RestrictedFormats

Revision 274 as of 2006-05-22 23:34:02

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Disclaimer and Legal Notice

attachment:IconsPage/IconDialog-Warning1.png Patent and licensing restrictions on media formats can complicate a free operating system's ability to distribute software that will support those formats. Ubuntu actively supports the FreeFormats. This page will walk you through getting support for the most popular non-free media formats.

Some of the packages listed here may be illegal in your country. This page is not legal advice.

Before You Start

  • You must have administration privileges to install packages. RootSudo explains how Ubuntu provides the necessary privileges.

  • Nearly all the applications and packages mentioned on this page are found in the Universe and Multiverse repositories. See AddingRepositoriesHowto for instructions on enabling the Universe and Multiverse repositories.

  • Some additional packages are found in repositories not controlled by Ubuntu. Please do not file bugs about these specific packages.

Media Players

The Ubuntu Media Players

  • Ubuntu comes with Totem (a movie player) and Rhythmbox (a music player); Kubuntu includes Kaffeine and Amarok. These applications play free formats (Ogg Vorbis, Ogg Theora, and the like) 'out of the box'. However, they can also play most non-free media formats if you install some additional packages.

MP3s

  • [:AddingRepositoriesHowto: Enable the multiverse and universe repositories] and install the proper package. Use your favorite package manager or type in a terminal:

    Ubuntu 5.10 (Breezy Badger)

    sudo aptitude install gstreamer0.8-mad

attachment:IconsPage/IconNote.png KDE/Kubuntu users: Your specific configuration may require you to install the akode-mpeg package to enable mp3 playback.

  • Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper Drake)

    sudo aptitude install gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly

attachment:IconsPage/IconNote.png KDE/Kubuntu users you will need to install the package libxine-extracodecs for mp3 support.

  • If your portable music player does not support FreeFormats, the page [:CDRipping] explains how to convert your CDs to MP3 and AAC.

Other Non-Free Formats

  • [:AddingRepositoriesHowto: Enable the universe and multiverse repositories] and install the necessary packages with your favorite package manager. Alternatively, you could type in a terminal:

    Ubuntu 5.10 (Breezy Badger)

    sudo aptitude install  gstreamer0.8-plugins gstreamer0.8-plugins-multiverse  gstreamer0.8-ffmpeg

attachment:IconsPage/IconHint2.png Note: This is a single command. Don't write in multiple lines.

  • Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper Drake)

    sudo aptitude install gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg gstreamer0.10-gl gstreamer0.10-plugins-base gstreamer0.10-plugins-good gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly-multiverse libxine-extracodecs ffmpeg lame faad sox mjpegtools libxine-main1

attachment:IconsPage/IconHint2.png Note: This is a single command. Don't write in multiple lines.

Alternative Media Players

  • Currently, the best support for most non-free video media (that is, media encoded as MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, QuickTime and others) is provided by Totem-Xine, MPlayer, and Xine. Playing WMV or RealVideo requires a package that Ubuntu is unable to distribute (See [#w32codecs Windows Codecs] below for installation instructions).

    Totem-Xine is recommended for most users since MPlayer and Xine can be complicated to configure and use. If you would like to try these media players, [:AddingRepositoriesHowto: enable the universe and multiverse repositories] and type the following in a terminal:

Ubuntu 5.10 and earlier

  • {{{sudo aptitude install totem-xine xine-ui

}}}

Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper Drake)

  • {{{sudo aptitude install totem-xine xine-ui mplayer

}}}

Anchor(w32codecs)

Windows Codecs

i386

  • Support for WMV, RealMedia and other formats has been bundled into the w32codecs package. Since this package is not supported by Ubuntu, you will need to install it from an unoffical repository. Simply type in a terminal:

  • wget -c ftp://ftp.nerim.net/debian-marillat/pool/main/w/w32codecs/w32codecs_20050412-0.4_i386.deb
    sudo dpkg -i w32codecs_20050412-0.4_i386.deb

attachment:IconsPage/IconDialog-Warning1.png WMV files encoded with DRM (Digital Rights Management) are not playable by the codecs.

attachment:IconsPage/IconHint2.png If you are experiencing choppy audio when playing WMV files, try [http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=136306&postcount=2 this] fix.

