GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 610570
Totem Firefox plugin doesn't play Shoutcast playlists (*.pls)
Last modified: 2010-03-24 18:02:11 UTC
In FF 3.5.8 reports: " /tmp/listen.pls could not be opened, because the associated helper application does not exist. Change the association in your preferences. " about:plugins shows VLC, WMP, DivX, Quicktime, etc. -- all handled by Totem 2.28.2 -- but pls suffix does not appear.
I'm on Ubuntu 9.10.
Totem itself has no troubleopening the .pls URL directly.
Thanks for taking the time to report this bug. This bug report isn't very useful because it doesn't describe the bug well. If you have time and can still reproduce the bug, please read http://bugzilla.gnome.org/bug-HOWTO.html and add a more useful description to this bug.
Components: Firefox Totem plugin. (Totem itself does not display this problem.) Firefox version 3.5.8. Totem version 2.28.2. OS: Ubuntu 9.10 Summary: Totem plugin doesn't play Shoutcast playlists (*.pls) Steps to Reproduce: 1) Type an address like http://74.173.217.126:8000/listen.pls into Firefox address bar. Actual Results: Firefox pop-up reports: " /tmp/listen.pls could not be opened, because the associated helper application does not exist. Change the association in your preferences. " What the application did after performing the above steps: nothing Expected Results: 1) Typing the same URL directly into the Totem MoviePlayer application works fine. 2) Typing a URL like http://ogg.smgradio.com/vc160.ogg into the Firefox address bar invokes the plugin. Build Date & Platform: ubuntu-9.10-desktop-amd64: 2.6.31-16-generic #53-Ubuntu SMP Tue Dec 8 04:02:15 UTC 2009 x86_64 GNU/Linux Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux x86_64; en-US; rv:1.9.1.6) Gecko/20091215 Ubuntu/9.10 (karmic) Firefox/3.5.6
The plugin is not used in this case. When you put http://74.173.217.126:8000/listen.pls in the Firefox bar, Firefox will check it mime-type, offer you to open it with an external application, and then fail to launch the external application. This is a problem with your Firefox setup, not with Totem, the Totem plugin should not be used for opening PLS files.
Thanks for your reply. (In reply to comment #5) > This is a problem with your Firefox setup Can you suggest a better setup? In particular, how can I make FF aware of Totem as an external application? > the Totem plugin should not be used for opening PLS files. The Totem plugin does work for VLC, WMP, DivX, Quicktime, etc. I guess I don't understand why PLS is different. > The plugin is not used in this case. When you put > http://74.173.217.126:8000/listen.pls in the Firefox bar, Firefox will check it > mime-type, offer you to open it with an external application, and then fail to > launch the external application. This was not exactly my experience. Firefox did not offer (in a dialog) to open the URL with an external application.
(In reply to comment #6) > Thanks for your reply. > (In reply to comment #5) > > > This is a problem with your Firefox setup > Can you suggest a better setup? In particular, how can I make FF aware of > Totem as an external application? It should automatically show up in the possible applications for the mime-type. > > the Totem plugin should not be used for opening PLS files. > The Totem plugin does work for VLC, WMP, DivX, Quicktime, etc. I guess I don't > understand why PLS is different. That's because we have no way to tell Firefox not to handle non-embedded media types. There's a mozilla bug and a Totem bug open to that effect. Playlists are usually handled in Totem as an external application if they're not embedded. > > The plugin is not used in this case. When you put > > http://74.173.217.126:8000/listen.pls in the Firefox bar, Firefox will check it > > mime-type, offer you to open it with an external application, and then fail to > > launch the external application. > This was not exactly my experience. Firefox did not offer (in a dialog) to > open the URL with an external application. Check the preferences, you probably clicked the "do that every time" checkbox. Check in the Firefox preferences, it's probably trying to launch an application that does not exist.
Got it. > It should automatically show up in the possible applications for the mime-type. It does not for me. (It seems to me that I used to be able to manually add Applications in Firefox's Preferences, but on this machine I see no way. Perhaps I need to create a helpers.private_mime_types_file ?) > Check the preferences, you probably clicked the "do that every time" checkbox. > Check in the Firefox preferences, it's probably trying to launch an application > that does not exist. My FF Preferences has no entry for Content Type PLS file.
Then it's your GNOME configuration that's broken. Try downloading a .pls file, and opening it from nautilus or some such. In any case, this isn't a bug in totem's browser plugin, as it does not handle PLS files. If you have more questions, I would ask you to try on IRC, or in forums instead.
You've been very helpful. I'll take it there. Thanks again.
p.s. It turns out that you have given me a solution. Using Nautilus, I had no trouble opening /tmp/listen-1.pls. It automatically went to Totem, as expected. My Firefox Preference entry for Shoutcast files was similarly set to Totem, but caused the failures. Based on a hunch following your advice, I changed the Preference to Ask Me Every Time. When prompted, I selected Totem. It worked! I speculate that the Totem entry in the Preferences automatically tried to use the plugin, which I now understand was not designed to handle PLS files. Perhaps my manual selection forced it to use Totem as an external application. Best wishes, Ron