Looking for help with VLC removal

[dequire]

Hi all. Hoping someone can help with an issue I am having. Specifically, I installed VLC from the standard Neon repositories, which is version 2.2 and rather old. There is a need for me to move to a newer version for features that version 2 does not currently have. As you can see from the paste output below, attempting to remove VLC will end in disaster. I cannot figure a way around this, and I'm kind of stuck.

Output of what will be removed if VLC is uninstalled.

The reason I would like to remove it is that I have installed a snap image of VLC which is a newer release and contains the features I want. However, I cannot run it as the older version is the only version that can be revoked from the command line. Since my understanding of snaps is centered around them being mounted and sym-linked to be evoked from the command line by just typing the applications name (e.g. just typing VLC in the command line), I was hoping that just installing the snap would solve the problem and be the version run, since it's newer. However, it appears that it has not.

Apparently the command line app shortcuts use apps installed from standard repositories, regardless of version, over a Snap-installed version. Any ideas?

[claydoh]

/snap/bin/vlc works here
Maybe have to adjust an env variable to put /snap/bin at the head of the list?

[oshunluvr]

What audio-backends do you have installed? If you only have the vlc backend that could cause this. Try installing phonon-backend-gstreamer and then uninstalling vlc.

[GreyGeek]

AppImage for 3.0.0?
https://github.com/anupam-git/vlc-ap...86_64.AppImage

[acheron]

sudo apt install phonon4qt5-backend-gstreamer
sudo apt purge vlc

[dequire]

Thanks for the replies all!

/snap/bin/vlc works here
Maybe have to adjust an env variable to put /snap/bin at the head of the list?

Yepp that works! Thanks.

sudo apt install phonon4qt5-backend-gstreamer
sudo apt purge vlc

Thanks! I'll try that once I get the snap version running properly (or another alternative like GG's Appimage recommendation). One question - why can't apt or packagekit figure that back-end dependency out on it's own? I'm sure I'm not the first one to hit this issue and seems a recipe for disaster for a new user...

===

Running the snapped version of VLC produces some errors - at first I thought both might be related to permissions, but maybe not, as I've given liberal permissions to the affected snap directories, at least as far as I can tell. Also, massively-ample storage space available, so space isn't an issue.





A Google search let to the same error in KDE on Mint, albeit not in the the snapped version. The solution did not help in my case (changing the target directory to the proper one), but I still think it's a permissions issue. What do you guys think? Could someone try to reproduce? Thanks.

[GreyGeek]

The article you linked solved the problem by changing ownership from root:root to, in your case, james:james
That didn’t fix your problem?

[dequire]

The article you linked solved the problem by changing ownership from root:root to, in your case, james:james
That didn’t fix your problem?

It did not, no. I also tried changing the permissions to full r/w access to no avail either.

[GreyGeek]

Is the immutable bit set?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[oshunluvr]

One question - why can't apt or packagekit figure that back-end dependency out on it's own? I'm sure I'm not the first one to hit this issue and seems a recipe for disaster for a new user...

I had this same or similar issue when I installed KDEneon for this first time and tried to remove VLC (so I could install a newer version) and it wanted to wipe all of Plasma 5 off the install. IMO, the phonon backend depends are wrong and I reported it as a bug. If I recall the devs didn't agree with my assessment. Seems to me this sort of thing is what we called (in my old line of work) FIRST DAY STUFF - as in - basic functionality.

I pointed out that not everyone wants VLC and in my opinion, it should not have been included in the ISO to begin with. It's not a KDE/Plasma program. A less experienced user might not have been able to figure out the issue and thus would be stuck with VLC whether or not they wanted it. Stupid.

[GreyGeek]

Dpkg was designed specifically to not remove a package if there are other packages dependent on it, unless the user allows it. That's probably to prevent most people from borking their system, although if they are careless and don't pay attention to all the dependencies that is exactly what they could do.

Of course, the user could delete vlc and all of its dependencies and then reinstall plasma-desktop.

[woodsmoke]

sudo apt install phonon4qt5-backend-gstreamer
sudo apt purge vlc

Acheron is a good man.

