Posts on Felix Paul Kühne

VLC media player for iOS, iPadOS and tvOS version 3.3

Mon, 21 Mar 2022 11:15:36 +0000

After a long time, I have exciting things to share!

VLC media player for iPhone, iPod touch, iPad and Apple TV is receiving a major update on the App Store today. As always, it is completely free of charge in all countries and the source code is here.

We spent a bit of effort to bring the update to iOS 9 as there seem to be many people still using the 2nd generation iPad or the original iPad mini for video and also even iPhone 4S - so those are the oldest devices we still support - like in our last major release 2 years ago! It will even run faster than before now.

MobileVLCKit and VLCKit, part 3

Tue, 13 Mar 2018 12:27:34 +0000

This is part of an article series covering VLC’s Objective-C framework, which we provide to allow inclusion of all its features in third party applications as well as VLC for iOS and Apple TV.

Previously published:

Today, we will discuss thumbnailing of video content. We need to differenciate two key aspects: saving still images of a currently playing video (snapshot) and previewing media stored somewhere without being played (thumbnail). While either way, VLCKit will open the resource, decode the bitstream and provide you with a image, performance and usability will differ.

VLCKit 3.0

Mon, 19 Feb 2018 15:22:33 +0000

10 days ago, we published VLC media player 3.0 for all platforms. It’s the first major release in three years and brings a huge number of features, improvements and fixes. Get an overview here and the full changelog there.

For VLCKit, we improved performance and memory management, added new APIs and you get all improvements from the underlying libvlc including full support for decoding H264 and H265 using VideoToolbox in hardware. Instead of using all cores of your iPhones CPU at 100%, decoding a 4K video uses less than 20%.
Further you can look at all aspects of a 360° video with touch gesture based controls, discover and browse shares on your network with UPnP, NFS, FTP, SFTP and SMB and more.

As you remember, we published VLC for Apple TV in January 2016, but so far, we never made VLCKit available on tvOS. In addition to MobileVLCKit for iOS, we now introduce TVVLCKit for tvOS!

For macOS, iOS and tvOS, VLCKit 3.0 is available through Cocoapods as a precompiled binary under the LGPLv2.1 license. You can find the source code on our website - contributions welcome!

We are looking forward to all your feedback and the apps deploying VLCKit to deliver multimedia to their users.
Do you want to learn more about integrating VLCKit? Have a look at the tutorials I wrote not too long ago ( Part 1, Part 2).

So what did we change in VLCKit, API-wise?

Announcing VLC for Apple TV

Tue, 12 Jan 2016 16:00:00 +0000

Today, we are proud to announce VLC on the Apple TV. It’s a full port of VLC media player combined with platform specific features.

VLC for Apple TV integrates with a plethora of devices and services on your local network and includes a custom way of casting files directly to the TV from your other computers using a web browser!

Background Immediately after Apple announced the future of television, we started to develop for the new box and now it is finally ready to be published. This is the first app we release with the increased limit of 2000 TestFlight beta testers, who had access to our app since mid November and greatly influenced the result. We were excited about the amazing amount of feedback we received.

VLC for iOS, version 2.7.0

Tue, 22 Dec 2015 15:21:50 +0000

Today, we will release a new major version of VLC for iOS. Note that due to adapted review guidelines, it is branded “VLC for Mobile” on the iOS App Store now.

We have been working on this update for the last few months, so it adds a lot of features:

full iOS 9 support incl. split screen and iPad Pro
re-written Apple Watch app for watchOS 2
system-wide search for content stored locally within the app using “CoreSpotlight”
Touch ID support to unlock the app
full support for Right-To-Left languages

VLC for iOS, version 2.6.0

Tue, 30 Jun 2015 10:17:27 +0000

Today, we will release version 2.6.0 of VLC for iOS adding support for Apple Watch. With Apple Watch, you can fully control VLC on iPhone, browse the library and retrieve info about stored or playing media items.

Since playback control using Apple Watch allows you to start playback while the app is in background, we took the occasion to completely rework the playback process which culminated in the introduction of a mini player. This way, you can finally browse the media library or network services without interrupting playback.

VLC for iOS 2.5.0

Fri, 27 Mar 2015 20:18:43 +0000

Today, we released version 2.5.0 of VLC for iOS with a strong focus on cloud integration. We added support for iCloud Drive, box.com and OneDrive. As part of iCloud Drive, you can have access to any cloud storage enabled app on iOS 8 and later. For box.com and OneDrive, we added native support, which allows us direct streaming from the cloud without having the user download a media first.

VLC for iOS 2.4.0 & 2.4.1

Fri, 27 Feb 2015 16:00:00 +0000

After a 5 month hiatus and a couple of delays in between, we are very happy to release version 2.4.1 of VLC for iOS to the general public today. Please see our press release for cross-platform information.

