vlc being compiled with wxwidgets 2.6 .. should use 2.8 to fix "allway on top" in Hardy

[Jerone Young]

Binary package hint: vlc

The "allways on top" function in vlc does not work. This is a bug in wxwidgets 2.6 (libxgtk2.6 is the lib being used). Though this is fixed in 2.8. Both 2.6 & 2.8 come with Ubuntu hardy (as well as gutsy, I think edgy too). Yet vlc is still being compiled with 2.6. This should be corrected and vlc should be compiled with version 2.8 to fix this issue.

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio (andrewsomething)]

Thanks for your bug report Jerone. You contacted me by email, but after further investigation, I can not confirm this issue with
version 0.8.6.release.d-0ubuntu6 in Hardy. If I select "always on top" from the context (right click) on the title bar, the results are expected. The window stays on top of others even if I click on them. Am I misunderstanding your issue?

[Jerone Young (jerone)]

I am refering to option in vlc. On the top bar Video->Always-on-Top .. you need to be playing a video for this option to take affect. Currently it will not keep the vlc window on top.

Now I just noticed that Gnome now has always-on-top for apps again (whoot!)..but this still does not full solve this issue (more so works around it). So those using any other windows manager will see this.

[Jerone Young (jerone)]

Yes so to add on to my last comment and pervent confusion.

1) Ensure that in the left hand corner (where the app icon is). That "allways on top" is not checked. This is a feature of metacity (which is the windows manager for Gnome).
2) Now you open a video in vlc
3) Now go to the top bar in vlc, go to Video->Always on Top
3.5) initiate option
4) Now try dragging another window over the vlc.

   If the vlc window is not on top of the other window, this is an indication that "allways on top" is broken for vlc. The reason for this is vlc depends on wxwidgets in Linux. There is a bug in 2.6 of wxwidgets & 2.8 fixes it.

Hope that should clear up any confusion. Just post if you need more info.

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio (andrewsomething)]

Thanks for the clarification. Confirmed.

[Jerone Young (jerone)]

I was looking at the file:
vlc_0.8.6.release.e+x264svn20071224+faad2.6.1-0ubuntu2.diff

And in the file debian/control, under "Build-Depends:" . You need to change "libwxgtk2.6-dev" to be "libwxgtk2.8-dev"

FYI.. I noticed this in the change log. There have been updates to vlc since this, but be aware of this bug:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/linux/+bug/91248

Apprently someone had linked against 2.8 but ran other into problems, this may be resolved.

[Devid Antonio Filoni (d.filoni)]

I'm working on this, I tried to build vlc with wxwidgets2.8 and it works fine, there is not bug 91248.

[Devid Antonio Filoni (d.filoni)]

The debdiff

[Luca Falavigna (dktrkranz)]

Switching to wxwidgets2.8 is quite intrusive.
Loic, you co-maintain vlc in Debian, what do you think about this?

[Loïc Minier (lool)]

I think it makes sense to switch to wxwidgets2.8, but I agree it's intrusive.

But this is probably moot as vlc 0.9 will release shortly with a qt4 frontend and the goal is to merge that for intrepid.

[Jerone Young (jerone)]

I'm curious of exactly how updating a library is "intrusive" ? Also now that it is seen that the updated lib does not cause any potential issues, this is a no brainer to replace one line in the deb control file.

[Devid Antonio Filoni (d.filoni)]

Switch to another library is not a suggested thing because with new functions a new library also drop definitively some other functions or change them, so if the code is not updated for the new library the program will have issues (or it will not work).

[Jerone Young (jerone)]

I'm lost on your logic. We are using an updated version of wxwidgets, a minor update 2.6 to 2.8. Not 2.6 to 3.0. This is not a major version change. I have also personally tested this long ago. So I'm failing to see what you guys are talking about when you say "intrusive" or things not working, because this is a minor version change and has been tested to work.

[Jerone Young (jerone)]

With the release of vlc 0.9.2 today also comes qt4 integration and the removal of using wxwidgets. Will the hardy & intrepid repos get a build of vlc 0.9.2 built with qt4. If so this bug can be closed.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package vlc - 0.9.2-1ubuntu1

---------------
vlc (0.9.2-1ubuntu1) intrepid; urgency=low

  * New Upstream Release, exception granted by
      - dktrkranz, norsetto, Hobbsee (via irc). LP: #270404

  Changes done in ubuntu:

  * add libxul-dev to build-depends
  * make sure that vlc is build against libxul in configure. This doesn't
    change anything in the package, but makes it more robust if building
    in an 'unclean' chroot or when modifying the package.
  * debian/control: make Vcs-* fields point to the motumedia branch
  * add libx264-dev and libass-dev to build-depends
    LP: #210354, #199870
  * actually enable libass support by passing --enable-libass to configure
  * enable libdca: add libdca-dev to build depends and --enable-libdca
  * install the x264 plugin.

  Changes already in the pkg-multimedia branch in debian:

  * don't install usr/share/vlc/mozilla in debian/mozilla-plugin-vlc.install
  * new upstream .desktop file now registers flash video mimetype LP: #261567
  * add Xb-Npp-Applications to mozilla-plugin-vlc
  * remove duplicate entries in debian/vlc-nox.install

vlc (0.9.2-1) experimental; urgency=low

  [ Christophe Mutricy ]
  * New upstream release
    + Soname changed
    + Bugs fixed upstream: Closes: #487646, #298150, #325069, #392292,
      #458004, #470903, #458004, #423121
    + new upstream fixes various crasher bugs reported in ubuntu:
      LP: #189575, #113927, #103741, #111615, #107899, #112076, #198916, 221428,
          #91679, #96978, #123589, #133528, #231621, #259025
    + plays files with '+' in its name, LP: #239431, #217305
    + New packages: libvlccore0, libvlccore-dev, vlc-plugin-pulse
     (Closes: #471069)
    + Build-depends on libswsale-dev, libshout3-dev, libxpm-dev,
      zlib1g-dev, liblua5.1-0-dev, libschroedinger-dev, libtag1-dev,
      libqt4-dev, libqt4-dev-tools and pkg-config. (Closes: #461324)
    + time display no longer incomplete, LP: #193445
    + fixed volume bar behavior, LP: #250041
    + shout support closes LP: #127594, #84098,
    + Install new modules:
      - vlc-nox: alphamask, blendbench, bluescreen, canvas, cc, cdg, chain,
        colorthres, croppadd, dynamicoverlay, erase, faad, gaussianblur, grain,
        inhibit, lua, memcpy*, mmap, osd_parser, puzzle, remoteosd, rtmp,
        schroedinger, sharpen, stats, subusf, t140, telepathy, v4l2, vmem
      - vlc: qt4
      - vlc-plugin-jack: access_jack
    + Distribute the .pc for libvlc and vlc-plugin (Closes: #289507)
    + Remove wx interface and glide plugin as they've been dropped by upstream
      LP: #205325, #88487, #90603, #150380
    + The Python and java bindings are no longer part of the upstream tarballs
      (Closes: #469011)
    + Temporarly disable libdca module until a pkg with the new
      API get in unstable
    + Delete or refresh patches
    + New patches:
        - 052_as-needed taken from bug #347650 to teach libtool about
          -Wl,--as-needed
  * Install the skins DTD and the default skins it's only 113kB
  * Improve watch file
  * Add a vlc-data package for /usr/share (13 MB)
  * Add a vlc-dbg package (Closes: #491564)
  * Sort vlc.install and vlc-nox.inst...