woodlikesAcheronsmoke

[dequire]

sudo apt install phonon4qt5-backend-gstreamer
sudo apt purge vlc

Well, after installing both phonon4qt5-backend-gstreamer and phonon-backend-gstreamer, I get this when attempting to purge VLC:

james@james-amd-rig:~$ sudo apt purge vlc
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Starting pkgProblemResolver with broken count: 3
Starting 2 pkgProblemResolver with broken count: 3
Investigating (0) phonon4qt5-backend-vlc [ amd64 ] < 0.10.1-0neon+16.04+xenial+build13 > ( sound )
Broken phonon4qt5-backend-vlc:amd64 Depends on vlc [ amd64 ] < 2.2.2-5ubuntu0.16.04.4 > ( universe/graphics )
Considering vlc:amd64 10004 as a solution to phonon4qt5-backend-vlc:amd64 19
Removing phonon4qt5-backend-vlc:amd64 rather than change vlc:amd64
Investigating (0) kaffeine [ amd64 ] < 2.0.14-0neon+16.04+xenial+build10 > ( video )
Broken kaffeine:amd64 Depends on vlc [ amd64 ] < 2.2.2-5ubuntu0.16.04.4 > ( universe/graphics )
Considering vlc:amd64 10004 as a solution to kaffeine:amd64 1
Removing kaffeine:amd64 rather than change vlc:amd64
Investigating (0) phonon-backend-vlc [ amd64 ] < 0.10.1-0neon+16.04+xenial+build13 > ( sound )
Broken phonon-backend-vlc:amd64 Depends on vlc [ amd64 ] < 2.2.2-5ubuntu0.16.04.4 > ( universe/graphics )
Considering vlc:amd64 10004 as a solution to phonon-backend-vlc:amd64 1
Removing phonon-backend-vlc:amd64 rather than change vlc:amd64
Investigating (0) kaffeine-dbgsym [ amd64 ] < 2.0.14-0neon+16.04+xenial+build10 > ( debug )
Broken kaffeine-dbgsym:amd64 Depends on kaffeine [ amd64 ] < 2.0.14-0neon+16.04+xenial+build10 > ( video ) (= 2.0.14-0neon+16.04+xenial+build10)
Considering kaffeine:amd64 1 as a solution to kaffeine-dbgsym:amd64 -1
Removing kaffeine-dbgsym:amd64 rather than change kaffeine:amd64
Investigating (1) phonon [ amd64 ] < 4:4.10.0-0neon+16.04+xenial+build21 > ( sound )
Broken phonon:amd64 Depends on phonon-backend-gstreamer [ amd64 ] < none -> 4:4.9.0-1+16.04+xenial+build6 > ( sound )
Considering phonon-backend-gstreamer:amd64 1 as a solution to phonon:amd64 7
Try Installing phonon-backend-gstreamer [ amd64 ] < none -> 4:4.9.0-1+16.04+xenial+build6 > ( sound ) before changing phonon:amd64
Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
libbasicusageenvironment1 libcddb2 libdvbpsi10 libdvbv5-0 libebml4v5 libfreerdp-cache1.1 libfreerdp-client1.1 libfreerdp-codec1.1 libfreerdp-common1.1.0 libfreerdp-core1.1
libfreerdp-crypto1.1 libfreerdp-gdi1.1 libfreerdp-locale1.1 libfreerdp-primitives1.1 libfreerdp-utils1.1 libgles2-mesa libgroupsock8 liblivemedia50 liblua5.2-0 libmatroska6v5
libproxy-tools libresid-builder0c2a libsdl-image1.2 libsidplay2v5 libupnp6 libusageenvironment3 libva-drm1 libva-x11-1 libvlc5 libvlccore8 libvncclient1 libwinpr-crt0.1
libwinpr-dsparse0.1 libwinpr-environment0.1 libwinpr-file0.1 libwinpr-handle0.1 libwinpr-heap0.1 libwinpr-input0.1 libwinpr-interlocked0.1 libwinpr-library0.1 libwinpr-path0.1
libwinpr-pool0.1 libwinpr-registry0.1 libwinpr-rpc0.1 libwinpr-sspi0.1 libwinpr-synch0.1 libwinpr-sysinfo0.1 libwinpr-thread0.1 libwinpr-utils0.1 libxcb-xv0 vlc-data vlc-nox
vlc-plugin-notify vlc-plugin-samba
Use 'sudo apt autoremove' to remove them.
The following additional packages will be installed:
gstreamer1.0-pulseaudio phonon-backend-gstreamer
The following packages will be REMOVED:
kaffeine* kaffeine-dbgsym* phonon-backend-vlc* phonon4qt5-backend-vlc* vlc*
The following NEW packages will be installed:
gstreamer1.0-pulseaudio phonon-backend-gstreamer
0 upgraded, 2 newly installed, 5 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 167 kB of archives.
After this operation, 21.6 MB disk space will be freed.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] n
Abort.

So it looks like (possibly) removing plasma-desktop, removing VLC, and re-installing plasma-desktop is perhaps the only safe way to accomplish this. Unfortunate.

[acheron]

Well, after installing both phonon4qt5-backend-gstreamer and phonon-backend-gstreamer, I get this when attempting to purge VLC:

So it looks like (possibly) removing plasma-desktop, removing VLC, and re-installing plasma-desktop is perhaps the only safe way to accomplish this. Unfortunate.

Nothing there indicates you need to do that. The only extra getting removed there is kaffeine.