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Fixing ffmpeg on Ubuntu

For a litany of legal reasons, ffmpeg does not come with all of the necessary things enabled for you to encode video for the iPod Video by default. Therefore, we need to build it from source and install some other libraries and programs, as well. Make sure you have multiverse and universe enabled.

Compiling ffmpeg from version in the repositories

In the terminal, run:

sudo apt-get build-dep ffmpeg

On pre-8.04:

sudo apt-get install liblame-dev libfaad2-dev libfaac-dev libxvidcore4-dev liba52-0.7.4 liba52-0.7.4-dev libdts-dev checkinstall

On 8.04:

sudo apt-get install liblame-dev libfaad-dev libx264-dev libfaac-dev libxvidcore4-dev liba52-0.7.4 liba52-0.7.4-dev libdts-dev checkinstall

As there is only a dummy package with libfaad2-dev, it is now replaced with libfaad-dev.

apt-get source ffmpeg

cd ffmpeg-*/

In pre-7.10 releases (these should be all on one line):

./configure --enable-gpl --enable-pp --enable-vorbis --enable-libogg --enable-a52 --enable-dts --enable-dc1394 --enable-libgsm --disable-debug --enable-mp3lame --enable-faad --enable-faac --enable-xvid --enable-shared

Or, on 7.10:

./configure --enable-gpl --enable-pp --enable-libvorbis --enable-libogg --enable-liba52 --enable-libdts --enable-dc1394 --enable-libgsm --disable-debug --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libfaad --enable-libfaac --enable-xvid --enable-shared

On 8.04:

./configure --enable-liba52 --disable-debug --enable-libfaad --enable-libfaac --enable-gpl --enable-amr_nb --enable-amr_wb --enable-x264 --enable-xvid --enable-libdts --enable-pthreads --enable-libvorbis --enable-pp --enable-libtheora --enable-libogg --enable-libgsm --disable-debug --enable-shared --prefix=/usr

On later versions of 8.04:

./configure --enable-liba52 --disable-debug --enable-libfaad --enable-libfaac --enable-gpl --enable-x264 --enable-xvid --enable-pthreads --enable-libvorbis --enable-pp --enable-libtheora --enable-libogg --enable-libgsm --enable-swscaler --disable-debug --enable-shared --prefix=/usr

AMR requires codecs available in Medibuntu repositories.

Then compile:

make

sudo checkinstall -D make install

*Only!!! If the above command doesn't work try this (reasons are explained below):

sudo make install

*If you get these errors in 8.04:

install:`cannot stat 'doc/ffmpeg.1' No such file or directory
.. ffplay.1 ..
.. ffserver.1..
make: *** Error 1
**** Installation failed. Aborting package creation
Cleaning up...OK
Bye.

Then you should run this command:

sudo apt-get install libx264-dev checkinstall

And then repeat the steps above preceeding the error message.

It will go through a bunch of stuff and prompt you on the last command for a few things. First, hit y to create docs, then just hit enter at the EOF question. Next, it will take you to the name and version. Edit #2 (name) to be ffmpeg, then edit #3 (version) to be something newer than what it is...so, either 1.cvsxxxxxx or some other way. If your installation fails because it claims that it was downgrading ffmpeg, you may use "sudo make install" instead of "sudo checkinstall -D make install", but you will not have a dpkg for it. If you go thise route, you can always uninstall by returning to this directory and typing "sudo make uninstall". If you don't mind not having a dpkg for it, then I'd recommend going straight to a sudo make install. Now, ffmpeg is fixed, time to move onto gtkpod's abilities.

Compiling ffmpeg from upstream svn snapshots

• September 2008: Compiling from upstream may currently be broken if you choose to compile in support for H264 (--enable-x264 option). libx264-dev shipped with Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron is too old to compile ffmpeg. See this http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.video.mplayer.user/56828. The error message you might see includes "'X264_ME_TESA' undeclared (first use in this function)", Please follow these instructions.

Remove ffmpeg

sudo apt-get remove ffmpeg

sudo apt-get install liba52-dev libdts-dev libgsm1-dev libvorbis-dev  libxvidcore4 libxvidcore-dev libdc1394-dev libfaac-dev liblame-dev libx264-dev libfaad2-dev libtheora-dev libsdl1.2-dev 

wget http://ffmpeg.mplayerhq.hu/ffmpeg-export-snapshot.tar.bz2
tar jxvf ffmpeg-export-snapshot.tar.bz2
cd ffmpeg-export-*

sudo apt-get install SVN
svn co svn://svn.mplayerhq.hu/ffmpeg/trunk ffmpeg
cd ffmpeg

September 2008: There is some on going changes in SVN and trunk is not stable. Use revision 15261

svn checkout -r 15261 svn://svn.mplayerhq.hu/ffmpeg/trunk ffmpeg

./configure --prefix=/usr/local --disable-debug --enable-shared --enable-gpl --enable-postproc --enable-swscale --enable-pthreads --enable-x11grab --enable-liba52 --enable-libdc1394 --enable-libfaac --enable-libfaad --enable-libgsm --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libx264 --enable-libxvid

make

sudo make install

export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/local/lib/
 ffmpeg -version
FFmpeg version SVN-r9450, Copyright (c) 2000-2007 Fabrice Bellard, et al.
  configuration: --enable-gpl --enable-pp --enable-pthreads --enable-vorbis --enable-libogg --enable-a52 --enable-libgsm --enable-dc1394 --disable-debug --enable-shared --enable-xvid --enable-faac --enable-mp3lame --enable-x264 --enable-faad  --enable-x11grab --enable-swscaler --prefix=/usr/local
  libavutil version: 49.4.1
  libavcodec version: 51.40.4
  libavformat version: 51.12.1
  built on Jul  4 2007 21:14:05, gcc: 4.1.3 20070629 (prerelease) (Ubuntu 4.1.2-13ubuntu2)
ffmpeg      SVN-r9450
libavutil   3212289
libavcodec  3352580
libavformat 3345409