As an introductory remark, make sure to get the legitimate version of VLC. There are a number of clones on the iOS App Store right now, which violate both our copyright and our trademarks, include advertisement and usually charge $1 to $5 per download. We sent 39 DMCA take down notices against 48 apps over the cause of the last 12 months and in the end, we always succeeded. However, this can take up to 3 months, even for seemingly obvious violations.

VLC media player for Mac OS X 2.2.0

Fri, 27 Feb 2015 15:59:00 +0000

Today, we will also a major new version of VLC for Mac OS X. For cross-platform changes, please have a look at the release notes and our press release.

What’s new in VLC for Mac?

Support for OS X Yosemite
Completely re-written web plugin for Chrome, Safari and Firefox is back!
Improved fullscreen behavior
Continue playback where you left off
Improved playlist adding a file size column and an option to increase the font size
In addition to iTunes, Spotify can be paused on playback start
New encryption and decryption modules for SSL based on OS X’s SecureTransport library for FTP and HTTP connections. This greatly improves speed and security.
A lot of improvements in VLCKit for use in third party applications, notably
- Switched the code base to ARC and added support for Swift projects
- Support for HLS and HTTPS playback on iOS
- Improved thumbnailing
- Various new APIs for playlist handling, the equalizer, thumbnailing and meta data handling

We are excited about this major update of VLC for Mac and hope that you’ll like it as much as we do.

MobileVLCKit and VLCKit, part 2

Wed, 18 Feb 2015 13:39:11 +0000

This is part of an article series covering VLC’s Objective-C framework, which we provide to allow inclusion of all its features in third party applications as well as VLC for iOS and Apple TV.

Currently published:

Today, we will discuss meta data processing.

In VLCKit, every item you play is a VLCMedia object. For typical use cases, it can be created with an NSURL or an NSString containing a path.

MobileVLCKit and VLCKit, part 1

Tue, 02 Dec 2014 20:08:41 +0000

This is part of an article series covering VLC’s Objective-C framework, which we provide to allow inclusion of all its features in third party applications as well as VLC for iOS and Apple TV.

Currently published:

VLCKit is a generic library for any audio or video playback needs on both Apple platforms and also supports streaming and media to file conversations on the Mac. It is open-source software licensed under the LGPLv2.1 or later, available in source code and binary form from the VideoLAN website. You can also integrate MobileVLCKit easily via CocoaPods.

upnpx 1.3.0

Mon, 20 Oct 2014 10:51:00 +0000

When I started to work on VLC for iOS last summer, it quickly became apparent that it would need to support playback from local media servers announced over the UPnP protocol. I came across a Objective-C++ library named upnpx which suited my use case nicely and which included broad support for all the various UPnP dialects.

Regrettably, upnpx was not maintained anymore since a few months, so I started a private fork within VLC for iOS and eventually moved on to github. Nowadays, my fork is officially endorsed by the original developer Bruno Keymolen.

VLC media player for Mac OS X, versions 2.1.4 and 2.0.10

Fri, 21 Feb 2014 18:48:59 +0000

Today, we released 2 versions of VLC media player for Mac OS X targeting different client systems.

Version 2.1.4

This is a small bug fix release, which improves an important regression regarding DVD playback and improves compatibility with HUffYUV contents by upgrading the respective decoder library. Additionally, a rare issue with some specifically crafted wmv files was fixed and a misleading error message no longer appears during video playback on OS X Mavericks.
Grab a copy here or trigger the internal updater if it doesn’t prompt you right away.

VLC for iOS, version 2.2.1

Thu, 06 Feb 2014 00:03:05 +0000

Today, we released a small update of VLC for iOS. It solves the most important regressions in last week’s 2.2 major release, but also includes a major improvement: full initial support of 64bit aka AArch64 aka arm64 on late 2013’s iPhone and iPad thanks to a close collaboration with the libav team.

Additionally, we added enhanced support for a broader set of UPnP servers, notably Twonky 7, Serviio 1.4 and XMBC 12, and resolved an inconvenient memory management issue in the underlying upnp library, which lead to the weird behavior that from a full folder only a single file would actually be played over and over again.

VLC for iOS, version 2.2

Mon, 20 Jan 2014 14:00:25 +0000

Today, we published version 2.2 of VLC for iOS on the App Store. It features a re-designed interface for iOS 7, which we demonstrated in early November last year.

Since then, we took the time for further improvements, polishing and most importantly adding features in addition a plain restyling.

Notably, we added the following:

Google Drive integration and Dropbox streaming,
New multitouch gestures,
Improved library for TV Shows and Audio,
Better UPnP integration, with downloading support,
A startup tutorial,
New streaming formats and protocols supported,
Rewritten WiFi upload,
Improved privacy when using Passcode Lock

VLC 2.1

Thu, 14 Nov 2013 13:55:47 +0000

Today, we published VLC media player 2.1.1 for all major desktop operating systems. If you used VLC for Android or for iOS in the last couple of months, you already got in touch with VLC’s 2.1 code base.

