[Pkg-freevo-maint] Bug#478574: freevo: Video playback fails under some circumstances from files on removable media

[Darkhorse Winterwolf]

Package: freevo
Version: 1.8.0-2
Severity: important


Hello,

I've found a bug that seriously affects the usability of Freevo for me
as someone who uses it purely as a media player without any live TV
input, and mainly from CDs and DVDs. This problem has only appeared with
Freevo 1.8.0-2; when using 1.7.3-1 playing files as described below seems
to work perfectly.

The problem is that under some circumstances, playing video from CD or
DVD fails. When the failure occurs, the screen blanks as if the video
player starts, then the freevo screen re-starts, displaying the parent
to the directory on display when the movie was selected. Interestingly,
it also appears that the CD/DVD has been unmounted when returned to
Freevo.

Most of the files I have that demonstrate this are quite large, so for
now I'm going to try to describe the problem. If it is difficult to
reproduce or if it would be useful anyway, I'd be happy to create
cut-down files that demonstrate the bug and/or images of discs
containing such files that demonstrate the problem.

The problem is not seen for all CDs or DVDs containing video files, just
some of them. So far, the following situations do cause this error of
not playing the video but returning to the menu after a blank screen for
a second or two:

* CD/DVD with one or more directories containing video files.
* CD/DVD with a directory containing a video file and other directories.

These situations do not affect the bug either way:

* The exact filesystem on the DVD.
* The title of the disc.
* Video encoding.

These situations seem to work perfectly:

* Video files in the root of a CD/DVD with no directories.
* Copying a file manually to the hard drive, then playing from there.
* Selecting a directory with just one video file in it (plays
  automatically).
* Video DVDs.
* Anything except for video files (music and images are fine).

I'm perhaps a little unusual in not using Freevo for TV but only for
playing files, and then mainly from CD/DVD, which is why I've just set
the severity of this report to normal to start with. I'll keep trying a
few things to narrow down the problem when I have the time, and will
keep this bug updated. In the mean time, if you'd like any further
information, configuration files or tests performing, feel free to let
me know and I'll post the results as soon as I can.

All the best,
-Dave.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: lenny/sid
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (500, 'testing'), (500, 'stable')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.22.3
Locale: LANG=en_GB, LC_CTYPE=en_GB (charmap=ISO-8859-1)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash

Versions of packages freevo depends on:
ii  adduser         3.107                    add and remove users and groups
ii  console-tools   1:0.2.3dbs-65            Linux console and font utilities
ii  debconf         1.5.20                   Debian configuration management sy
ii  freevo-data     1.8.0-2                  Themes and non-application data fo
ii  lsdvd           0.16-3                   read the content info of a DVD
ii  mplayer         1:1.0.rc2svn20071207-0.3 The Ultimate Movie Player For Linu
ii  python          2.4.4-6                  An interactive high-level object-o
ii  python-central  0.6.5                    register and build utility for Pyt
ii  python-freevo   1.8.0-2                  Python modules for Freevo

Versions of packages freevo recommends:
ii  cdparanoia          3.10+debian~pre0-6   audio extraction tool for sampling
ii  libxmltv-perl       0.5.51-2             Perl libraries related to the XMLT
ii  xine-ui             0.99.5+cvs20070914-2 the xine video player, user interf
ii  xmltv-util          0.5.51-2             Utilities related to the XMLTV fil

-- debconf information:
* freevo/display: x11
* freevo/path_to_audio:
* freevo/path_to_image:
* freevo/norm: pal
* freevo/title_image:
* freevo/chanlist: europe-west
* freevo/geometry: 800x600
* freevo/title_audio:
  freevo/path_to_recordings: /home/freevo/recordings
* freevo/start_on_boot:
* freevo/path_to_video:
* freevo/title_video:
* freevo/services: xserver, recordserver, encodingserver