Howto: Compile the development version of vlc under the latest Ubuntu release

[andrew.46]

Thanks for looking at this mc4man, I am greatly relieved that I am not alone with that error . Looks like I will go ahead with the snapshot from FFmpeg gitweb as this gives a great amount of flexibility as well as a standardised FFmpeg source. The release versions will always stay frozen in time with point upgrades for 3-4 months and, as in this case, this can be more than a little frustrating and maintaining a cloned git repository for FFmpeg is something I would prefer to avoid.

I will say up front that this is yet another idea I have taken from alienBOB's vlc build, that man is truly a genius with a script. That particular slackbuild is quite complex and a similar level of complexity can be seen in his libreoffice build. Always something to learn from alienBOB...

[ron998]

Hi

ron@Xubuntu:~$ cvlc --version | head -n 2
VLC media player 2.2.0-git Weatherwax (revision 8da1697)
VLC version 2.2.0-git Weatherwax (8da1697)
Compiled by ron on Xubuntu (Mar 1 2014 04:19:07)

"From time to time the live555 libraries will be updated..."

Tweaked the live555 procedure...

cd $HOME/vlc_build; sudo apt-get -y remove liblivemedia-dev; \
curl live555.com/liveMedia/public/live555-latest.tar.gz | tar -xz; chmod -R u+w live; cd live; \
if [ "$(uname -m)" = "x86_64" ]; then
  ./genMakefiles linux-64bit; make
else 
  ./genMakefiles linux; make
 fi
......

[andrew.46]

Ron I am starting to suspect that you have been spending too much time at the commandline

[andrew.46]

Weekend updates now in place and I am glad to have made some substantial progress as I am not only back to work in a day but I have another 12 months of hard study ahead!! Changes have been:

1. FFmpeg moved to gitweb snapshot and environment variables added. I have selected a gitweb snapshot at about the time that 2.2 is being released but this strategy will pay off in the long term I am sure as I will be able to 'surgically' select an FFmpeg snapshot and capture new features when required. The environment variables will enable FFmpeg to pick up locally installed libraries such as fdk-aac and this is another investment in the future of this guide.
2. libfaac-dev removed and fdk-aac instructions added plus a cli example for aac encoding. Faac has been dead technology for a while now and I have found much better sounding aac encoding with fdk-aac through vlc. I am almost 100% sure that fdk-aac is doing the encoding via FFmpeg, the vlc commandline does not give a lot away and the 'encoded by' tag is a vlc one... I have added an example of such encoding from the cli.
3. x265 instructions moved to the 'Optional' section. My next weekend project is to sort out the x265 issues. As the guide sits at the moment x265 encoding does not work although just 5 minutes ago I compiled current FFmpeg against current x265 and produced a workable hevc file in an mkv container. I suspect I need a newer x265 compiled against a newer FFmpeg (with --enable-libx265) and see if that will make vlc happier.Next week.
4. Removal instructions for 'local', compiled applications standardised throughout the guide. This makes my work on the guide a little easier and perhaps will make those unhappy with not using checkinstall a little happier.
5. cli instructions for resetting preferences to default. Added this near the 'Skins' section as I have found several of the skins will make vlc crash and burn!

So I suspect the sequence will be: fix x265 definitively and then have a look at Trusty. A more nebulous project is to gather a few commandline examples in one section for those who are keen on this, there is not a lot of decent information on cli usage with vlc.

[ron998]

... I am almost 100% sure that fdk-aac is doing the encoding via FFmpeg...

Yes, I think so too.

With --enable-libfdkaac...

mediainfo outfile1.m4a shows LC
mediainfo outfile2.m4a shows HE-AAC / LC
mediainfo outfile3.m4a shows HE-AACv2 / HE-AAC / LC

cvlc -vv --sout \
     "#transcode{acodec=mp4a,ab=128,channels=2,samplerate=44100}:\
     std{access=file,mux=mp4,dst=outfile1.m4a}" \
     infile.wav vlc://quit

cvlc -vv --sout-avcodec-aac-profile hev1 --sout \
     "#transcode{acodec=mp4a,ab=64,channels=2,samplerate=44100}:\
     std{access=file,mux=mp4,dst=outfile2.m4a}" \
     infile.wav vlc://quit

cvlc -vv --sout-avcodec-aac-profile hev2 --sout \
     "#transcode{acodec=mp4a,ab=32,channels=2,samplerate=44100}:\
     std{access=file,mux=mp4,dst=outfile3.m4a}" \
     infile.wav vlc://quit

ron@Xubuntu:~$ cvlc --version | head -n 2
VLC media player 2.2.0-git Weatherwax (revision 54536c5)
VLC version 2.2.0-git Weatherwax (54536c5)
Compiled by ron on Xubuntu (Mar 1 2014 12:30:50)

[andrew.46]

Thanks Ron for confirming that, I was not aware of the --sout-avcodec-aac-profile option but that demonstrates it nicely . One day I should delve a little deeper into the cli options for vlc.....

I see it clearly enough now:

      --sout-avcodec-aac-profile <string>
                                 Specify AAC audio profile to use
          Specify the AAC audio profile to use for encoding the audio
          bitstream. It takes the following options: main, low, ssr (not
          supported),ltp, hev1, hev2 (default: low). hev1 and hev2 are
          currently supported only with libfdk-aac enabled libavcodec

Much buried treasure in cvlc -H !

Edit: On digging a little deeper it looks like in this build FFmpeg only has 2 aac encoders: aac and libfdk_aac and these can be specified on the commandline:

cvlc -vv --sout-avcodec-aac-profile hev2 --sout-avcodec-codec libfdk_aac --sout \
     "#transcode{acodec=mp4a,ab=32,channels=2,samplerate=44100}:\
     std{access=file,mux=mp4,dst=outfile.m44}" \
     luckynight.wav vlc://quit

Using aac of course fails, this is FFmpeg's own native encoder, and there is an error message suggesting libfdk_aac. It is always a good day when you learn something new...

[mc4man]

Just a note -
don't know how many want https support in vlc (I find handy) but the current git & recent releases seem to require higher version than before

configure: error: Requested 'gnutls >= 3.0.20' but version of GnuTLS is 2.12.23

Satisfied with - libgnutls28-dev

[ron998]

Satisfied with - libgnutls28-dev

Pangolin-12.04LTS libgnutls28-dev is only 3.0.11.
"Requested 'gnutls >= 3.0.20' but version of GnuTLS is 3.0.11"

Trusty-14.04LTS libgnutls28-dev is 3.2.3
Will have to manage without gnutls till April.

[mc4man]

Pangolin-12.04LTS libgnutls28-dev is only 3.0.11.
"Requested 'gnutls >= 3.0.20' but version of GnuTLS is 3.0.11"

Trusty-14.04LTS libgnutls28-dev is 3.2.3
Will have to manage without gnutls till April.

14.04 should be much improved, currently has a few issues, mainly around unity-window-decorator, compiz & lim.

A small side 'issue' of libgnutls28-dev is then librtmp-dev is removed. Doesn't much matter unless one wanted for a mplayer build, then it & libgnutls-dev would need to be returned for the build.
(I did put up a test build of rtmpdump off of libgnutls28 for trusty to see, seems fine.

[andrew.46]

Thanks mc4man and ron, I have added in the required gnutls dev package. Also taken out the x265 material as it is getting a little too hard. Perhaps I will add back in after Trusty has arrived...