VLC media player 2.1 was initially published on September 26. However, we didn’t enable VLC’s internal updater since then. Why? We spent extra time on polishing the release, added support for the upcoming major video codec HEVC aka H.265 in MKV and MP4 containers as well as raw files, and lastly improved compatibility with both OS X 10.6 and 10.9.

VLC for iOS 7, preview

Mon, 04 Nov 2013 12:47:12 +0000

Over the last weeks, I worked closely with Damien Erambert on VLC’s user interface on iOS, rethinking it for iOS 7.

I would like to share a small preview today with further iterations pending. Version 2.2 of VLC for iOS will also include various new features and refinements. More on that, at a later point.

Any feedback and remarks are strongly welcome.

VLC for iOS, version 2.1

Fri, 06 Sep 2013 20:45:46 +0000

About 8 weeks passed since the initial re-release of VLC for iOS based upon its entirely re-written code base. Its success outperformed our expectations with more than 2.5 million downloads during the first week. Wow!

For the first major update, we listed carefully to the feedback received on the App Stores and through others channels.
It adds the following features and improvements:

Improved overall stability
Newly implemented menu and application flow
Added support for subtitles in non-western languages
Improved Subtitles support with options to choose font, size, and color
Add basic UPNP discovery and streaming for HTTP servers
Add FTP server discovery, streaming and downloading
Add Bonjour announcements for the WiFi Uploader’s website
Add playback of audio-only media
Improved VoiceOver and accessibility support
Added Deinterlace option (off by default)
Device no longer goes to sleep during media downloads
Improved video output on external screens
Improved Passcode Lock behavior
Minor usability improvements
New translations to Bosnian, Catalan, Galician, Greek, Marathi, Portuguese,
Slovenian

Additionally, we took the time finish a complete walkthrough of the app to discover what’s actually included and to answer most questions.

VLC for iOS 2.0

Thu, 18 Jul 2013 22:05:10 +0000

So there we are. We have come a long way. Today, it’s my pleasure to announce that VLC for iOS is back on the App Store. It’s available free of charge in any country, requires iOS 5.1 or later and runs on any iPhone, iPad or iPod touch.

This is more than an upgrade of the initial version: it’s a full re-write. From the ground-up. Relying on the power of MobileVLCKit and its underlying libvlc, we started with modern video and audio output modules offering faster drawing, full support for 10bit H264 encodings, retina displays and lower latency.

VLC 2.0.7 out now

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 11:19:48 +0000

Today, we published VLC 2.0.7. This is an important update to VLC’s 2.0 series, which improves the overall stability, fixes minor annoyances and solves certain security implications.

It will be available through the internal updater on Mac OS X later today and is already live on our main website for manual downloads. The in-app announcement on Windows will be enabled as soon as the load on our servers allows.

Notable changes include:

VideoLAN at Akademy 2013, Bilbao

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 13:53:06 +0000

Members of the VideoLAN team and our friends from Tomahawk will attend our favorite summer geek conference: Akademy. This year, it’s in Bilbao, Spain starting on July 13.

In addition to the usual KDE conferencing and geeking, Qt Contributors Summit will take place at the same venue! We are looking forward to what’s new in KDE and Qt, lots of chatter and perhaps a few beers?

VLC 2.0.6

Thu, 11 Apr 2013 12:45:43 +0000

Today, we published VLC 2.0.6. This is an important update to VLC’s 2.0 series, which improves the overall stability, fixes minor annoyances and solves certain security implications.

It will be available through the internal updater on Mac OS X later today and is already live on for manual downloads on our main website. The in-app announcement on Windows will be enabled as soon as the load on our servers allows. This release is the first to use our new mirror server distribution system. We finally moved away from SourceForge to our own trusted set of download partners.

VideoLAN at SCALE 11x

Tue, 05 Feb 2013 19:24:26 +0000

For the second year in a row, members of the VideoLAN team will be at the Annual Southern California Linux Expo in Los Angeles.

This year, SCALE takes place at the Hilton Los Angeles Airport Hotel from February 22 to 24.

On Saturday, Feb 23, at 1:30 PM, Jean-Baptiste Kempf, president of the VideoLAN organization, will give a talk about VLC in the Century CD room. On both Saturday and Sunday, Ludovic Fauvet, Jean-Baptiste and me will man booth 7 to show the latest developments on VLC and further VideoLAN projects, to answer your questions and to discuss future ideas.

VideoLAN at FOSDEM

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 12:24:00 +0000

The entire VLC team and most teams from further projects hosted by VideoLAN will be at FOSDEM in Brussels, Belgium, on the first weekend of February.

While we won’t have a booth or a dedicated dev room this year, we will be around for the entire weekend to attend interesting talks, meet great people and enjoy one or two Belgian beers.

