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Any need for /opt/netscape/plugins/ ?
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Joffer
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PostPosted: Tue Apr 11, 2006 10:32 pm    Post subject: Any need for /opt/netscape/plugins/ ? Reply with quote

I'm on a AMD64 system (~amd64 actually), and have the usual browser trouble with java/flash/mplayerplug-in (which I'm fixing at the moment) to work flawless. I'm mostly a Opera user, but some packages depends on mozilla/firefox and thus I've got firefox installed as well, and wanting java/flash/mplayerplug-in in firefox too (when I occasionally use it) I've also installed firefox-bin. Then, to have movies (streaming etc) inside my browsers, I've installed mplayerplug-in-bin overlay from http://sh.nu/download/ebuilds/mplayer/ (3.11 at the moment).

Looking at the files installed by netscape-flash and mplayerplug-in(-bin) gives me a few headaches:

netscape-flash installes into /opt/netscape/plugins/, with symlinks to /usr/lib32/nsbrowser/plugins/
mplayerplug-in installs into /opt/netscape/plugins/ with symlinks to /usr/lib64/nsbrowser/plugins/
mplayerplug-in-bin installs into /opt/netscape/plugins with symlinks to /usr/lib/nsbrowser/plugins/ which again is a symlink to /usr/lib64/... (!!)

Is /opt/netscape/plugins/ hardcoded as a plugin location in opera and firefox(-bin)? Wouldn't it be better to have opera (32bit) and firefox-bin (32bit) use /usr/lib32/nsbrowser/plugins/ as default plugin location and /usr/lib64/nsbrowser/plugins/ for firefox (64bit) (and probably Konquer etc made for 64bit)? This would probably only be valid for a x86_64 system (ppc64 perhaps?) though, but it shouldn't be much of a change to the ebuilds to facilitate this.

This way we could be using 32bit plugins with 32bit browsers and 64bit plugins (not many at this time though) with 64bit browsers without mixing the different arches in the same folder. I would at least believe it would be a better way to install the plugins into the right lib32/lib64 folder and then symlink them to /opt/netscape/plugins/ instead of the other way around... (a x86 system would of course just use /usr/lib/nsbrowser/plugins/)

The bottom line - I don't see any use for /opt/netscape/plugins. (Or perhaps we should only link 32bit plugins into that folder).

Well, thats my view of things after much trouble with plugins and 32- AND 64-bit versions of things installed. Then again, I'm no linux expert or "the-gentoo-way" expert of doing things.. Any thoughts on my suggestiong or explanations why it is the way it is today?
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LAj
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 7:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've build mozilla-firefox on amd64 and, of course, is not possible to use plugins!
There's another way to manage them, I think.

After the netscape-flash emerge there are:

in /opt/netscape/plugins/
- flashplayer.xpt
- libflashplayer.so

two link in /usr/lib32/nsbrowser/pluginsinoltre

trough these there're links in ~/.mozilla/plugins to the files

but about:plugins don't list them and I can't show flash content!


Moreover, I've the auto generated file ~/.mozilla/firefox/pluginreg.dat
with lines like( these lines are shown at about:plugins ):
Code:
[PLUGINS]
/opt/sun-jre-bin-1.5.0.06-i586/jre1.5.0_06/plugin/i386/ns7/libjavaplugin_oji.so:$
:$
11311659099000:1:13:$
49
0:application/x-java-vm:Java::$


I've installed Sun JVM, with its plugin link, but JVM selected is Blackdown becouse of some dependencies
I also linked to /usr/lib/nsbrowser/plugins

So I can't understand how the pluginreg.dat content is generated!
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nixnut
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 1:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Moved from Gentoo Chat to Gentoo on AMD64.
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Emopig
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 6:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

LAj wrote:
I've build mozilla-firefox on amd64 and, of course, is not possible to use plugins!


It is, there are just very few USEFUL 64 bit plugins due to the nature of the content rampantly and most commonly used throughout the web (WMV video, Realmedia/Realaudio, Flash)
There's another way to manage them, I think.

LAj wrote:
about:plugins don't list them and I can't show flash content!


This is because libflashplayer.so is a 32 bit plugin and the Firefox you build is a 64 bit browser. You cannot use 32 bit plugins in a 64 bit browser (unless you use nspluginwrapper, which is rather unstable, see this thread for discussion)

LAj wrote:
I've installed Sun JVM, with its plugin link, but JVM selected is Blackdown becouse of some dependencies


The 64 bit / AMD64 version of Sun's JVM doesn't come with a mozilla/netscape plugin, regardless of what what the ebuild or your USE flags say. the Blackdown JRE does however (I think)

LAj wrote:
I can't understand how the pluginreg.dat content is generated!


I believe Firefox generates this file after searching all of it's plugin directories for plugins, probably so it can provide plugin metadata to other parts of the program, like MIME handling and about:plugins, atleast thats my guess...

I suggest you search around the forum or start a new thread to discuss you plugin woe's, this thread seems headed in a different direction, although the plugin path is probably part of your problem aswell...
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Emopig
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 6:54 pm    Post subject: Re: Any need for /opt/netscape/plugins/ ? Reply with quote

Joffer wrote:
The bottom line - I don't see any use for /opt/netscape/plugins. (Or perhaps we should only link 32bit plugins into that folder).


Yep, I totally agree that it is a mess. I've seen this mentioned by somebody before (maybe it was you)

I believe the reason they are placed in /opt is because according to the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (OK, so according to Wikipedia) the directory is for "Static application software packages", in other words, snubbed binary blob's that we don't really 'trust'.

This is why most (all?) open source plugins go into the /usr/lib* directory but proprietary ones do not. It just so happens that most plugins are proprietary. Once again proprietary software causes problems for Linux/Open Source users. Now you can see why Microsoft implemented automatic redirection (I think using arch sensitive evaluation of environment variables in filesystem calls) to "C:\Program Files (x86)\" and to "C:\Windows\SysWoW64\" for 32 bit binaries on their 64 bit architectures, rather than leaving applications to decide for themselves.

Perhaps what is really needed is:
Code:
/opt -> /opt64
/opt64
/opt32

although crowding up the root of the heirarchy isn't exactly appealing either. It already seems rather cramped, here's mine:

Code:
.    boot  etc   lib32       mnt          proc  service  usr
..   dev   home  lib64       nonexistent  root  sys      var
bin  emul  lib   lost+found  opt          sbin  tmp


nonexistant really baffles me..(it's empty)
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LAj
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 12:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Emopig wrote:
This is because libflashplayer.so is a 32 bit plugin and the Firefox you build is a 64 bit browser. You cannot use 32 bit plugins in a 64 bit browser (unless you use nspluginwrapper, which is rather unstable, see this thread for discussion)


Why is not masked and added nspluginwrapper as a dependencies?

I'll go to read your link ...do you mean that I've to use mozilla-firefox-bin to see flash component on web?
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Emopig
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 3:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

LAj wrote:

Why is not masked and added nspluginwrapper as a dependencies?

I'll go to read your link ...do you mean that I've to use mozilla-firefox-bin to see flash component on web?


nspluginwrapper isn't a dependency because it isn't in portage, you have to install the ebuild manually as an overlay. it also wouldn't be 'correct' because it isn't actually required for firefox OR flash, it could happen if Firefox had a "plugins" or "flash" USE flag but it won't as everyone is waiting for a native 64bit flash version.

So yes, you need to emerge mozilla-firefox-bin to to see flash on the web.
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