AMD64

  • The [#w32codecs Windows Codecs] cannot be used directly by the AMD64 distribution. Some people solve this problem by installing the i386 Ubuntu distribution inside a chroot (for example, [:VServer:Linux Vserver] or [http://packages.ubuntu.com/breezy/admin/dchroot dchroot]), and this works very well.

PowerPC

  • The PowerPC distribution cannot use the [#w32codecs Windows Codecs].

Playing Streaming Video from the Internet

  • There are a variety of plugins that allow you to play streaming video in your browser. The recommended plugin is totem-xine-firefox-plugin, which is available in the universe repository. You should install the [#w32codecs Windows Codecs], [:AddingRepositoriesHowto: enable the multiverse repository] and, in a terminal, type:

sudo aptitude install totem-xine-firefox-plugin
  • If you prefer MPlayer over Totem-Xine, you can install mozilla-mplayer instead. install the [#w32codecs Windows Codecs], [:AddingRepositoriesHowto: enable the multiverse repository] and, in a terminal, type:

sudo aptitude install mozilla-mplayer

Playing DVD's

  • Most commercial DVDs are encrypted with CSS (the Content Scrambling System). The movie players provided in Ubuntu are capable of reading DVDs that are not encrypted. If it is legal for you to circumvent CSS, then you can enable reading encrypted DVDs in vlc, mplayer, xine and totem-xine by installing libdvdcss2. Type in a terminal:

    sudo aptitude install libdvdread3
    sudo /usr/share/doc/libdvdread3/examples/install-css.sh

(i) Note: To execute the above install-css.sh script, you will require some basic tools already installed into your Ubuntu system. Namely, you will require dpkg-dev, fakeroot, debhelper, and build-essential. To accomplish this with one fell swoop, simply type:

sudo aptitude install dpkg-dev fakeroot debhelper build-essential

(i) Note: If all of thise seems like a lot of work to get DVD playback up and running, consider that we as free-software users are forced to kludge these workarounds thanks to poor optics in technological legislation. Please look to the future and make sure that DRM and like concepts are carefully monitored by you -- the open-source community and free-software users.

(i) Note: With Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper Drake), the gstreamer dvd plugin has not been ported to the new version of gstreamer, 0.10. Please use the xine backend.

DVD Lockup

  • If your movie player locks up when attempting to access a DVD, you will need to place a DVD movie in your DVD drive, then do the following:

    sudo aptitude install regionset
    regionset

    Alternatively, you can do this without a DVD in your drive if you know your region number. Be warned the software claims you can only change regions 4 times, so that the effects of this procedure are irreversible and may render your drive permanently unable to read DVDs encoded for a particular region.

Jerky Playback

  • If DVD playback is jerky or you notice optical data transfer (i.e burning a CD/DVD) is slower than it should be, then you need to enable DMA transfer for that drive. See the ["DMA"] page for details.

RealPlayer

  • To install RealPlayer 10, use your browser to download the package [ftp://ftp.nerim.net/debian-marillat/pool/main/r/realplay/realplayer_10.0.7-0.0_i386.deb realplayer_10.0.7-0.0_i386.deb] to your Desktop, and install it (along with a support package needed by RealPlayer) by typing in a terminal:

    cd ~/Desktop
    sudo aptitude install libstdc++5
    sudo dpkg -i realplayer_10.0.7-0.0_i386.deb

    See RealplayerInstallationMethods for other ways to install RealPlayer.

    Most of Real's non-free media formats can also be played by mplayer, xine, and totem-xine when the native or w32codecs are installed.