Additionally, the president of the VideoLAN association and lead developer on VLC, Jean-Baptiste Kempf, will give at talk at the Legal Issues dev room ( K.3.201) on Relicensing libVLC and VLC modules from GPL to LGPL on Sunday morning.

Goal reached! Additional ideas!

Sun, 23 Dec 2012 23:56:00 +0000

Last night, we reached the goal of our fundraiser for VLC for Windows 8, RT and Phone. We are enormously proud of the result and stunned by the support of the folks who made this possible.

Any further money coming in will greatly speed up the availability of our port of VLC to Windows Phone 8, since it will allow us to parallelize the workload of the ports to Windows 8 / RT and Phone.

Updates on the VLC for Windows 8, RT and Phone fundraiser

Sat, 22 Dec 2012 15:17:00 +0000

On Tuesday, we pushed a 2nd update on our fundraiser for VLC for Windows 8, RT and Phone.

It includes a first mockup of the application interface on Windows 8. We are proud of the positive feedback and we are looking forward to yours! You can find the update here.

Furthermore, since Wednesday noon, you can find Update #3 on Kickstarter, which includes additional mockups to demonstrate our new port on Windows RT tablets.

VLC 2.0.5

Sat, 15 Dec 2012 09:19:00 +0000

Today, we released VLC 2.0.5. This is a minor update to VLC’s 2.0.x series, which improves the overall stability of our application.

It’s available for download now as well as through the in-app updater on Mac OS X. We will push the update to our users on Windows directly as soon as the load on our servers allows.

Noteable changes include:

Improved reliability for MKV, Koreus and SWF playback
Resolved system sleep issue on OS X 10.5
Resolved potential security issues in HTML subtitle parser and AIFF demuxer
Fixed MPEG2 audio and video encoding
Various minor fixes and improvements
Improved HTTPS streaming on WIndows
Improved reliablity for libVLC based applications
Updated translations for Asturian, Bengali (India), Bosnian, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, French, Galician, Scottish Gaelic, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Khmer, Malayalam, Polish, Slovak, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Brazilian Portuguese, Turkish and Thai

Additionally, I would like to give a status update on our fundraiser for VLC for Windows 8, RT and Phone on Kickstarter. At time of writing, it is at 56 % of our goal of £40,000 thanks to more than 1,500 generous backers. Thanks a lot for the support! It’s another 14 days to go and we really hope to achieve our goal in time. More updates on this endeavor, soon!

Update on the VLC for Windows 8 fundraiser

Mon, 10 Dec 2012 16:13:00 +0000

In this post, you’ll find current information on our fundraiser for VLC for Windows 8, RT and Phone.

As of writing, £13,448 were pledged, so 33 % of our goal.

Over the last few days, we achieved the following progress:

The first important news is that a port of VLC to Windows Phone 8 appears to be easier than expected. While the roadmap is about Windows 8 for Intel followed by a version for Windows RT, it appears to be feasible to publish another version with a specific interface for Windows Phone shortly after, since the WP8 APIs are way more similar to Windows 8 than WP7 ones.

VLC for Windows 8 fundraiser

Sun, 18 Nov 2012 12:32:00 +0000

Today, some VideoLAN team members launched a fundraiser on Kickstarter to support a port to the new User Experience on Windows 8 (aka “Metro”) and Windows RT.

VLC for Windows is widely used since a few years now and it is by far the dominant platform for VLC according to our user base numbers. Installation numbers are estimated as followed:

100,000,000 on Windows
10,000,000 on Mac OS X
2,000,000 on Android
countless on GNU/Linux, BSD and OS/21

The current version of VLC is able to run on Windows 8 which was launched last month. However, VLC is currently limited to the desktop experience, which is hidden by default along with other classic applications, behind one of the tiles (interface element of the Start screen).

VideoLAN at FOSS.IN

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 10:14:00 +0000

VideoLAN association’s president and lead developer Jean-Baptiste Kempf was invited as a guest speaker to this year’s FOSS.IN in Bangalore, India. The event takes place in the NIMHANS Convention centre from Nov 29 until Dec 1.This is the first time for VideoLAN to send people to Asia!

He will give a talk on how to add your own features to VLC, how to build your own application based on VLC be a it a player, a converter or a streaming server and how to contribute to VideoLAN in general.

VideoLAN at OSDC

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 10:06:00 +0000

I was invited as a guest speaker to this year’s Open Source Developers Conference (OSDC) in Sydney, Australia. It will take place during the first week of december at the University of Technology.

This is the first time for VideoLAN developers to present at a conference in Australia. I will give an introductory talk on VideoLAN and VLC focussing on what you can do beyond simple playback and on what’s up with VLC on mobile devices. My talk is scheduled for Wednesday afternoon at 1:30pm in the Open Room.

VLC 2.0.4

Thu, 18 Oct 2012 12:56:42 +0000

We released VLC 2.0.4 for all platforms today.

It includes various fixes and improvements for the Mac OS X port as well as all the other desktop platforms.

Let’s start with the specific improvements for the Mac:

Improved audio output behavior when the output device is plugged or unplugged during playback and fixed live audio device selection.
Disabled CoreAnimation UI effects on OS X Leopard leading to overall performance improvements
Improved menu display and behavior
Fixed various crashes and minor issues in bookmarks, playlist, main window buttons, streaming wizard, video size, hotkeys and fullscreen controler
Fixed font selection for unicode subtitles
Improved system sleep behavior when playing audio-only media. The screen is now allowed to sleep while the system is kept awake during playback.
Added option to the Audio Effects panel to activate the karaoke filter
Improved behavior when using command-line options to control the Mac interface

VideoLAN Dev Days

Sun, 02 Sep 2012 09:22:00 +0000

For the 4th year in a row, virtually all people involved in open source multimedia applications gathered in Paris to discuss the latest developments, schedule future features and share a few beers.

Photo credit: Diego Elio Pettenò

For the Mac, we were finally able to solve the infamous #4834 ticket, so VLC no longer fails to output audio if you unplug or replug an external audio device during playback. Of course, there is way more cool stuff to come.

VLC 2.0.3

Thu, 19 Jul 2012 00:13:00 +0000

We released VLC 2.0.3 this morning. This update mostly targets the Mac OS X platform: it adds support for OS X Mountain Lion.

Additionally, we added a few Mac-specific bug fixes (hotkey handling, fullscreen toggling when using a remote app on a phone), fixed issues with some Flash Video (flv), APE files and a small number of radio streams broadcasted through the HTTP protocol.

On Windows 8, VLC’s interface will be drawn correctly now.

Convert and Save

Mon, 16 Jul 2012 00:55:00 +0000

Back in 2005, VLC 0.8.4 included one of my first noticeable contributions to the Mac OS X port: the Streaming and Transcoding Wizard. Since then, VLC moved on quite a bit, but the window and its functionality is still present (with some small additions).

While it was cool and handy at that time, things beyond the VLC universe moved on, too, so we decided it was time for a re-write to enable more users to make use of the nifty included features by making it more easy to access and to configure.
Quite a while ago, transcoding presets were added to the Linux and Windows ports. This new panel is an attempt to bring these presets to the Mac along with the flexibility already known from the wizard. Here’s a first look at the current draft, which will evolve during the next months in time for VLC’s next major release version 2.1 Rincewind. Most importantly, the streaming features will also become part of this panel as well as minor missing features like the ability to extract parts of a media sample.

VideoLAN at FISL

Sun, 08 Jul 2012 08:28:29 +0000

Jean-Baptiste Kempf and me were invited as guest speakers to this year’s Fórum Internacional Software Livre in Porto Alegre, Brazil, from July 25 until the 28th.

This is the first time for VideoLAN developers to present at a conference in South America. We will give a talk on VideoLAN and VLC focussing on advanced end-user features and more technical details with in-depth coverage of libvlc’s usage in desktop and mobile products.

VLC 2.0.2 out now

Sat, 30 Jun 2012 06:26:00 +0000

About a month after passing the 1,000,000,000th download, we released VLC 2.0.2 last nights. It’s now available on videolan.org.

It includes the following security content:

Fixed Ogg Heap buffer overflow
Updated taglib (CVE-2012-2396)

VLC 2.0.2 adds further refinements to the new Mac interface. We improved the video playback experience by enhancing the crop features and restoring the highly desired “go automatically to fullscreen” feature. Additionally, the aspect ratio is respected like in the 1.1.x releases. The Retina Display (HiDPI) on the new MacBook Pro is natively supported, too.

Retina Display support

Thu, 14 Jun 2012 11:22:00 +0000

VLC’s next release, version 2.0.2, will include HiDPI / Retina Display support for its video output. This way, both video and subtitles or other overlays will be rendered at the display’s native resolution leading to a greatly improved viewing experience.

If you’re one of the lucky guys to have a MacBook Pro with Retina Display already, you’re welcome to check out tomorrow night’s nightly builds (CEST).

Click on the screenshots to see the differences more in detail.

VideoLAN at LinuxTag

Mon, 21 May 2012 15:14:00 +0000

We will have a booth at LinuxTag in Berlin, Germany this week along with our friends from libav. It’s #167 in hall 7.2a.

We are looking forward to show you the latest developments in VideoLAN’s projects and would love to hear your feedback!

The booth will be manned by Hugo and Ludovic on Wednesday and Thursday, while I’ll be there on Friday and Saturday. Jean-Paul and Mirsal will be available throughout the week and all of us during LinuxNacht.

