EasyCodecInstallation

Revision 10 as of 2006-06-07 18:53:46

Clear message

Summary

Messages about unsupported gstreamer formats are currently unhelpful. This utility assists users in installing the packages needed to use those formats.

Use cases

  • Frederic is a new Linux user on DSL. He attempts to open an mp3 file through a gstreamer application and receives an assistant to help him download and install the needed codecs.

  • Vincent, also new to Linux, is not on the internet. He attempts to open a QuickTime file and is given a different assistant with instructions on how to download the files he needs from an official Ubuntu mirror, and an offer to locate file if he already has a copy handy.

Scope

All gstreamer applications

Design

This assistant appears on an as-needed basis, and may also be presented by an application's first run if all supported plugins are not installed.

Bracketed items below are either buttons or conditional text which varies based on if a user is:

  • online
  • a member of the group admin
  • starting a program or trying to perform an action

This application [supports the following multimedia formats through the use of plugins/requires the following plugins to [run / play this file / compress this file / whatever]][, which you are unable to install. Start [program] as an adminstrative user to install these plugins].

[Certain countries have laws making the installation of these plugins illegal. _link_ may help in determining what steps, if any, must be taken by you to legally install these plugins in your jurisdiction.]

Plugin

Install

Read Licence

Quicktime Audio

[checkbox, checked / browse button if offline]

[read licence]

Quicktime Video

[checkbox, checked / browse button if offline]

[read licence]

Optional Plugins

Quicktime Audio

[checkbox, unchecked / browse button if offline]

[read licence]

Quicktime Audio

[checkbox, unchecked / browse button if offline]

[read licence]

checkbox] Disable this assistant for all non-administrative users of this computer''

[checkbox] Ask me again next time I run [program]

continue, grayed until all required entries are checked/located] [cancel

If password authentication is failed for a user, the dialog will not cancel, but ask me again will be checked'

The disable this assistant option will disable the assistant for all applications and all non-administrative users.

Implementation

1. All non free codecs need to be split into individual packages on a licence-by-licence basis with the existing by package replaced by a metapackage.

Code

Data preservation and migration

Outstanding issues

BoF agenda and discussion

Suggestions from VideoPlaybackRoadmap

ATM, when you try to play an unhandled video with totem, it tells you that he cannot found the corresponding plugin. What I suggest he must do is :

- Tell you what format you are trying to view and what plugin you need. - If available with apt-get, it must suggest "Install this plugin now", so you can install the corresponding plugin in one click. - If not available via apt-get for known issues (patents), it must explain why it is not avalaible and offer a "click here to know more" that send you to a page on this wiki (or on the website), telling you how to install w32codecs, libdvdcss, ... (it can perhaps download and install it automatically after asking you if you are in a country with software patents)

Another way is to have a standalone application that manage gstreamer plugins

- What about developing "dummy" plugins which somehow trigger the display of a message explaining the problem? It could be possible to have fake libraries which either play beck an audio clip or video clip (these things are either decoding audio, video, or both) with directions as to what the problem is, and the individual plugin packages could simply obsolete the dummy plugins / libraries... It seems reasonable to assume that the user will have sound support if he's trying to play back a sound file, and video support if he's trying to play back a video file.

  • This would cause some fairly large issues with many GStreamer-based applications that do more than simple playback. It would (for example) confuse music players that require users to "import" tracks before they can be played. -- JamesLivingston

also see DesktopTeam/CommonInstallHook --SamTygier

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