Warning: this page content is terribly out-of-date!
What Are Codecs?
Simply put for most users a codec is a program capable of compressing/decompressing data streams to make them more manageable and consume less bandwidth. To view files that are compressed by codecs, you will need to install a program capable of decompressing them for you.
How to Install Codecs
To install common codecs included in the Debian repositories:
apt-get update apt-get install gstreamer0.8-plugins gstreamer0.8-ffmpeg gstreamer0.8-mpeg2dec \ vorbis-tools toolame sox ffmpeg gstreamer0.8-misc gst-register-0.8
To install other codecs not included with Debian (such as mp3 codecs):
Depending on your chosen release, add one of the following lines to your /etc/apt/sources.list' file:
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ sarge main
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ etch main
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ sid main
This repository has packages for mplayer, gmplayer, and other codecs also. Do your own legal due diligence before using these.
- Then do the following:
apt-get update apt-get install lame lame-extras faad gst-register-0.8
WMA Codec
There is no WMA codec available in Debian, but you can compile one yourself. Note that this procedure is only known to work with Beep Media Player, for more information see BeepMediaPlayerHowTo.
- Open up a terminal and download the WMA Plugin:
wget http://download.berlios.de/bmp-plugins/bmp-wma-0.1.1.tar.gz
- Extract the files:
tar -xvzf bmp-wma-0.1.1.tar.gz
- Change to the directory that was created and compile:
cd bmp-wma-0.1.1 ./configure make make install
Note: You cannot play WMA files with DRM.
DIVX, Quick Time, Real Video, Windows Media, etc...
Depending on your chosen release, add one of the following lines to your /etc/apt/sources.list file:
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ sarge main
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ etch main
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ sid main
- Do the following:
apt-get update apt-get install w32codecs
- To see what codecs are included in w32codecs:
apt-get update apt-cache show w32codecs
DVD Playback
Depending on your chosen release, add one of the following lines to your /etc/apt/sources.list file:
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ sarge main
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ etch main
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ sid main
- Do the following:
apt-get update apt-get install libdvdcss2 gnome-xine
You can replace gnome-xine with totem-xine or another program capable of playing back DVDs depending on your taste.
deb http://download.videolan.org/pub/videolan/debian sid main
Most media players which are in Debian main, such as kaffeine, will play DVDs as soon as libdvdcss2 is installed.
Updated for Etch
To install the latest available versions of the above codecs for Etch:
Add the following line to your /etc/apt/sources.list' file:
deb http://debian-multimedia.org/ etch main
- Then do the following (you can replace both instances of aptitude with apt-get in the following examples):
aptitude update aptitude install gstreamer0.8-plugins gstreamer0.8-misc ffmpeg gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg-full sox toolame vorbis-tools lame lame-extras faad w32codecs libdvdcss2 totem-xine
- You may also want to add flash:
aptitude install flashplayer-mozilla
I was not able to play a video that required a wmp plugin in iceweasel until I installed the mplayer mozilla plugin and installed the MediaWrap iceweasel add-on:
aptitude install mozilla-mplayer
The MediaWrap iceweasel plugin seems to help when ActiveX objects are involved: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1879 .
External Links
Christian Marillat's repository contains Multimedia related packages for Debian Stable, Testing and Unstable.