Phonon-gstreamer missing plugins.

[Melcar]

I have a problem with the phonon-gstreamer backend. It refuses to play media files in the Dolphin side panel. Keeps complaining that I'm missing plugins. Already checked and I have everything installed, and even media players that use phonon-gstreamer have no problems playing any media. Only way I can get Dolphin's side panel player to work is if I switch to the VLC backend.
Already goolgled the problem and all I find are ancient posts that suggest a missing plugin pack. Apparently that worked for the OP but it doesn't in my case.

Kubuntu 13.10 64bit.

[SteveRiley]

Install ffmpegthumbs.

[Melcar]

I'm not having a problem with thumbnails, but with Dolphin's integrated media player.

[SteveRiley]

Like this?

If that's what you want, ffmpegthumbs is the correct package.

steve@t520:~$ [B]apt-cache show ffmpegthumbs[/B]
Package: ffmpegthumbs
...
Description-en: video thumbnail generator using ffmpeg
 FFMpegThumbs is a video thumbnail generator for KDE file managers
 like Dolphin and Konqueror.  It enables them to show preview images
 of video files using FFMpeg.
 .
 This package is part of the KDE multimedia module.

Also, make sure you enable the preview setting:

[Melcar]

If I'm not mistaken, that's so Dolphin can generate thumbnails for previews (when you check the preview option in Dolphin and it shows your file's thumbnails inside the work window). I already have a thumbnailer package for Dolphin anyway. What I'm referring too is the video player on the right side of the browser pane (information pane) in your first screenshot. That I can only get to work with the phonon-vlc backend. If I switch the gstreamer I get a system notification that I'm missing plugins (I have all plugins installed). This happens with any video file. Music files cause dolphin to outright crash. I will try installing that specific thumbnailer package latter tonight anyway.

[claydoh]

Odd. I do NOT have ffmpegthumbs installed, yet I have video previews in Dolphin that work for mp3, mp4 and mkv files I have. The preview looks exactly like what you have, SteveRiley. Don't know if I have any extra gstreamer or ffmpeg plugins/codecs installed over stock.

lark@lark-Latitude-D630:~$ dpkg --get-selections | grep gstreamer
bluez-gstreamer                                 install
gir1.2-gstreamer-1.0                            install
gstreamer0.10-alsa:amd64                        install
gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg:amd64                      install
gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3:amd64                 install
gstreamer0.10-nice:amd64                        install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad:amd64                 install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-base:amd64                install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-good:amd64                install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly:amd64                install
gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio:amd64                  install
gstreamer0.10-qapt                              install
gstreamer0.10-x:amd64                           install
gstreamer1.0-libav:amd64                        install
gstreamer1.0-plugins-base:amd64                 install
gstreamer1.0-plugins-good:amd64                 install
gstreamer1.0-plugins-ugly:amd64                 install
gstreamer1.0-pulseaudio:amd64                   install
gstreamer1.0-x:amd64                            install
libgstreamer-plugins-bad0.10-0:amd64            install
libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-0:amd64           install
libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-0:i386            install
libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-0:amd64            install
libgstreamer-plugins-good1.0-0:amd64            install
libgstreamer0.10-0:amd64                        install
libgstreamer0.10-0:i386                         install
libgstreamer1.0-0:amd64                         install
libqtgstreamer-0.10-0:amd64                     install
libqtgstreamerui-0.10-0:amd64                   install
libqtgstreamerutils-0.10-0:amd64                deinstall
phonon-backend-gstreamer:amd64                  install

lark@lark-Latitude-D630:~$ dpkg --get-selections | grep ffmpeg
chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra                    install
ffmpeg                                          install
gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg:amd64                      install
nepomuk-core-ffmpegextractor

[SteveRiley]

OK, this is weird... I was always under the impression that ffmpegthumbs provided the necessary hooks to play media in Dolphin, even though it has "thumbs" in the name.

Here's what I have...

steve@t520:~$ [B]dpkg -l | awk '/gstreamer|libav|ffmpeg/ {print $2}'[/B]
chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra
ffmpeg
ffmpegthumbs
gstreamer0.10-alsa:amd64
gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg:amd64
gstreamer0.10-nice:amd64
gstreamer0.10-plugins-base:amd64
gstreamer0.10-plugins-good:amd64
gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly:amd64
gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio:amd64
gstreamer0.10-qapt
gstreamer0.10-x:amd64
libav-tools
libavahi-client-dev
libavahi-client3:amd64
libavahi-common-data:amd64
libavahi-common-dev
libavahi-common3:amd64
libavahi-core7:amd64
libavahi-glib1:amd64
libavc1394-0:amd64
libavcodec-extra-53:amd64
libavdevice-extra-53:amd64
libavfilter-extra-2:amd64
libavformat-extra-53:amd64
libavogadro1
libavutil-extra-51:amd64
libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-0:amd64
libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-0:amd64
libgstreamer0.10-0:amd64
libgstreamer1.0-0:amd64
libqtgstreamer-0.10-0:amd64
libqtgstreamerui-0.10-0:amd64
phonon-backend-gstreamer:amd64

