The problem is that Firefox-3.5 (and 3.6) contains code specific to the Ogg and Wav file formats and specific codecs. Though the original <video> tag support included generic gstreamer support, MozCorp for some reason rewrote that to exclude the use of system-provided codecs. See, for example, the method nsHTMLMediaElement::CanHandleMediaType() in mozilla-1.9.1/content/html/content/src/nsHTMLMediaElement.cpp, and the subsequent methods.
This means that even if you have e.g. an H.323 codec installed in your Ubuntu system, Firefox won't use it to implement the <video> tag. This prevents Ubuntu users from playing e.g. Youtube or Vimeo videos by using free software. Strictly speaking, this is an enhancement request -- the upstream code contains a limitation that is not appropriate for Ubuntu users, but it's not strictly speaking "a bug". The support in Firefox for <video> and <audio> was tracked in 3 mozilla bugs: Bare <video> with no codecs: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=382267 Ogg Theora/Vorbis codecs: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=422538 Gstreamer backend for <video> and <audio>: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=422540 This third set of patches is not yet in the upstream Firefox releases. It was used for prototyping the <video> support, it limps on embedded Firefox on the N810, but looks like it could use some love from a gstreamer expert in the Ubuntu community. ** Bug watch added: Mozilla Bugzilla #382267 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=382267 ** Bug watch added: Mozilla Bugzilla #422538 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=422538 ** Bug watch added: Mozilla Bugzilla #422540 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=422540 -- Firefox is not able to play mp4 <video> tags https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/412647 You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Bugs, which is subscribed to Ubuntu. -- ubuntu-bugs mailing list [email protected] https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs
