Important notice for Debian/Ubuntu users

[patriot2135]

Hello Forum.

I am using Debian Linux - 2.6.32-5-686 (code name --> Snow Linux) and have recently updated my repository. To be clear, I deleted the Debian Multimedia source and added http://www.deb-multimedia.org/ . Did I simply change the name, or did I actually add an entirely different source to my list? And is this problem still an issue with Debian users using VLC?

I haven't been able to find any information on this issue beyond this forum.

The problem that I am currently experiencing is that when I try to open an H.264 formatted movie in VLC, I get sound but no video.
I can open the same file in Movie Player and I don't have any problems with it. But I prefer VLC over any other player out there. I have been a loyal user/supporter of VideoLan for almost ten years now and I don't intend to change.

Any help regarding this post would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you in advance.
Respectfully....

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

You need to remove all packages from the repository and potential undo any installation/uninstallation script.

Other than that, the only completely certain procedure is to reinstall the distribution from scratch.

[DragonDon]

When I go to remove the lib* packages, it wants to uninstall a TON of other programs! Looks like too many things will get removed.

http://paste.debian.net/hidden/fef7ea43/

This is Squeeze in a VirtualBox VM, if that makes any difference.

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

Yes, so it does. You should not have installed the faulty packages. Now you broke your system and indeed fixing it may be a PITA.

[Lew_Rockwell_Fan]

JeepFreak wrote:

And by "Debian Multimedia Repository", you do not mean the "Medibuntu Repository", correct? I know others wanted to clarify that as well, but I didn't notice a response.
Thank you!
Billy

From the original post by Rémi Denis-Courmont:

. . . do not use the Debian Multimedia repository . . . Remove any Debian-Multimedia.org entries from the APT sources list . . .

rober1s:

By this do you mean the ubuntu "multiverse" repository?

xtophe:

no. He means debian-multimedia.org

Call me a plagarist, but: no. He means debian-multimedia.org

medibuntu = http://www.medibuntu.org

"Multiverse" is just a separate part of Canonical's regular repositories. It is stuff written by other people and has various kinds of intellectual property restrictions on it, like if you use it more than 90 days you're supposed to register if or send somebody some money or something like that, but they distribute it from the same servers you get updates from. Ditto, with different distinctions, for "main", "universe", and "restricted".

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

Please don't hijack sticky topics with off-topic support requests. You are being selfish.

[nidez]

is raspibian jessie affected too ? could my MJPG stream -> h264 file transcode problem be related to this ?

[skebbelshweps]

[*]Remove any libavutil package. This will also temporarily remove VLC, MPlayer, etc if they are installed. For example:

Code: Select all

sudo apt-get remove libavutil*

I was stupid enough to copy paste this, which removed my gnome-control-center, Skype, sound control (no sound devices show up), and god knows what else.
Went from trying to fix VLC to deleting half my operating system real fast, and of course it didn't fix the problem either.

Again, I should have known better, but in my humble opinion these kinds of instructions have no place on a troubleshooting forum.

I got the control center back with with

Code: Select all

apt-get install gnome-control-center

, but since more broken stuff just keeps popping up I will look for a way to reinstall all the packages that come with debian/gnome.

Best part of it all is that I never even had that multimedia repository in my sources..

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

And you suggest what other way to remove libavutil for those users that actually need to do exactly that??

[skebbelshweps]

do they really need to just remove all those packages? Shouldn't they re-install them using another repository as the source?

apparently the remove command deleted packages that had nothing to do with VLC as the install of VLC didn't install those packages, so the remove command spans too wide, if it only covered the VLC related packages they would be reinstalled when installing VLC and nothing else would be affected right?

Maybe instruct people to make a list installed packages that have to be re-installed after the remove?

I don't know what the best solution is, but something where the user doesn't end up with a broken GNOME and missing software should be possible.

Would you maybe know how I could re-install all the packages included with basic debian and GNOME install? I'd like to do this without completely re-installing debian.

[galen]

don't do this under current Sparky Debian Linux

[mmmmna]

[*]Remove any libavutil package. This will also temporarily remove VLC, MPlayer, etc if they are installed. For example:

Code: Select all

sudo apt-get remove libavutil*

I was stupid enough to copy paste this, which removed my gnome-control-center, Skype, sound control (no sound devices show up), and god knows what else.
Went from trying to fix VLC to deleting half my operating system real fast, and of course it didn't fix the problem either.