Smil

  • Use the File Manager to navigate to a folder containing a Smil file. Click the file with the right mouse button, select Properties, and then the tab Open With. Click the radio button next to RealPlayer 10, and close the dialog window.

RealMedia

  • If you want RealPlayer to be the default application to open RealMedia files, use the File Manager to navigate to a folder containing a RealMedia file. Click the file with the right mouse button, select Properties, and then the tab Open With. Click the radio button next to RealPlayer 10, and close the dialog window.

Macromedia Flash

  • Macromedia's Flash Player is only available for i386 based machines, and Shock Wave is not available at all. There are projects that are attempting to provide free support for Flash, and currently they are the only way to get Flash support for the PPC and AMD64 distributions of Ubuntu.

    Flash can be problematic, so if you have problems (and solutions), read Flash Issues below.

Flash for i386

  • To add Flash Player support for konqueror, mozilla, firefox, epiphany and other browsers, [:AddingRepositoriesHowto:enable the multiverse repository] and, in a terminal, type:

for Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper Drake)

  •   sudo aptitude install flashplugin-nonfree
      sudo update-flashplugin

(i) Note: With Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper Drake Flight 5), aptitude does not seem to activate flashplugin, so you will have to use the update-flashplugin to allow Mozilla Firefox to use it.

(i) Note to Kubuntu Users: Konqueror DOES NOT auto-detect flash. There are a few steps you must use for flash to work:

  •    In the menu bar of konqueror click settings (Next to help) --> configure konqueror' --> scroll down the side to plugins --> click scan for new plugins
    • It should now work

for Ubuntu 5.10 (Breezy Badger)

  •   sudo aptitude install flashplugin-nonfree 

(i) Note: If you are using Ubuntu 5.10 or prior and installed FireFox 1.5.x from [https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FirefoxNewVersion ff1.5] than you will need to make a symlink for flash by typing the following.

  •   sudo ln -s /usr/lib/mozilla-firefox/*flash* /opt/firefox/plugins

(i) Note to Kubuntu Users: Konqueror DOES NOT auto-detect flash. There are a few steps you must use for flash to work:

  •    In the menu bar of konqueror click settings (Next to help) --> configure konqueror --> scroll down the side to plugins --> click scan for new plugins
    • It should now work

for Ubuntu 5.04 (Hoary Hedgehog)

  •   sudo aptitude install flashplugin-nonfree

Flash for AMD64 and PPC

  • "For those of us with 64-bit processors (or Mac) there is no non-free flash implementation available because the manufacturer does not support them. However, there are two free implementations. One is gplflash and the other is swfdec. There is also gplflash2 in development that aims to be the proper free, open source replacement for all the platforms. While you can install them using aptitude, they tend not to work very well and are unstable, so that option is not great. Better to install one of them (I recommend gplflash) manually." If you are determined, another option is to install a i386 ubuntu in a DebootstrapChroot and launch your browser with flash plugin from there.

GPLFlash

Installing from repository

To install GPLFlash [:AddingRepositoriesHowto:enable the universe repository] and type in a terminal:

  sudo aptitude install libflash-mozplugin

Installing from source

Since the GPLFlash in Ubuntu can be unstable, a better method is to compile it from source. To do this, first install some needed build packages by typing:

  sudo aptitude install libx11-dev xlibs-dev libmad0-dev libjpeg-dev checkinstall build-essential

Then, get the GPLFlash source from [http://sourceforge.net/projects/gplflash/ sf.net], compile and install it:

  wget -c http://heanet.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/gplflash/gplflash-0.4.13.tar.bz2
  tar xvjf gplflash-0.4.13.tar.bz2
  cd gplflash-0.4.13
  ./configure --with-plugin-dir=/usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/
  make
  sudo checkinstall

When you restart your web browser you should have a working, stable flash plugin.

