VLC old 2022 bug regression, .mkv subtitles throw error is back

[Josue]

VLC was working just fine a month ago, I expected the update I got yesterday to fix things, but nothing. I don’t know where I should file the bug because even though the error is thrown by VLC, it seems the actual bug comes from an underlying dependance, and this problem, this same bug has already happened before.

Josue (@JcJosue3773) on X

I found several similar topics form 2022:

Vlc: codec undf for the subtitles

Hi, Since the latest’s updates (and kernel 518 to 519), I have an issue with the subtitles in vlc. vlc say for all sub files : Codec : undf And the subs are not displayed. I installed vlc flatpack, with it there is no issue with the subs. How do I find and fix the problem?

Vlc error de codec al abrir mkv

Hola soy nuevo en este foro Hace unos días actualice mi kde plasma y borré los paquetes huérfanos. a partir de entonces, me sale este error cuando VLC abre el fichero MKV .Os pongo una captura de pantalla para verlo. Aparte me cambia el punto del cuando abro algunas aplicaciones gtK2 (emule) y antes no lo hacía Los detalles de error que me da en consola [ecc@manjarokde ~]$ vlc VLC media player 3.0.17.4 Vetinari (revision 3.0.13-8-g41878ff4f2) [000055579af86550] main libvlc: Ejecutar vlc co…

https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=280218

This affects any .MKV file I have created with Mkvtoolnix so any soft subs are effectively borked, and VLC cannot display subtitles, all it does is throw this dumb codec error.

But if having a codec error for mere subtitles sounds dumb, it seems there’s something else that is wrong here, because that thread in the Arch forums doesn¡t point to VLC as the underlying source for the bug, but some obscure library dependency (libebml) which was the actual culprit in that case.
Now, I don’t want to take the risk and downgrade anything, specially since this is a rolling release distro and the downgrade would be updated back very quickly, but also the risk of breaking things sounds too high for me, I use this Manjaro machine for everything and I don’t want that risk. All I think I can do is find out where do I report this bug so it can be fixed?

[omano]

Just a wild guess, but do you have all plugins installed for VLC?

sudo pacman -Syu vlc-plugins-all

Before reporting, you need to identify the issue EXACTLY or else you don’t know what to report and where to report it.

[Josue]

@omano

Just a wild guess, but do you have all plugins installed for VLC?

sudo pacman -Syu vlc-plugins-all

No, I don’t remember installing any plugins.
vlc-plugins-all is not installed and I didn’t need it before, VLC was perfectly capable of playing any .MKV file with subtitles, now after the update it is uncapable of doing it.

@omano

Before reporting, you need to identify the issue EXACTLY or else you don’t know what to report and where to report it.

Yeah, that’s the problem I have, it seems it’s libebml but I don’t know how to confirm it, and even if it is the source of the problem, I’m afraid the solutions others have used won’t work for me, because I don’t want to take the risk of downgrading my system.
I tried installing the Flatpak version, and that one just fails to show the subtitles silently, without the error message, I guess that’s just due to configuration, it seems it’s because it’s the same version.

[scotty65]

@Josue

vlc-plugins-all is not installed and I didn’t need it before

So, have you now installed the vlc-plugins-all package? A lot of vlc’s plugins were split from the main vlc package last month (July), so installing separate plugin packages may now be required to return some features to vlc:

Split the package based on plugins with external dependencies (d476e026) ·...

[omano]

@Josue

No, I don’t remember installing any plugins.
vlc-plugins-all is not installed and I didn’t need it before, VLC was perfectly capable of playing any .MKV file with subtitles, now after the update it is uncapable of doing it.

@omano

sudo pacman -Syu vlc-plugins-all

Then report.

[linux-aarhus]

I don’t know about vlc - but I am curious about your window decoration - care to share?

[Aragorn]

@Josue

vlc-plugins-all is not installed and I didn’t need it before

Well, from now on, you do.

[dmt]

You don’t need all the plugins for subtitles, just a couple but I can’t remember which ones atm, there’s a recent thread about it.

[Josue]

Ok guys, I just installed vlc-plugins-all package but that didn’t fix the bug. It only made it worse because now it’s unnoticeable, the error message is gone, but the subtitles still won’t show up.

@scotty65

So, have you now installed the vlc-plugins-all package? A lot of vlc’s plugins were split from the main vlc package last month (July), so installing separate plugin packages may now be required to return some features to vlc:

Something must have gone horribly wrong with it then, because it’s not working. Also, I have noticed that some videos don’t play at all anymore, I only get a black screen, or a green screen, or in some other cases some videos get wrong colors, it’s quite weird.

@omano

Then report.

Could you please elaborate? where do I report this and how?

@linux-aarhus

I don’t know about vlc - but I am curious about your window decoration - care to share?

Oh, about that, It’s my own edition of the Ghost KDE Plasma Aurorae theme, I have been working on it for some time, I would like to post my fork to make it avaliable for everyone but I haven’t done it yet, you see, I have been busy with lots of trouble lately.

@Aragorn

Well, from now on, you do.

Thanks for the reply, but it seems this fix didn’t help me.

@dmt

You don’t need all the plugins for subtitles, just a couple but I can’t remember which ones atm, there’s a recent thread about it.

Uhm… I have even made my own .MKV subs with Mkvtoolnix but nope, not even with all the plugins installed, this problem has not been solved.

Thanks for all your replies guys, but I’m afraid the problems are not over and more issues are piling up.
As I was saying, sometimes VLC can’t even play some videos, but I also installed Celluloid and that one does play those videos, albeit with low FPS. And for some other videos I get horrible colors, everything is pretty much only green, (that happens in my smartphone where I also have installed VLC). All this just gives me a bad feeling. Where and how do I report these bugs exactly? That Gitlab link… is that the repo? I haven’t used Gitlab in years…

EDIT
OK, sorry but I double checked again, finally got the subtitles working, I was testing the wrong video. Thank you guys!

But still I have the other issue with some videos that don’t play at all or get wrong colors.

[Aragorn]

@Josue

But still I have the other issue with some videos that don’t play at all or get wrong colors.

What video format are those in? And just for the record — might be important — what graphics adapter are you using?

[omano]

@Josue

OK, sorry but I double checked again, finally got the subtitles working, I was testing the wrong video. Thank you guys!

So you didn’t have an issue at all with the subtitles, or installing the plugins fixed the issue with subtitles?

[dmt]

@Josue

sometimes VLC can’t even play some videos, but I also installed Celluloid and that one does play those videos, albeit with low FPS. And for some other videos I get horrible colors, everything is pretty much only green, (that happens in my smartphone where I also have installed VLC).

Have you tried playing with the settings?
Have you tried comparing the properties (fps, resolution, bitrate, codec, container, etc) of working and non-working files?

Have you tried mpv, and perhaps other players? To see if it’s the video or the software. As @Aragorn pointed out - hardware is another thing to rule out.

[scotty65]

@Josue

but I also installed Celluloid and that one does play those videos, albeit with low FPS

As you are using Plasma, you might find KDE’s haruna to be a better fit for your system than the GTK-based celluloid. haruna uses mpv as its back-end, and has full support for subtitles and alternative audio languages.

I’ve been using haruna as my primary video player for several years. When I bought my new mini-PC near the end of 2023, I installed it immediately:

paclog --grep=haruna 
[2023-11-09T18:26:30+1100] [ALPM] installed haruna (0.12.1-2)

The paclog command can be found in the pacutils package

Haruna

[Aragorn]

@scotty65

I’ve been using haruna as my primary video player for several years.

I’ve also recently begun using it as my primary video player.

[Josue]

@Aragorn

What video format are those in? And just for the record — might be important — what graphics adapter are you using?

Nvidia. Some of those are old .AVI format (but the videos are new, recently created by old software) but Celluloid opens those videos just fine, VLC gets wrong colors.
On my smartphone, videos are just normal .MP4 (I don’t know about the internal format, details) but they show horrible green colors. Other video players do play those videos well there.

@omano

So you didn’t have an issue at all with the subtitles, or installing the plugins fixed the issue with subtitles?

Installing the vlc-plugins-all fixed the subtitles issue, thank you. But then that implies the last update should have automatically added the package but it didn’t, I had to manually install it.

@scotty65

As you are using Plasma, you might find KDE’s haruna to be a better fit for your system than the GTK-based celluloid.

Yeah, I just installed haruna and it seems to be working well, I don’t have the problems with the colors and such with it. and it does play the other videos.

@dmt

Have you tried mpv, and perhaps other players?

Yeah, I just tried Haruna, it seems to be working well.
Thank you guys!

[dmt]

@Josue

Installing the vlc-plugins-all fixed the subtitles issue, thank you. But then that implies the last update should have automatically added the package

No it doesn’t.

Whilst I understand you wanting things to just continue working as they were, a decision was made to separate that functionality from the base package.

The decision was made for better integration with other software, better package management, easier development, etc. See the link below.

That decision means you have to make a decision - which plugins do you want? So clearly opinions will differ. The easy way is to install all of them, but apparently that pulls in more than before.

There’s also vlc-plugins-extra which pulls in subtitles and a few other things people may or may not expect, but presumably less than -all. Amazing what you find when you poke around with pacman -Si (pacman -Si vlc, pacman -Si vlc-gui-qt, etc).

Split vlc package (#6) · Issues · Arch Linux / Packaging / Packages / vlc ·...