[helix-maintainers] Re: Problems with Helix/Replayer 10 on Debian Linux

[R (Chandra) Chandrasekhar]

Dear Thomas,

Thank you for your reply.  My answers are interleaved below.

Thomas Maurer wrote:
> Hello Chandra,
> 
> Am Samstag, den 09.10.2004, 18:16 +0800 schrieb R (Chandra)
> Chandrasekhar:
> 
>>2. I downloaded the RealPlayer10GOLD.rpm package and using alien 
>>installed the realplayer_10.0.1.436-20040925_i386.deb that resulted. 
>>This package was recognized by mozilla in the about:plugins page but I 
>>could not play Real Audio at some web sites.
> 
> 
> The reason for this could be that some old Real codecs are no more
> supported by the RealPlayer gold.
> 
> Please let me know the addresses of the streams that you couldn't play.

The sites I tried include:

http://www.sivanandadlshq.org/realaudio/

specifically one file was:

pnm://www.SivanandaDlshq.org/realaudio/govinda.ra

With HelixPlayer it gave the error message
***********
The following components are required:

protocol_pnm
***********
With RealPlayer it gave the error message
***********
The following components are required:

28_8
***********

> 
> Btw: You know the difference between Helix Player and RealPlayer? [I
> just asked me why you installed both.]

I want my browser to be able to play material on web sites that require 
RealPlayer.

For example, I tried a music CD site where one can sample music on the 
web browser and order custom-made CDs.  Sample page is:

http://www.hamaracd.com/hcdinternational/asp/vaGiftIdeas.asp?GiftId=G694

Even after installing HelixPlayer, I got the message that my browser 
needed RealPlayer.

I then installed RealPlayer and still got the same message with my 
Mozilla browser, even after ensuring that the RealPlayer plugin metafile 
showed up in about:plugins.  Therefore, I cannot at present sample the 
music before selecting tracks.  This was what started me installing 
HelixPlayer and RealPlayer today.

> 
> For more infos:
> https://player.helixcommunity.org/2004/unix/helixrealfaq.html

Thaks for this.  I need to sample RealAudio material and I am not sure 
that HelixPlayer does this.  Thus, my decision to install both.  I do 
not know if this makes sense.

> 
> 
>>7. On playing two files that gave me error messages, I got the following 
>>error pop-ups shown in the two .png files attached.
> 
> 
> Well, the error messages are self-explaining, aren't they?
> 
> 
>>8. Is there anything I can do about these or is it because of outdated 
>>audio formats?
> 
> 
> I don't know if you can do something about it, but I forward this point
> to the player-dev list, probably the can give a more helpful answer :).

Thank you.

> 
> 
>>9. In any case, is there a web site where I can test my RealPlayer10 
>>installation, both as stand-alone, and as a Mozilla plugin, as was the 
>>case previously with the downloads from RealPlayer?
> 
> 
> I don't know if there is a test suite of RealNetworks, but you can try
> this site to test the RealPlayer: http://guide.real.com/

Interestingly enough, I tried some of the audio material on this site 
and also got error messages with Mozilla that the necessary components 
were not installed.  I do not know whether this was because of work in 
progress, or because of improper installation on my system.  Hence my 
e-mail.

> 
> 
>>10. Finally, when do you plan on making a Debian package available for 
>>RealPlayer10 so that I do not have to install (or worse, remove) 
>>anything by hand?
> 
> 
> Of course, this is planned. And producing realplayer debs is actually a
> very small problem, but the RealPlayer is a branded _product_ of
> RealNetworks and is supported by them. So if Debian wants to ship
> RealPlayer debs with its distro they need an agreement with RealNetworks
> (because the RealPlayer cannot be distributed freely). How long this
> takes and if at all, I don't know. But hopefully I can soon create a
> debian repository on helixcommunity.org with RealPlayer debs, so you can
> install the RealPlayer as easily as anything else with Debian :).

I look forward to this.

> 
> Thomas
> 
> PS: CC'd to player-dev@hc.org
> PPS: For player-dev@hc.org readers: the full mail of Chandra can be
> found here:
> http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/helix-maintainers/2004-October/000049.html

Thank you very much.

Chandra
10 Oct 04
-- 
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Dr R (Chandra) Chandrasekhar
Adjunct Senior Lecturer
M018, Centre for Intelligent Information Processing Systems (CIIPS)
School of Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering
The University of Western Australia
35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, WA 6009, AUSTRALIA
Phone: +61-(8)-6488-3749  Fax: +61-(8)-6488-1168
email: chandra@ee.uwa.edu.au
CRICOS Provider Code: 00126G
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