Again, I should have known better, but in my humble opinion these kinds of instructions have no place on a troubleshooting forum.

I got the control center back with with

Code: Select all

apt-get install gnome-control-center

, but since more broken stuff just keeps popping up I will look for a way to reinstall all the packages that come with debian/gnome.

Best part of it all is that I never even had that multimedia repository in my sources..

And as you did this, did you ignore the dire warnings of what would be removed?

This is a common issue with most distros. I have since learned to not uninstall certain packages because they 'broke KDE', very similar to this Gnome issue. I have managed to get some such apps uninstalled (ones which declared the world would fail), but this was lucky. Me, I NOW say why risk it, since, like you, this is NOT a tester computer, it must work for me.

Somewhere in the dependency tree, a decision has been made that if this doesn't exist, then this also CANNOT exist (such as control center, which in turn may cause sound devices to get pulled out, etcetera), but this WHOLE TREE of failure isn't a deliberate decision, it is just perpetually assumed to be present: the bottom assumes the middle is present, the middle assumes the top is present, etcetera, nobody checks if the bottom needs the top). We only see this after installation has put something (everything) together. Distros testing seem to not test what-if scenarios, since such removal actions would maybe quadruple testing times. Maybe we need to send feedback to the development team that such a breakdown is senseless. My point is for users of 'VLC in Linux' to encourage development teams to hear every LONG TERM users needs, not just the needs of the testing setups. I personally try this from time to time, but sometimes I'm considered a troll for not accepting slop. When you go to the development teams, be prepared, be accurate, be as unbiased as possible, state facts, do your research (Debian is a good start), and be prepared to possibly follow the discussions for months.

[Jack Dearlad]

Does this alert also apply to Linux Mint (KDE, Cinnamon, MATE)? Mint is based on Ubuntu, as far as I know.

Jack Dearlad

[DRAGSTER_TUNER]

A significant number of VLC users on Debian and Ubuntu appear to be hit by bugs in the unofficial so-called Debian Multimedia repository (debian-multimedia.org).

This unofficial package repository is well known to introduce incompatibilities in the FFMPEG libraries. This causes VLC media player and possibly some other multimedia software to stop working, as the FFMPEG binary interface is silently broken. The members of the VideoLAN project as well as the official Debian Multimedia maintainers[1] strongly advise that you do not use the Debian Multimedia repository under any circumstances. Before you report problems with VLC on Debian or Ubuntu, make sure you have not installed any package from that repository.

If it is too late, you can follow the simple clean-up procedure:

• Remove any Debian-Multimedia.org entries from the APT sources list via your package manager, or from the command line:

  Code: Select all

  sudo vi /etc/apt/sources.list
• Update the package list, e.g.:

  Code: Select all

  sudo apt-get update
• Remove any libavutil package. This will also temporarily remove VLC, MPlayer, etc if they are installed. For example:

  Code: Select all

  sudo apt-get remove libavutil*
• Reinstall VLC and other packages you are interested in, from the official Debian repositories, e.g.

  Code: Select all

  sudo apt-get install vlc

If you choose to keep the faulty packages and repository, then FFMPEG will not work properly, and hence neither will VLC. In that case, there is really no point in looking for help on this forum.

Thank you for your attention

[1] http://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia ... mon_issues

i removed debian multimedia from sources.list and give an apt-get clean apt-get autoclean apt-get autoremove and then apt-get update

then sudo apt-get remove libavutil*

It removes ALL this packages together:

k3b k3b-i18n audacity ffmpeg browser-plugin-freshplayer-pepperflash gimp parole pulseaudio mpv

Then, i mande an apt-get install vlc...and it still hangs!

installed all again (k3b k3b-i18n audacity ffmpeg browser-plugin-freshplayer-pepperflash gimp parole pulseaudio mpv) and try use vlc again...

Still freezing X!

Resuming:

making an
apt-get remove libavutil*
apt-get install vlc does not works

ik tried apt-get remove libavutil* vcl* and then apt-get install vlc, but have no luck too...

my sources.list:

deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ testing main contrib non-free
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ testing main contrib non-free
deb http://repo.vivaldi.com/archive/deb/ stable main