, (3) removing orphaned packages which are not needed anymore, (4) removing a certain repo and uninstalling its packages. All these actions should be performed without breaking anything precious… Guess this might be another thread.

Finally, I could resolve this issue by myself. This is step 1 towards the solution.

I did install a fresh Tumbleweed (snapshot 2017-07-10), initially with the trilogy of openSUSE Tmblwd repos (OSS, NOSS, UPDT) only. Then, closely following Deano Ferrari’s https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/523476-Multimedia-Guide-for-openSUSE-Tumbleweed, I added the Tmblwd Packman and libdvdcss repositories. Then I installed the packages he lists in his recipe for Tumbleweed KDE except the vlc-beta ones; this did fail again for all gstreamer-0_10-… stuff which is not available anywhere. Next step was to apply the vendor change to Packman via YaST, works fine.

Trying to install vlc-beta and its asscociates failed again with the same error, “libfreerdp.so.2()(64-bit) as needed by vlc-beta-noX-3.0.0+git-12282-6.8-x86_64 not available anywhere”.

Finally, I installed vlc and its associates from Packman. vlc automatically picks vlc-codec-gstreamer, vlc-noX and vlc-qt. Funny enough, an older version of vlc-codec-gstreamer is automatically picked from oS-OSS, not from Packman - guess this IS A BUG in the Packman vlc dependencies; I manually picked the Packman one. The others are picked up from Packman. I also installed vlc-lang.

WOW, in this configuration vlc 2.2.6 does work fine!

To find a reason for the vlc malfunction in the previous setup, I did also install vlc-codecs from Packman. This had been driven by analogy to Deano Ferrari including vlc-beta-codecs in his list, which fails during install (cf. above) and which doesn’t have a package vlc-beta-codec-gstreamer in the repo.

Summary Part 1:

  1. For a vlc 2.2.6 installation in Tumbleweed, make sure to pick vlc-codec-gstreamer from Packman
    , since the vlc package in my case automatically went for oS-OSS.
  2. DO not install vlc-codecs
    , this one broke the video display from vlc in my case.
  3. I cannot get vlc-beta
    as included in Packman to install.

Perhaps someone can give items 1 and 3 a look - I think these are flaws in the repo.
Item 2 was my fault or lack of knowledge wrt a vlc installation.

Summary Part 2: To finish up, I went back to my other (production) Tumbleweed installation, uninstalled vlc-codecs - guess what, all vcl things work fine.

Thread could be marked SOLVED, if I knew how to do it in this forum.

For me, it is reassuring to save my puddletag installation which relies on the multimedia:apps/libs repos. There is no obvious conflict between Packman and those ones as far as I can see now.

One more remark, mostly directed to app/package maintainers who might read this: The difference between the screwy Tumbleweed vlc 2.2.6 (all from T’s Packman) installation and the functioning Leap 42.2 vlc 2.2.4 (all from L’s Packman) is that under Leap vlc has both vlc-codecs and vlc-codec-gstreamer installed - and it works. Whatever vlc-codecs is good for, it seems to be screwed up in Tumbleweed only.

Hope this thread helps others in the community, and hope it is finding its way to app/package maintainers if appropriate. I might be willing to file a bug report, but would like to wait a bit for further feedback from the forum community.

For reference, here’s an update to my multi-media installation summary:

                                                 Tumbleweed          Leap 42.2           Unofficial Guide    One-Click Installer oS Forums
                                                 My installation     My installation     by Martin Schlander oS-Community.org    Deano Ferrari
                                                 from repo           from repo           for oS Leap 42.2    codecs-kde.ymp      03/01/2017
                                                                                                             for Tumbleweed      for Tumbleweed

libxine2-codecs                                  P                   (P)                                                         x
ffmpeg                                           P                   P                   x                   x                   x
lame                                             P                   P                   x                   x                   x
 
gstreamer-plugins-base                           oS                  oS                                                          x
gstreamer-plugins-good                           oS                  oS                                      x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-good-extra                     oS                  (oS)                                                        x
gstreamer-plugins-bad                            P                   P                   x                   x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-bad-orig-addon                 P                   (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-plugins-ugly                           P                   P                   x                   x                   x
gstreamer-plugins-ugly-orig-addon                P                   P                   x                   x                   x
libgstreamer-1_0-0                               oS                  oS

gstreamer-0_10                                   n.a.                oS
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-base                      n.a.                oS
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-good                      n.a.                (oS)                                                        x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-good-extra                n.a.                (oS)                                                        x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-bad                       n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-bad-orig-addon            n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ugly                      n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ugly-orig-addon           n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-ffmpeg                    n.a.                (P)                                                         x
gstreamer-0_10-fluendo-mp3                       n.a.                oS
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-fluendo_mpegdemux         n.a.                n.a.                                                        x
gstreamer-0_10-plugins-fluendo_mpegmux           n.a.                n.a.                                                        x
libgstreamer-0_10-0                              n.a.                oS

k3b                                              P                   P
k3b-codecs                                       n.a.                n.a.                x                   x                   x

vlc (includes vlc-noX, vlc-qt)                   P                   P
vlc-lang                                         P                   P
vlc-codecs                                       P, causes vid fail! P
vlc-codec-gstreamer                              P, (oS)             P, (oS)
vlc-beta                                         (P), quit           (P)                                                         x
vlc-beta-codecs                                  (P), quit           (P)                                                         x
h264enc                                          P                   (P)                                                         x
x264                                             P                   (P)                                                         x
libx264-148                                      P                   P
gstreamer-plugins-libav                          P                   P                                       x                   x

libdvdcss2                                       L                   L                   x                                       x
dvdauthor07                                                          (P)                                                         x
dvdauthor                                        M, (oS)             (P, M)


