363267 - Linux version cannot find plugin for vmw files when codebase point to activex mplayer

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Toolkit Graveyard :: Plugin Finder Service, defect)

Description

[Urpo Kaila]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.8.1) Gecko/20061010 Firefox/2.0
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.8.1) Gecko/20061010 Firefox/2.0

On many popular sites for videoclips  Firefox 2.0 on linux cannot handle 
vmw files with its defined helper application (for example xine)
because the HTML code points to Microsoft activex, like in the example below.

In the HTML code there is a line after <object>:
codebase="http://activex.microsoft.com/activex/controls/mplayer/en/nsmp2inf.cab#Version=6,4,5,715"

This kind of pages are perhaps created with some HTML editor from Microsoft?

The plugin finder can also not find a plugin for these kind of pages,
although xine can play at least most of the vmw files (depends on codecs)
if you dig the URL to the actual vmw file from the HTML source and
enter it manually  to Firefox.

This lack of ability of is a big disadvantage for the usability for Firefox on Linux! Could there be a way to go around the codebase pointer
and feed the vmw file directly to the helper application (xine).?



object classid="CLSID:22d6f312-b0f6-11d0-94ab-0080c74c7e95"  codebase="http://activex.microsoft.com/activex/controls/mplayer/en/nsmp2inf.cab#Version=6,4,5,715" type="application/x-oleobject" height="350" width="385" vspace="0" standby="Loading Microsoft® Windows® Media Player components..." id="Object1" VIEWASTEXT="true">
							<param name="FileName" value="http://4media.2ndhead.fi/hauskatkotivideot/j_55_e4_2411_2006.wmv">
							<param name="AutoStart" value="true">
							<param name="AutoRewind" value="true">
							<param name="Loop" value="false">
							<param name="TransparentAtStart" value="false">
							<param name="AnimationatStart" value="true">
							<param name="ShowControls" value="true">

							<param name="autoSize" value="false">
							<param name="displaySize" value="0">
							<param name="ShowStatusBar" value="true">
							<param name="ShowTracker" value="true">
							<param name="ShowPositionControls" value="0">
							<embed rc="http://4media.2ndhead.fi/hauskatkotivideot/j_55_e4_2411_2006.wmv" height="350" width="385" vspace="0"
								autostart=true loop="false" type="application/x-mplayer2" 
								pluginspage="http://www.microsoft.com/Windows/Downloads/Contents/Products/MediaPlayer/" 
								filename="http://4media.2ndhead.fi/hauskatkotivideot/j_55_e4_2411_2006.wmv" transparentatstart=false animationstart=1 showcontrols=true
								showpositioncontrols=false showstatusbar=true showtracker=true autosize=false
								displaysize=0 autorewind="true" animationatstart="false">
						</object>

***



Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Surf to http://www.nelonen.fi/hauskatnettivideot/ with Firefox 3 for Linux
2. Try to look at the video
3. Try to get the right plugin

(I'll try to find another example site  in english)

Actual Results:  
Cannot see the video clip, cannot find a plugin,

Expected Results:  
Should see the vmw videoclip, should find right plugin

Comment 1

[Urpo Kaila]

Other pages where the vmw plugins doesn't work with Firefox 2 for linux
because of the activex codebase:

http://www.video-clips.co.uk/
http://video.aol.com

A bit similar problem might be in 

http://video.msn.com/ 

But there the problem is because of Firefox cannot
use the flash player.  Should it be Macromedia Flash 9?

Comment 2

[Doron Rosenberg (IBM)]

Mozilla will use the embed tag, not the object tag in this case.  Most likely you don't have a plugin that can handle that file type - on windows it works fine.

Comment 3

[Urpo Kaila]

Hi,

Many thanks for your comment Doron.

This is a linux specific bug, as you by defintion
cannot run activex (=native windows  binary) on Linux. 
On the browser, by  which I tested this feature, I  *did* have 
a functional  plugin configured for wmv files: xine
(http://xinehq.de/). The clips runs fine when fetched
directly but not through the acticex codebase tag.

How could Mozilla/Firefox  use the embed tag in this case?

Comment 4

[Doron Rosenberg (IBM)]

First of all, Firefox doesn't support ActiveX without an addtional download on windows - on every OS, we will default to the inner embed tag. and use that.

Go to your urlbar, enter about:plugins and press enter.  Search for "video/x-ms-wvx" in that list.  On windows, Windows Media player registers for that mimetype.  Most likely xine doesn't register for that mimetype.

Comment 5

[Urpo Kaila]

Many thanks Doron,

You were right, I hade xine configured only as "helper application",
not as a plugin.  When I got the file $HOME/.firefox/plugins/gxineplugin.so
the vmw files with codebase activex became functional. Thanks.

In case somebode else would like to know how that can be done as easy
as possible, on a debian linux (Ubuntu) the problem was fixed with 
the command:

sudo apt-get install  gxineplugin

I close this bug as WORKSFORME. In the future, however, I think the
installation of plugins should be made much easier also for the
Linux version.

U.K.