Ubuntu® Linux® Secrets

Chapter 12. Using Video

Secrets in This Chapter

• Video Formats

• Playing Video Files

• Using Video in Firefox

There's no question that video is one area where Linux systems have been playing catch-up. The original Linux systems didn't even support a Windows-style desktop! In the early days of Linux it was nearly impossible to display any type of video, let alone play movies or computer games. Things are a little better now. Ubuntu provides some of the basics for handling certain types of video, although there are still a few problems. This chapter helps you understand the Ubuntu video world, discussing how to view most types of video files and explaining why it's not possible to view some files.

Video Formats

With the popularity of digital video recorders, video clips are all the rage on the Internet. These days it's not uncommon to receive a video clip of your niece's ballet recital in an email message or see it posted on one of the many video file-sharing sites. Video files are stored in a variety of video formats:

• AVI: audio-visual interleave format, a standard video format supported by most video software packages

• DIVX: a proprietary AVI video compression format that must be licensed to work in Linux

• MPG: Moving Pictures Experts Group (MPEG) standard format, which includes both MPEG and MPG formats

• OGG: an open-source video format

• VOB: the DVD-video media format, used for storing MPG videos on DVDs

• WMV: Windows Media Video format, a proprietary Microsoft format

• RM: the RealNetworks proprietary ...