Customizing VLC for Mac, 1st update

Wed, 02 May 2012 13:16:00 +0000

In VLC 2.0, we introduced a brand new interface, which looks quite different to VLC 1.x. We basically did 2 things here:

clean up the code by striping out most of the accumulated hacks of a 10 year old code base
introduce a new interface design, which suits the look and feel of nowadays Mac applications

However, there are quite a few users, who want to customize the UI, which is easily possible. Let me show you how. For sakes of simplicity, I’ll demonstrate the gray, default appearance only. However, it works exactly the same way if you prefer the dark style.

Improved media key support

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 20:00:00 +0000

VLC 2.0.2 will include improved support for the media keys on keyboards produced by companies other than Apple, notably the brand Cherry.

VLC uses a piece of code called SPMediaKeyTap developed by Spotify AB to provide this functionality. The fix was contributed back, so all the other client applications will benefit as well once they are updated.

This would not have been possible without the generous and enormously fast donation by ZF Friedrichshafen AG / Cherry, who delived the boards less than a week after our initial contact.

VDA decoder support

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 00:15:00 +0000

VLC’s next major release will include support for the VDA decoder API on Mac OS X thanks to Sébastien Zwickert, who added the needed code both to VLC and libav.

So, what’s the use? This adds hardware acceleration to H.264 video decoding on Mac OS X 10.6.3 and later! This way, VLC’s CPU load is reduced by up to 40 per cent on supported devices! These include Mac models equipped with the NVIDIA GeForce 9400M, GeForce 320M, GeForce GT 330M, ATI HD Radeon GFX, Intel HD Graphics and others.

VLC 2.0.1 Q&A (updated)

Thu, 29 Mar 2012 11:33:00 +0000

Update: VLC 2.0.3 is out! Please make sure to get the latest version!

Following the previous Q&A post, here’s a new one about VLC 2.0.1. It should explain the most common problems.

As usual, feel free to add new questions to the comments since this a living document.

When doing snapshots, I get an error message about some encoder issue. What’s wrong?

Due to a bug in the underlying libavcodec library, saving snapshots in the JPEG format doesn’t work in this release ( #6415). Saving as PNG works correctly. To change the file format, go to the “Video” category of VLC’s preferences (which you can find in the VLC menu).

VLC 2.0.1 out now

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 09:19:19 +0000

VLC 2.0.1 is now available on videolan.org and pushed directly to your Mac through VLC’s internal updater.

Here are the most important improvements for VLC for the Mac:

fixed delay when changing the volume
added a way to minimize the playlist
- option-click on the playlist button, if the video is played within the main window
- click normally on the playlist button, if the video is played in a detached window or no video is playing at all
provided a way to hide the sidebar
added playback controls to the detached video window
added OSD feedback when changing the volume
added accessibility support to the black UI mode
resolved fullscreen playback issues on Lion and Snow Leopard
the forward / backward buttons are way less sensitive now, so you can skip the movie much more slowly (the speed matches iTunes now)
disabled the native fullscreen mode on OS X Lion by default
fixed issues with the track synchronization panel
fixed playback of multicast UDP / RTP streams on certain setups
fixed SAP service discovery on certain setups
fixed crop functionality in the main menu and the video effects panel
fixed issues with the aspect ratio and subtitles menu items
fixed various crashes and minor ui issues
- progress bar flickering, video window getting larger than the actual screen size, re-appearing “Updating font cache” dialogs, etc.

This update includes the following security content:

VLC 2.0 Q&A

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 11:09:00 +0000

Update: VLC 2.0.1 is out! Please make sure that you updated.
A 2.0.1 Q&A is available here.

Fullscreen mode doesn’t work on my 2nd monitor anymore… is there a way to fix this?

Yes, this is due to the way the fullscreen mode was implemented by Apple for OS X Lion. To get VLC’s own mode back as well as working output on your 2nd screen, disable “Use the native fullscreen mode on OS X Lion” in the Interface category of VLC’s preferences. You can find the preferences in the “VLC” menu next to the “Quit” item.

VLC 2.0 Twoflower released

Sat, 18 Feb 2012 10:56:00 +0000

Our new major release was published today. Get it from videolan.org.

VLC 2.0 includes the following Mac OS X specific changes:

Completely re-written single window interface
2 interface styles: Lion gray and QTX-like black
Full access to VLC’s video and audio filters
- new Audio Effects panel adding Compressor and Spatializer filters
- new Video Effects panel for color and geometry adjustments, and more
A new panel to synchronize audio or subtitle tracks with the video
Re-written Open Disc functionality with automatic media detection
Native fullscreen support on OS X Lion (can be disabled if desired)
enhanced AppleScript support
support for VLC’s lua-based extensions, which which allow you to get info about the current movie from Allociné, post to Twitter, fetch subtitles automatically, etc.

