vlc
Before installing vlc player make sure that you updated your system. Otherwise you can face issues during player installation.
sudo apt-get update
To install vlc player on Linux platform (e.g. Raspbian) run the following command:
sudo apt-get install vlc
That will install the player in folder /usr/bin.
In addition to the vlc player itself the Python binding library should be installed as well. It will allow Peppy Player to talk to the vlc player using Python. To install vlc Python binding run the following commands:
pip install python-vlc
If this commands doesn't work run it using 'sudo':
sudo pip install python-vlc
In case of successful installation the following command executed from the Python's prompt should not cause any exception:
>> import vlc
The following example shows parameters which should be defined in audio section of the players.txt file in order to use vlc:
[audio]
player.name = vlc
music.folder.linux = /music
music.folder.windows = C:\music
The property music.folder is not required for vlc and can be left blank.
The following parameters defined in players.txt file will be used to run vlc player on Linux platform:
[vlc.linux]
server.command = --aout=alsa --alsa-audio-device=hw --verbose=-1
client.name = vlcclient
stream.server.parameters = --sout=#transcode{acodec=flac}:std{access=http,mux=flac,dst=10.0.0.6:8080}
The following parameters defined in players.txt file will be used to run vlc player on Windows platform:
[vlc.windows]
server.command = --verbose=-1
client.name = vlcclient
stream.server.parameters = --sout=#transcode{acodec=flac}:std{access=http,mux=flac,dst=10.0.0.6:8080}
The communication with vlc player includes commands which UI sends to the player and notifications which player sends back to UI. The following diagram shows how this communication was implemented:
The following table lists the functionality available from vlc on different platforms. The lack of particular functionality doesn't mean that player doesn't provide it. That just means that it's currently not available in Peppy player and probably will be supported in the future.
| Features | vlc/Linux | vlc/Windows |
|---|---|---|
| Web Radio | x | x |
| File Playback | x | x |
| m3u Playlist | x | x |
| cue Playlist | ||
| Audiobooks | x | x |
| Podcasts | x | x |
| Streaming Server | x | x |
| Streaming Client | x | x |
| CD Player | x | x |
| Support for UTF-8 filenames | x | x |
| VU Meter Screensaver | x | * |
*VU Meter screensaver will be displayed but it will show randomly generated values.