Flash Issues

Sound

Symptoms
  • Flash videos stop playing after 1 second.
  • Firefox freezes when going to another page ater having tried to view a flash video.
  • The firefox process not correctly ending after having tried to view a flash video.

Possible Fixes
  • After Flash is installed, if the sound is not working properly, or you experience one of the above symptoms, try one of the following solutions: Open:
      gedit ~/.mozilla/firefox/rc
    Add the line:
      FIREFOX_DSP="none"
    As an alternative solution, if the above doesn't solve the problem: Type the following in a terminal:
      sudo ln -s /usr/lib/libesd.so.0 /usr/lib/libesd.so.1

Video

  • If you use an Intel 855GM video card, ensure you set the X server colour depth to 24 bits, otherwise you will probably experience Firefox crashes.

Fonts

  • If you are viewing a Flash video and you do not see any text, the following command should help:
      sudo aptitude install gsfonts gsfonts-x11

Macromedia Shockwave

Installation

  • The Shockwave player is unfortunately only available for Windows, but it's possible to run (some) Windows programs on Linux using Wine. Wine will only work on a PC, and users of 64-bit Ubuntu may encounter problems with it. Then you will need mozplugger, which is a program that lets you "embed" other programs in your web browser. First, install Wine and mozplugger. Open a terminal and type:

      sudo aptitude install wine mozplugger

    Then you need to install the Windows version of Firefox (yes you read that right). Download it from here: http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/all.html . Choose to open the installer with Wine and follow the instructions on the screen. When the installation has finished go to a web site that requires Shockwave and choose to get the missing plugin. When the plugin has installed and is working you may close Firefox. Now you need to configure mozplugger to use the Windows version of Firefox for Shockwave files. From a terminal, type this:

      sudo -b gedit /etc/mozpluggerrc
    Add the following two lines to the end of the file:
      application/x-director: dir,dcr,dxr,cst,cct,cxt,w3d,fgd,swa: Macromedia Director file
            swallow(firefox.exe) fill: wine "C:\\Program Files\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe" -chrome "file://Z:$file"
    Finally you need to make Firefox reload the plugin database. Close all Firefox windows and do this in a terminal:
      rm ~/.mozilla/firefox/pluginreg.dat
    Now Shockwave should (hopefully) work for you. However some Shockwave objects may not work (see below).

Shockwave Issues and Workarounds

  • Objects appear in a small window of its own.
    • Cause 1: Wine or Shockwave is still running in the background Workaround 1: Type this in a terminal to end all wine processes:

        killall wine-preloader -s KILL

      Cause 2: mozplugger does not handle multiple objects. I don't know how to fix this.

  • Objects claim they're being run from the harddisk
    • Cause: The files are first downloaded and then run from the Windows version of Firefox. Workaround: Change the /etc/mozpluggerrc file so that streaming is enabled:

      • Change this line:
            swallow(firefox.exe) fill: wine "C:\\Program Files\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe" -chrome '''"file://Z:$file"'''
        Into:
            swallow(firefox.exe) fill stream: wine "C:\\Program Files\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe" -chrome '''"$file"'''
        Then remove ~/.mozilla/firefox/pluginreg.dat and restart Firefox. This may not work if you are connected using IPv6 or a proxy.
  • Objects claim they're "stolen"
    • Cause (when using streaming): The Shockwave object expects the "Referrer" HTTP header to be set, and it's not when using mozplugger. Workaround: None yet

AAC and iTunes Music Store

AAC decoding

  • The default audio format used by Apple's iTunes and iPod is AAC. This is a variant of the MPEG standard, and as such has patent issues. However, you can listen to AAC files in rhythmbox or amarok by installing gstreamer0.8-faad. You will need this for listening to any AAC file, including those bought from the iTunes Music Store (see below for more info on using the music store on Linux). Warning: songs purchased from the iTunes music store (.m4p) are encrypted and will not just play using gstreamer0.8-faad. You will need to decrypt them first.

For Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper Drake):

  • Install the gstreamer-plugins-bad-multiverse package.

    •    sudo aptitude install gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad-multiverse

AAC encoding:

  • FAAC can be used to encode AACs, although this is somewhat experimental compared to MP3 encoding at this point. For encoding programs which use gstreamer, there is a gstreamer plugin called gstreamer0.8-faac. See CDRipping for how to encode CDs to AAC. For other programs, you may be able to utilize FAAC directly to encode to AACs using the "faac" package.

iTunes Music Store

  • Apple's iTunes Music Store sells music online with a large selection of artists. Songs are in 128K AAC format, and cost varies by country. Apple only has Mac and Windows clients, but it also can be used on Linux. There are two different methods by which this can be done.

    First of all, you can use CodeWeavers CrossOver Office (available at http://www.codeweavers.com) to install the Windows version of iTunes on Ubuntu. This will allow you to buy iTunes songs on Linux and listen to them. However, the main caveats of this approach are that 1) it costs money 2) it is not a fully Linux-native solution.

    As an alternative to using CrossOver, there is a new, Free program called PyMusique which allows basic usage of the iTunes Music Store on Linux. This works better than using iTunes on CrossOver, but PyMusique has fewer features than the official iTunes client at this point and may be in violation of the iTunes Music Store terms of service. To use this on Ubuntu, first install gstreamer0.8-faad and libmcrypt4. Then, go to http://fuware.nanocrew.net/pymusique/ or a mirror (google "pymusique 0.4" for mirrors) and download the pymusique, python2.4-mcrypt, python2.4-vlc, and python2.4-mp4ff packages. Finally, install all the packages you downloaded from the above website. You can now launch PyMusique from the Applications-Internet menu, and purchase songs (although you may have to restart your system for this to work).

    PyMusique has been superceded by SharpMusique, available from http://www.nanocrew.net/software/sharpmusique/. It is available as a .deb for Breezy Badger and allows you to preview songs, signup for an account, buy songs and albums, redownload songs that you bought, and more.

Getting Java

Blackdown Java

For Ubuntu 5.10 (Breezy Badger), the easiest method is to use the Blackdown Java 1.4 installer from Multiverse. To install Java with the installer, just do:

  sudo aptitude install j2re1.4

Ubuntu PPC, please see: ["JavaPPC"]. Ubuntu AMD64, please see: ["JavaAMD64"].

Sun Java in 6.06 (Dapper Drake)

Thanks to a redistribution license change from Sun, official Sun java packages are now available in the multiverse repositories. Install it from the Applications -> Add/Remove... menu, or type:

  sudo aptitude install sun-java5-bin

Sun Java directly from Sun

The alternative method it to get the latest version from Sun. This version of Java works better for most applications. Sun's implementation of Java and Java plugin for browsers however is non-free. Free Java is in active development and will be the preferred choice once it is released.

Blackdown Java is non-free. It is a direct port of Sun's Java implementation, and is subject to the same licenses, as stated in the [http://www.blackdown.org/java-linux/docs/faq/FAQ-java-linux-2.html#intro-licensing Blackdown FAQ]. The only current advantage of using Blackdown over Sun is that Blackdown is to have the the i386 package show up in apt. Those interested in a free (GPL) Java implementation may wish to look at [http://www.kaffe.org/ Kaffe], which is available in the universe repository.

Go to http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.5.0/download.jsp and click on “Download JRE 5.0 Update 6”. Ensure you do not choose one of the JDK or J2EE versions unless you are going to develop Java applications.

You must first accept the licence, then click on “Linux self-extracting file” (jre-1_5_0_06-linux-i586.bin). Save this file to your hard drive.