Updated EyeTV plugin

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:43:31 +0000

While preparing VLC’s 2.0 release, I silently updated VLC’s plugin for EyeTV. The new version fixes playback issues with HD content received via DVB through the EyeTV application.

The plugin is available for download now and also compatible with earlier releases of VLC.

Final design of VLC 2.0 for Mac

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 21:13:00 +0000

Since the release of VLC 2.0 is approaching, I thought it was time to publish its final interface design by Damien Erambert.

Jean-Baptiste Kempf and me started to collect ideas for this interface in the summer of 2008. After slightly chaotic approaches and a few near death experiences for VLC’s Mac OS X port, we’re really proud of the result.

The interface of VLC for Mac as you know it dated back to the 0.7.0 days with various additions until the 0.8.6 release (in 2008!). Since then, it was more or less unchanged with minor optimisations here and there. A re-write called Lunettes appeared in late 2009 and finally converged in VLC for iOS.

Updated VLC 2.0-RC1 builds for Mac

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 13:02:00 +0000

Due to packaging errors, the builds for Intel did not perform as described in the last post. They do so now. Thus, the crashes on Snow Leopard when using the 64bit build and on Leopard when using the 32bit build are gone.

The downloads are still located at the same place. (link withdrawn due to actual release)

Happy testing!

VLC 2.0-RC1 for Mac

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 12:24:00 +0000

VLC 2.0 reached the Release Candidate milestone. RC1 builds for Mac are available here (links withdrawn due to actual release).

Please note the following:

You use Mac OS X 10.6 or 10.7 on a Core2Duo, Xeon or Intel i3/i5/i7? Get the " intel64" binary.

You still use Mac OS X 10.5 on Intel or a CoreDuo CPU (first Intel-based machines introduced by Apple a few years ago)? Get the " intel32" binary.

VideoLAN at SCALE 10x

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 14:32:00 +0000

VideoLAN will have a booth at SCALE 10x, the Southern California Linux Expo, at the Hilton Los Angeles Airport Hotel this week. The event takes place next week-end from January 20-22.

The booth (#74) will be manned by Rémi Denis-Courmont and me. Feel free to drop by and have a look at our forthcoming 2.0 release of VLC media player!

VLC 1.1.12

Sun, 09 Oct 2011 16:26:00 +0000

VLC 1.1.12 is now available from videolan.org and through the internal updater. As said in the previous news item, this release fixes the optical audio output broken in the last update as well as on OS X Lion.

Additionally, the update includes a fix for a security issue in the included HTTP server (which is admittedly rarely used by most folks) as well as a few other minor improvements, e.g. a crash in the About panel when using the Japanese locale.

VLC 1.1.12 (coming soon)

Mon, 26 Sep 2011 16:00:00 +0000

VLC 1.1.12 will be released within the next week. Most importantly, it includes a fix for the optical audio output (S/PDIF) on OS X Lion, so you can enjoy your multi-channel movies again in a proper way. Additionally, VLC no longer crashes when using the Japanese locale.

To give it a try, feel free to fetch a pre-release build from nightlies.videolan.org. Please note that these pre-release builds require Mac OS X 10.6 or later. The actual release still supports OS X 10.5 Leopard of course.

Sidebar

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 15:36:29 +0000

Similar to the playlist view on Windows and Linux, VLC for Mac will get a sidebar in version 1.2. This way, you can easily access your media folders and media shared on the local network and the internet. Future versions will evolve to a full media library.

That’s what it looks like so far:

More media aggregators will be added until the release. As you would expect, of course you can hide this sidebar if you just need a playlist without any clutter.

Native fullscreen support on OS X Lion

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 16:10:00 +0000

In addition to the previously announced improvements, VLC will also make use of OS X Lion’s native fullscreen mode. This way, VLC runs in a separate virtual desktop to your other apps, which simplifies multi-tasking quite a bit. Instead of VLC’s usual fullscreen button, you’ll see Lion’s native control in the upper left corner of VLC’s video window:

If you don’t like the native mode, especially since it can be less useful when using multiple physical screens, you can choose to continue to use VLC’s own fullscreen mechanism.

Drop Zone

Wed, 03 Aug 2011 13:08:00 +0000

The completely re-worked interface of VLC for Mac will feature a so-called Drop Zone in VLC 1.2. It will always appear within the main window in case that your playlist is empty. While a similar feature was hidden in the timeline background of current VLC releases, we hope that this will make VLC even easier to use.

Click here to have a look at a detail of the new main window.

Redesigned and partially re-written Open panel with automatic disk detection

Wed, 20 Jul 2011 22:56:00 +0000

As part of my Google Summer of Code project, I had a look at VLC’s open panel on Mac OS X. After simplying and re-arranging the file tab and adding new options to the Capture tab (used to access webcams and other video input devices), I re-wrote the disk tab which allows you to open DVDs, etc.

