dvd and sound

[wolfgang-s]

I'm trying to play a dvd on a Thinkpad T40 with knoppix 3.8.1.

I boot from CD with the 'toram' parameter so that I can use the dvd drive later on. Since the T40 has some problems with sound, I need to run 'alsaconf' to get it sorted. then I need to install the libdvdcss2 package. this fails with some segmentation fault.

when I install the libdvdcss2 package before i run alsaconf, libdvdcss2 gets installed properly but alsaconf fails with a segmentation fault.

anyone have a clue why the two don't like each other ?

Thanks....

[UnderScore]

Where did you get libdvdcss2 from? Since it is not is Debian main, did you get it from http://debian.video.free.fr/ ? And since that is unsupported, have you tried compiling libdvdcss2 from source?

[wolfgang-s]

Where did you get libdvdcss2 from? Since it is not is Debian main, did you get it from http://debian.video.free.fr/ ? And since that is unsupported, have you tried compiling libdvdcss2 from source?

I downloaded libdvdcss2 from www.videolan.org - I got the link through a search on this forum - they have a .dep package there, its version 1.2.8

And no - I didn't compile it from source... I didn't intend to, anyway, since I consider myself as a bloody user, not a bit-charmer.... :P

[Harry Kuhman]

.... I didn't intend to, anyway, since I consider myself as a bloody user, not a bit-charmer.... :P

Welcome to Linux. You may find that sometimes the only way some Linux programs are available is as source code. This really isn't a problem, it's probably a very good thing to get users used to the idea that they compile their own sources. The first time I had to do this (a couple of years ago), it was really no problem at all beyond making sure I had a FAT partition that I could write to. It's some thing a Linux user should embrace, not resent.

[wolfgang-s]

It's some thing a Linux user should embrace, not resent.

Depends on what you want to do with your computer... I want to play a dvd, not compile software.

But since I started this, if you tell me how to get the source, how to compile it ant afterwords get it to run - on knoppix booted from CD, of course - I'll give it a try. Maybe compiling code is more interesting than watching the dvd. And the weekend is close anyway...

[Harry Kuhman]

....But since I started this, if you tell me how to get the source, how to compile it ant afterwords get it to run - on knoppix booted from CD, of course - I'll give it a try. Maybe compiling code is more interesting than watching the dvd.

I know nothing about the package you are talking about. From what I read above compiled versions are available. You likely can find the sources with minimal searching though.

In my case, where only sources were offered, I needed to compile it myself. I simply downloaded the sources and looked at them. Full instructions for the command line to compile them including all of the right switch options were right in the source. I just typed in the command line as spelled out in the source and had a runnable program. In the process I had a chance to look at what the program was really doing and I even found a few features available in the code (and nicely commented there) that were not mentioned in the help that the program gave when it listed it's options. So by reading the source I was in much better shape to use the software (a network card inspection tool) than I would have been if I had just been able to download a compiled program and never saw the source code.

Some Linux code is offered as pre-compiled programs. I certainly don't fault anyone for accepting and using them. But some is only offered as source code that you compile yourself. You are doing yourself a disservice if you say "I just want to run it, not compile it" and dismiss the software just because you don't want to type in a simple compile line.