[tvilkov]

Hello there,
Today emerged the latest vlc version. Now no GUI comes up when I try to play something. It does start, but it sais using interface module "rc" (when I run "vlc -vv"). I've noticed that the wxwindows USE flag has dissapeared. I have enabled "gnome" USE flag, so I guess it should GTK for GUI.
Has anyone found a solution to this? How does one list the available gui modules throught command line? I have looked at the vlc wiki but haven't found anything on there.

Thank you.

[gruven]

I remember seeing this on the gentoo forums.

vlc now uses qt4 as its gui from what I have read. It is not a bug, but a feature the programmer wanted to implement.

You have to enable the qt4 use flag for a gui.

[tvilkov]

WHY ???!!!! What was wrong with the wxwindows ??? I'll try that, thanks anyway.

[gruven]

Originally Posted by tvilkov

WHY ???!!!! What was wrong with the wxwindows ??? I'll try that, thanks anyway.

From what I have read, the dev really didn't like wxwindows.

On a positive not, the qt4 interface looks good.

[tvilkov]

I suppose it does, but I'm sure they could've left the wxwindows module.

[i92guboj]

Originally Posted by tvilkov

WHY ???!!!! What was wrong with the wxwindows ??? I'll try that, thanks anyway.

Qt4 Interface - Yet another blog for JBKempf

It's not a Gentoo decission, it's a decission of the developer that was maintaining that part of vlc, no one can force him to continue that -non payed- work forever. It's his right. However, I guess that if anyone is interested and volunteers to fix and maintain it, the vlc team might be interested in having it back (or not, I don't know).

I might add from personal experience that wxWidgets is a pain in the ass to work with, and that bugs are stacked along versions without being solved, which in turn makes any wxWidgets based app buggy by nature. Of course, that's not relevant for the end user as long as it works for him/her, but I had to say it

A tipical example is amule. One of the buggiest apps I've ever used, and it all due to wxWidgets (X-less daemon work without any problem, it's just the frontend which is buggy, or at least it was the last time I checked).

Originally Posted by tvilkov

Hello there,
Today emerged the latest vlc version. Now no GUI comes up when I try to play something. It does start, but it sais using interface module "rc" (when I run "vlc -vv"). I've noticed that the wxwindows USE flag has dissapeared. I have enabled "gnome" USE flag, so I guess it should GTK for GUI.

It might be still possible to enable it by porting that back into the ebuild, or by compiling vlc yourself by hand with the correct options. But if the USE flag is gone, it's usually for a good reason. You can only expect the number of problems and bugs to grow more and more, now that the wxWidgets interface maintainer is gone.

Has anyone found a solution to this? How does one list the available gui modules throught command line? I have looked at the vlc wiki but haven't found anything on there.

Thank you.

Vlc can be used from command line, and it has also an ncurses frontend. In any case, vlc should install a binary per frontend. So, if you have gentoolkits installed, you could do something like this, to see the binaries that it installed:

equery f vlc | grep \/usr\/bin\/

It also has streaming capabilities, so you should be able to use it via a web frontend, though I have never tried personally.

[tvilkov]

Thanks for the insight i92guboj.
I have only done some very basic wxWindows programming in C++, so I don't know how buggy it is when it gets complicated (I'm learning GTK instead).
I've compiled qt4 now anyway, so I'll just stick with it for the time being.

[i92guboj]

Originally Posted by tvilkov

Thanks for the insight i92guboj.
I have only done some very basic wxWindows programming in C++, so I don't know how buggy it is when it gets complicated (I'm learning GTK instead).
I've compiled qt4 now anyway, so I'll just stick with it for the time being.

Either gtk and qt are both good options. I am naturally inclined to use qt but that's just me.

In any case, I would love to see a native (non-wx) gtk frontend, it would be a good thing, but as everything in the open source world, that will only happen if someone with enough knowledge and interest volunteers to do it (and to maintain it afterwards).

Cheers

[tvilkov]

In any case, I would love to see a native (non-wx) gtk frontend, it would be a good thing, but as everything in the open source world, that will only happen if someone with enough knowledge and interest volunteers to do it (and to maintain it afterwards).

Yes, me too! Being a GNOME user I do like to have things with a GTK frontend. Some time in the future when my GTK and C/C++ skills are up to scratch I might have a go at writing a GTK front-end for VLC.