Repos: oS = openSUSE (various versions, resp.)
       P  = Packman (Tumbleweed or Leap versions, resp.)
       L  = libdvdcss
       M  = Multimedia
       Repo in (.) = available, but not installed
       n.a. = not available anywhere in oS/P/M repos for Tumbleweed or Leap, resp.
vid fail = no video output from vlc, just the audio
quit = quit vlc-beta due to "libfreerdp.so.2()(64-bit) as needed by vlc-beta-noX-3.0.0+git-12282-6.8-x86_64 not available anywhere"

Another experience but with Leap 42.3:

I had the same problem but it depended on the user. With user1, failure, with user2 vlc shows the video correctly.
Trying things like disabling hardware decoding achieved nothing.

Running
VDPAU_DRIVER=xyz vlc /var/tmp/*mp4
solved the problem for user1

I tried this to get in sync
zypper dup --from packman
It didn’t help

Finally doing
zypper remove vlc-codecs
fixed the problem.

please don’t reopen old threads if you have an issue start a new one, this thread is almost a year old
and please don’t post nonsense do not remove vlc-codecs it’s a needed package without it vlc will not be able to decode restricted formats

currently there is a dependency issue with vlc-codecs and vlc-codec-gstreamer where by installing vlc-codecs vlc-codec-gstreamer is also installed, while it’s up to the end user to chose which backend to use the use of gstreamer on vlc is imo redundant as there are other gstreamer based players if you want to use native vlc remove vlc-codec-gstreamer

Well, that’s not completely true.

vlc comes with a avcodec plugin in the vlc-noX package that should be able to play back everything that ffmpeg/libavcodec supports.
So if you switch ffmpeg/libavcodec to the Packman versions you should actually be able to playback anything even without vlc-codecs.

And vlc-codec-gstreamer allows vlc to use gstreamer’s codecs.

currently there is a dependency issue with vlc-codecs and vlc-codec-gstreamer where by installing vlc-codecs vlc-codec-gstreamer is also installed

That’s wrong as well.

vlc-codec-gstreamer supplements packageand(vlc-noX:libgstapp-1_0-0), i.e. it gets installed as recommended package if vlc-noX and libgstapp-1_0-0 (i.e. gstreamer) is installed.
No relation to vlc-codecs at all.

I suppose the reason why people here seem to have problems with vlc-codecs is that it contains the VDPAU support/plugins…

I just noticed that the VDPAU plugins have been split out into a separate package in Tumbleweed recently though.
So maybe try to uninstall that (vlc-vdpau) instead of vlc-codecs and see if that also fixes it.
(uninstalling vlc-codecs will also remove vlc-vdpau…)

Or try to switch to a different video output, other than “Auto” (which prefers VDPAU) or “VDPAU”.

Removing the gstreamer package did nothing. Removing vlc-codecs made it work again.
Then I reinstalled it and found that renaming
mv libvlc_vdpau.so.0.0.0 libvlc_vdpau.so.0.0.0-save
makes it work again. Presumably this is equivalent to setting VDPAU_DRIVER=junk

The strangest thing is that there is only a problem when running it as the same user that is running
the kde environment. It works for other users suggesting that I really have some mysterious permission
problem.

BTW I am using the nouveau driver on a recently installed Leap 42.3. The board identifies
as NVIDIA GF119

As I suspected, a problem with VDPAU then.

So it should suffice to uninstall vlc-vdpau, not vlc-codecs.

Or change vlc’s settings to not use VDPAU.

Presumably this is equivalent to setting VDPAU_DRIVER=junk

Sure, but that would affect all software.
To achieve the same you could also uninstall libvdpau_nouveau.

Well, nouveau does have a lot of problems unfortunately.
Maybe try to install the proprietary nvidia driver.

See SDB:NVIDIA drivers - openSUSE Wiki

I’ve just noticed this error message
core generic error: corrupt module: /usr/lib64/vlc/plugins/vdpau/libvdpau_avcodec_plugin.so

rpm -V shows that the file matches the rpm so the vlc-codecs or vlc rpm from packman must not be
built correctly.

Name : vlc-codecs
Version : 2.2.6
Release : 8.5
Architecture: x86_64
Install Date: Fri 16 Mar 2018 15:48:57 AEDT
Group : Productivity/Multimedia/Video/Players
Size : 296960
License : GPL-2.0+ AND LGPL-2.1+
Signature : RSA/SHA1, Sat 10 Mar 2018 02:25:18 AEDT, Key ID 45a1d0671abd1afb
Source RPM : vlc-2.2.6-8.5.src.rpm
Build Date : Sat 10 Mar 2018 00:53:03 AEDT
Build Host : swkjt02
Relocations : (not relocatable)
Packager : packman@links2linux.de
Vendor : http://packman.links2linux.de
URL : http://www.videolan.org
Summary : Additional codecs for the VLC media player
Description :
This package enhances the functionality of the VLC media player by
codecs that are not available in the stock openSUSE distribution.
Distribution: Essentials / openSUSE_Leap_42.3

Selecting a different video output such as xcb_xv works.

I still have that other users (not the desktop user) work when the video output setting is ‘automatic’.
I suppose that there is some permission problem that stops them from trying to go directly to the
video card.