Make the downloaded file executable. At the command line, change to the directory where you downloaded the file, and type:

  chmod +x jre-1_5_0_06-linux-i586.bin

Install the java-package and java-common, as well as fakeroot (which allows a non-root user to create the package derived from Sun's bin file):

  sudo aptitude install fakeroot java-package java-common

If you get an error when installing java-package, you need to enable the multiverse repository (see ["AddingRepositoriesHowto"]).

Use make-jpkg to translate Sun's bin file into a debian package:

  fakeroot make-jpkg jre-1_5_0_06-linux-i586.bin

(i) Note: You can see warning mesages like the ones below, but there is nothing to worry about.

  mkdir: cannot create directory `/etc/.java': Permission denied
  ./jdk-1_5_0_06-linux-i586.bin: line 507: /usr/share/mime-info/java-archive.keys: Permission denied

(X) Note: If you get an error similar to this:

  Loading plugins: blackdown-j2re.sh blackdown-j2sdk.sh common.sh ibm-j2re.sh ibm-j2sdk.sh j2re.sh j2sdk.sh j2se.sh sun-j2re.sh sun-j2sdk.sh

  No matching plugin was found.

Try:

  DEB_BUILD_GNU_TYPE=i386-linux fakeroot make-jpkg jre-1_5_0_06-linux-i586.bin

or similar command if you are not using i386 architecture.

Install the created package using dpkg:

  sudo dpkg -i sun-j2re1.5_1.5.0+update06_i386.deb

(i) Note: in above example, i386 might have to be i586.

Sun Java SDK (Software Development Kit)

The same procedure can also be used to install Sun's Java SDK instead of just the runtime environment (JRE). Just choose "Download JDK 5.0 Update 6" when downloading the package from Sun, and replace the file name with jdk-1_5_0_06-linux-i586.bin

Selecting the default Java version

In Ubuntu 5.10 (or Dapper), if you want to use Sun's Java instead of the open source GIJ (GNU Java bytecode interpreter) you need to set it as default. Run:

  sudo update-alternatives --config java

and select your preference from the list.

(i) Note: You might want to do the same with jar, javac, javadoc, javah, javap and javaws:

  sudo update-alternatives --config jar

To get common java applications (installed using .deb-packages) to run under your JVM of choice, make sure you also edit the JVM configuration file:

  sudo -b gedit /etc/jvm

and add the line:

  /usr/lib/j2sdk1.5-sun

Packages such as ant starts the first JVM found in this file.

Sun Java J2EE SDK

At the moment, there's no possibility to create a deb as described above for the J2EE SDK so you have to download the jdk from the site http://java.sun.com and then install:

  sudo aptitude install libstdc++2.10-dev

then install as user the binary file that you have downloaded before.

(i) Note:Remember to add the jar j2ee.jar in your IDE e.g. eclipse if you want to develop JSP and/or Servlet

Java on Mozilla Firefox

Installing Java without following the previous steps does not alert Firefox to its presence. If you simply executed the .bin file you downloaded, you will need to tell Firefox or Mozilla where to find the plugin library:

If you do not have a .mozilla/plugins directory in your home directory, create one:

mkdir -p /home/username/.mozilla/plugins

Then create links to plugin files:

  cd ~/.mozilla/plugins
  ln -s /usr/lib/j2re1.5-sun/plugin/i386/ns7/libjavaplugin_oji.so libjavaplugin_oji.so
  sudo ln -s /usr/lib/j2re1.5-sun/plugin/i386/ns7/libjavaplugin_oji.so /usr/lib/mozilla-firefox/plugins/

You can skip these steps if you used the make-jpkg command.

If you have downloaded more than one, you need to modify the command to be more specific.

Java on amd64 computers

Unfortunately, Sun's Java for 64-bit PC's does't work very well yet, but the Blackdown version of Java works and is available in the Ubuntu 5.10 (Breezy Badger) Multiverse repository.

  sudo aptitude install j2re1.4 j2re1.4-mozilla-plugin

Afterwards restart Firefox and you should have a working Java plugin.


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