[Melcar]

Installed the thumbnail package either way but still no show. This is all the plugins for gstreamer I have at the moment:

gstreamer0.10-alsa:amd64                        install
gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg:amd64                      install
gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3:amd64                 install
gstreamer0.10-nice:amd64                        install
gstreamer0.10-packagekit                        install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad:amd64                 install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad-multiverse            install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-base:amd64                install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-base-apps                 install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-good:amd64                install
gstreamer0.10-plugins-good:i386                 deinstall
gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly:amd64                install
gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio:amd64                  install
gstreamer0.10-qapt                              install
gstreamer0.10-tools                             install
gstreamer0.10-vaapi:amd64                       install
gstreamer0.10-x:amd64                           install
libgstreamer-plugins-bad0.10-0:amd64            install
libgstreamer-plugins-bad1.0-0:amd64             deinstall
libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-0:amd64           install
libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-0:i386            deinstall
libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-0:amd64            install
libgstreamer-plugins-good1.0-0:amd64            deinstall
libgstreamer-vaapi0.10:amd64                    install
libgstreamer0.10-0:amd64                        install
libgstreamer0.10-0:i386                         deinstall
libgstreamer1.0-0:amd64                         install
libqtgstreamer-0.10-0:amd64                     install
libqtgstreamerui-0.10-0:amd64                   install
phonon-backend-gstreamer:amd64                  install

Every time I try to play a file Dolphin crashes or tells me it can't find a plugin for "video/x-surface decoder" (for video files). Stand alone video players using phonon-gstreamer work fine, so this seems to be a Dolphin/gstreamer issue.

[claydoh]

lark@lark-Latitude-D630:~$ dpkg -l | awk '/gstreamer|libav|ffmpeg/ {print $2}'
bluez-gstreamer
chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra
ffmpeg
gir1.2-gstreamer-1.0
gstreamer0.10-alsa:amd64
gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg:amd64
gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3:amd64
gstreamer0.10-nice:amd64
gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad:amd64
gstreamer0.10-plugins-base:amd64
gstreamer0.10-plugins-good:amd64
gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly:amd64
gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio:amd64
gstreamer0.10-qapt
gstreamer0.10-x:amd64
gstreamer1.0-libav:amd64
gstreamer1.0-plugins-base:amd64
gstreamer1.0-plugins-good:amd64
gstreamer1.0-plugins-ugly:amd64
gstreamer1.0-pulseaudio:amd64
gstreamer1.0-x:amd64
libav-tools
libavahi-client3:amd64
libavahi-client3:i386
libavahi-common-data:amd64
libavahi-common-data:i386
libavahi-common3:amd64
libavahi-common3:i386
libavahi-core7:amd64
libavahi-glib1:amd64
libavahi-gobject0:amd64
libavc1394-0:amd64
libavcodec53:amd64
libavdevice53:amd64
libavfilter2:amd64
libavformat53:amd64
libavidemux0
libavutil51:amd64
libgstreamer-plugins-bad0.10-0:amd64
libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-0:amd64
libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-0:i386
libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-0:amd64
libgstreamer-plugins-good1.0-0:amd64
libgstreamer0.10-0:amd64
libgstreamer0.10-0:i386
libgstreamer1.0-0:amd64
libqtgstreamer-0.10-0:amd64
libqtgstreamerui-0.10-0:amd64
libqtgstreamerutils-0.10-0:amd64
nepomuk-core-ffmpegextractor
phonon-backend-gstreamer:amd64

[Melcar]

I see I have a few i386 packages. How to I go about removing them? Removing them with apt-get only uninstall the 64bit packages.

[Buddlespit]

Do you guys have mplayer or vlc installed?

[Melcar]

I have both. If I use the vlc backend for phonon videos work fine in the Dolphin player.

[Buddlespit]

I was just wondering. I had remembered that at one point, mplayer and mplayerthumbs had to be installed for previews to play videos.

[SteveRiley]

I have mplayer2 installed. Hmm... I wonder if that's what Dolphin is using to play videos in the side panel, then. But I don't have mplayerthumbs, just ffmepgthumbs.

[claydoh]

I have neither mplayer2, mplayerthumbs nor ffmpegthumbs installed, as well as lacking the vlc phonon backend.......curioius