[PLUG] Re: Desperate situation-> Quick time videos in Linux?

Jeme A Brelin jeme at brelin.net
Tue Feb 4 14:28:06 UTC 2003


On Tue, 4 Feb 2003, guy1656 wrote:
> No, your setting for 'EZ install - just plop-n-go' is out of calibration.

I don't think "not in line with Guy" means "out of calibration".

> A) But anyway, MPlayer builds cleanly and just works.
> B) You kinda gotta watch the configure output to make sure all the
> options you want are going to be compiled in based on the libraries you
> have available and everything, but it's not like it asks for anything
> unreasonable.
>
> Umm, statements (A) and (B) contradict each other.

I don't.  Let me (briefly) explain why.

The configure portion of the install process is not the same as the build
portion.  Once the Makefiles have been generated, the software builds
cleanly and just works.  However, making sure you're building the software
with the right options to do what you want to do requires ATTENTION.
It's not hard work.  You just watch the configure output go by and when it
says "DVD Navigation Disabled" you go "whoops!" and run ./configure --help
again and see that you should have appended --enable-dvdnav.  It's really
not rocket science or anything.  And when you actually run make, it just
works.  That's not the case with everything.

Now, I also think it's a GOOD THING that MPlayer doesn't enable everything
by default.  It's a big piece of software with lots of components and some
people may not want all that crud on their system (I wouldn't compile in
the DVD features if I didn't have a DVD ROM, for example).  So it makes
sense that you have to find the right options and enable them.  And I
don't see a functional difference between clicking a checkbox and typing
"--enable-foo".

> Software that 'just works' installs with a single and simple action (a
> 'familiar' word in a command shell, or a single action like a
> mouse-click)  runs with a similarly simple one-hit. That's what the
> 'just' part means.

I think `make all install` is pretty simple and familiar.  The
configuration takes a bit of attention, but if you're not going to pay
attention to what your software is doing, you're openning yourself up to
every kind of trojan and bug on Earth.

> So, you buy the radio, insert batteries, click 'On,' slide the volume to
> the middle, (because you didn't read the directions or look at the knob
> to know which way is LOUD - you select a mid-point expressly to avoid
> all these steps) and slide the tuner around. At this point, based on
> what you hear, you will make a decision about whether the device 'just
> works' or not.

You had to LEARN all of this at some point.  It's deeply ingrained now and
something of a cultural feature.  One might also make some argument about
the "collective unconscious".  You know how it was a running joke for most
of the eighties and nineties that you had to get your kid to program your
VCR?  The difference is the cultural queues and development rates.  Now,
most people have it figured out and the people that don't have given up or
gotten too old to care.

> Very few people buy a radio in order to learn about how amplitude
> modulation works They buy it to hear what the radio stations are
> playing. Same thing goes for the initial user in this thread. She need
> to learn about medicine, and doesn't have the bandwith to learn about
> that AND scalable back-whatchamacallits simultaneously.

You don't need to know anything about backend scalers to watch videos or
even to make MPlayer do whatever you want it to do.  Just like you don't
need to know everything about the endocrine system to know what happens
when you snort cocaine.

I mean, I don't know how HOW MPlayer works.  I don't have that level of
knowledge.  I mean, I know more than many and less than many.  I WISH I
knew more because it interests me, but that's one of the things that makes
me a geek; I have interest in details.

> So if you have a radio program, if it installs with a double-click on an
> RPM, and no other configurations are necessary, and it runs on my system
> and yours, THEN it's a 'normal, easy, simple install.'

"Normal" is relative.  Hopefully you understand that.  (Or you end up like
George W. Bush preaching about Isaiah and going "home" with "the creator"
in a eulogy for a group that included at least one hindu and one
buddhist.)

For me, a "normal, easy, simple install" is `make all install`.  The
"./configure" part is part of figuring what software I'd like installed,
what I would like it to do, and how I would like to use it.  When you use
binary installations with preconfigured options (both compile-time and
run-time options like config files), you are submitting yourself to the
decisions of other people and taking a very passive role in the way you go
about doing the things you want to do.

> If you have to go to another website and figure out what else to install
> and where to put it, AND if you don't get it right then NOTHING happens,
> well, that's called 'a bear to install.' Or worse.

You are trying to impose your ignorance on me and I won't have it.  We
have a different concept of what "a bear to install" means and you just
want to tell me that you're right and I'm wrong.  I reject that method of
thinking outright.

I do have an idea of what "a bear to install" means and it's related to
things that generate improper Makefiles, do not provide enough information
in their configure scripts or documentation to enable all of the options,
or require legal entanglements that prevent me from doing everything I can
to improve the lives of others.  So that doesn't jive with your
definition.  So what?

If you want to avoid "bears", I'm showing you another way to approach the
problem where the bears rarely come up.

> Remember, "builds cleanly and just works" contradicts "You kinda gotta
> watch."

Not if you're watching something other than the build, silly.


-- 
   -----------------
     Jeme A Brelin
    jeme at brelin.net
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