Starting with the current nightly builds, VLC can autodetect your inserted media as DVD, Audio CD, VCD or SVCD, and well, yes, as Bluray disk. There is no longer a need to select the type of disk, while all previously available features are still there if you need them.

VLC 1.1.11 (updated)

Thu, 14 Jul 2011 10:52:00 +0000

Another update for VLC will be available shortly. Here are the Mac-specific improvements with a main focus on full compatibility with Mac OS X Lion. While some GUI fixes and improved handling of the Apple Remote were already silently added to VLC 1.1.9 and 1.1.10, here are some more noticable:

Fixed scrolling direction if the input device’s signal is inverted
Updated the auhal audio output to the latest API
Disabled window restoration for privacy reasons

Regrettably, the screen input module will remain unavailable in VLC’s 1.1 series for Mac OS X Lion.

Updated Audio Output module for Mac OS X

Mon, 11 Jul 2011 11:53:00 +0000

In preparation of a future Mac OS X release, I’ve updated VLC’s audio output module for Mac OS X to the latest API. Feel free to get a nightly build and report any problems you might have.

Of course, these builds can be installed alongsite your current VLC installation.

New Video Effects panel

Fri, 24 Jun 2011 19:20:00 +0000

As part of the modernization of the Mac OS X interface, one of the major aspects is the feature synchronization between the Qt4 interface used on Windows & Linux and the Mac front-end. A bigger deficit of the current Mac versions is the lack of direct access to various effects included within VLC. Previous posts demonstrate panels for Audio Effects and Track Synchronization. Today, you’ll get an insight on the new Video Effects panel, if you click here.

Redesigned fullscreen controller panel

Tue, 21 Jun 2011 16:55:00 +0000

As you might already know, I am working on a redesigned new Mac OS X interface throughout the next couple of months as part of Google’s Summer of Code 2011. The actually user visible design is done by the French UI artist Damien Erambert.

While most of the work will focus on the video playback window and the playlist, he also had a look at the fullscreen controller panel, which you can see on flickr.

VLC 1.1.10.1

Thu, 16 Jun 2011 19:17:00 +0000

Shortly after version 1.1.10, today we published VLC 1.1.10.1. This is an OS X-only release with the following improvements:

Fixed disappearing repeat buttons when changing playback mode
Fixed Freebox TV playback
Dramatically reduced installation size (up to 30 MB on Universal Binary installations)
Fixed potential execution problems

Additionally, I’m currently working on a Video Effects panel for VLC 1.2, which will make all the options available currently known from the Windows and Linux ports. Screenshots to be posted shortly.

Capturing from more video devices (updated)

Sat, 07 May 2011 13:53:00 +0000

Thanks to a contribution by Katsushi Kobayashi, VLC 1.2 will support capturing video input signals from all QuickTime-compatible devices. This is basically your internal iSight (which was supported since VLC 0.9) plus any compatible webcam, FireWire video device, etc. The GUI was slightly updated to reflect this change and will get a few more options and refining until the release later this year.

In case you’re interested, this update will be available for testing in tomorrow night’s nightly builds.

Track Synchronization

Sat, 07 May 2011 11:01:00 +0000

Prior to starting with the more complex Video Filters panel, I’ve added a Track Synchronization panel to VLC 1.2. As its name says, it allows you to synchronize your audio, video and subtitle tracks more easily. Of course, the previously available hotkeys still work.

You can have a look at the result on flickr.

This panel will be available tonight through the development branch’s nightly builds.

Audio Filters

Fri, 06 May 2011 15:14:00 +0000

As a first step in reworking the existing Mac OS X interface for VLC 1.2, I’ve created an Audio Filters panel providing options similar to the Extended Controls panel known from the Qt interface used on Win32 and Linux. VLC 1.2 for Mac will get an entirely new main window and playback concept as part of this year’s Google Summer of Code. More on that once GSoC officially starts.

This panel is already fully functional and available through VLC’s unstable nightly builds. Note that video output is not supported in the current binaries, so you really need to focus on the audio features.

Update on VLC for Mac

Fri, 06 May 2011 13:29:00 +0000

After a long time of minimal changes to the Mac OS X port of VLC, I was able to pick up development of it again. As a first result, VLC 1.1.9 included a bunch of bug fixes to the interface (Apple Remote handling, hotkey preferences, Growl integration, quitting through the Dock, etc.).

VLC 1.1.10 will include improved Media Key support on Mac OS X 10.6 and later thanks to SPMediaKeyTap by Spotify AB as well as additional crash and bug fixes. VLC 1.1.10 no longer interferes with other applications using the media keys, most notably iTunes and QuickTimePlayer. Nightly builds reflecting the latest changes are available since last night on nightlies.videolan.org. Feel free to check these out and to provide feedback if you need anything else for VLC’s next minor release.

Untitled

Fri, 06 May 2011 12:59:00 +0000

Hello World.