qmplay2 - longer info file for the curious

[aus9]

The following expands on the info file.

full screen
############
toggle off or on with the f key

status bar
#########
bottom of player has some very important feedback
the main status are:
Stopped, Opening, Playback

Terminal info - or issues

Code: [Select]

QStandardPaths: XDG_RUNTIME_DIR not set, defaulting to '/tmp/runtime-tc'
[03 Jul 2020 08:51:53.702] initInstance: No Vulkan library available
[03 Jul 2020 08:51:53.703] Failed to create platform Vulkan instance
[03 Jul 2020 08:51:53.708] Vulkan is unable to work with QMPlay2 on this platform: Can't create Vulkan instance: ErrorInitializationFailed
mesa: for the -simplifycfg-sink-common option: may only occur zero or one times!
mesa: for the -global-isel-abort option: may only occur zero or one times!
Lines 1, 5 to 6 can be ignored

Lines 2-4 for vulkan mean that libvulkan.tcz has not been loaded.
Ignore if you are not attempting to use vulkan. Otherwise see below.

Play/stop and other buttons
Play and other Left hand buttons are for video/audio playback not for MediaBrowser, youtube, internet radio
The stop button may work for internet radio but not the play button.

Solution....double click the selection, eg youtube track.

Youtube
#######
I get a crash if I attempt to play my sample flv file

Search of youtube gives no hits....needs youtube-dl downloaded first.

(A) you need to manually load the python TCE as per info file
If you plan to do a lot of youtube, consider adding python.tcz to your boot list.

(B) no youtube-dl is yet in your ~/.qmplay2 dir

Check your firewall is not blocking the download of it please

You have 2 options
Option (i)
Hold Ctrl + u buttons to get an URL input box ->
input an url from your web browser for any youtube movie/audio
a one second video url to try is this...
https://youtu.be/jhFDyDgMVUI

A popup box should say Downloading youtube-dl
clicking Ok should then change popup box to say its
successful, after download is complete.

Only if that does not work for you....Option (ii)
Download the latest tarball from
https://youtube-dl.org/
Unpack it and copy the executable to ~/.qmplay2

Be aware that TC64 version of youtube-dl.tcz is out of date. I am the downstream maintainer of that,
it still works but qmplay2 expects the latest. YMMV

Spherical youtubes
###################
Once you start playing a spherical, I use the mouse to rotate view 360 degrees

Playing of still images
#######################
Setup a dir to play still images like jpg, pngs

Hold Ctrl + d and choose image dir to add to playlist
Hold Ctrl + O (to Open General Settings)
tick the box for "Read and display still images"
-> click Apply
Once you click play, f
....hitting the space bar advances to next image
At end of playlist, you can exit or
-----click top image and start again.

youtube search no longer works
#############################
I am not sure, but believe it is because
YT is missing out on serving you ads.
I believe it may have a limit of how much
you can search and play. I have not asked upstream.
And have no plans to do so.

Wbar or exe
###########
wbar icon is a green triangle and works as expected
command qmplay2 or QMPlay2 should also work

hardware/video acceleration
###########################
Please read
https://github.com/zaps166/QMPlay2
Mainly
cuvid is for nvidia
vdpau does not work with vulkan
va and vulkan deinterlacing filter only on Intel drivers

vulkan (for video stream/playback)
#######
Not all video chipsets or setup will allow vulkan.
You need to setup Xorg 3d first.

The following assumes you have amdgpu video driver

I have a special order of TCEs in my boot list, order is important

firmware-amdgpu.tcz
xf86-video-amdgpu.tcz (has a recursive dep of graphics-KERNEL)
Xorg-7.7-3d.tcz

At this stage...libvulkan.tcz is not in my list

Full reboot. Then load vulkan-tools and run vkcube. If I see
the spinning cube, I have vulkan working correctly.
I can then open qmplay2 and select vulkan as a renderer and click apply.
There are a heap of other settings too. What I need to see that after
playing a mp4....vulkan is shown as "active".

So you may need to do some tests to see what you need if not on my
video chipset. I have AMD Ryzen 3 3200G APU
(also known as internal graphics to CPU)(not onboard motherboard)

For other video chipsets....the formula is likely to be
(optional) firmware-something.tcz
xf86-video-something.tcz
Xorg-7.7-3d.tcz

Newbie alert! Do NOT edit your boot list for above.
Please use Apps or a command to download any missing TCEs
which will download any missing recursive dependencies.

Extra tip!
##########
Do not modify your current boot list. Instead copy
existing boot list and name it 2.lst
Then edit the order to get your fw, video driver and 3d TCES
into your 2.lst and do a full reboot and edit the
bootloader menu to try out lst=2.lst

If you make/made a mistake, you can always reboot to your
normal boot list.

Good Luck