gmplayer won't accept m3u playlist from interface only from CLI

[BrianA_MN]

Summary of the bug: If you hand create a playlist.m3u of a radio stream using either the EXTM3U/EXTINT headers or not using them, and pass that playlist to mplayer or gmplayer with the -playlist option from the command line it will play the playlist. If you open mplayer, using gui gmplayer, and then load that same radio station stream via the playlist button, nothing will play. SMPlayer and Xine do play the radio stream from the example playlist when using their playlist selection buttons.

Example playlist file:
bash-4.3$ cat Music/test.m3u8
#EXTM3U8
#EXTINF:0,BossBoss Radio - _{0
​http://streaming.live365.com/b26873_128mp3}

System is Slackware 64 14.2, Kernel is 4.4.118

[ib]

Since mplayer doesn't allow to directly play playlists for security reasons, you have to use gmplayer's load button or open file from its menu and filter playlists.

In your case (a simple URL) you can also use open url from the menu.

[BrianA_MN]

This is not an invalid defect. Mplayer does allow a playlist to be passed in the commandline with the following command #mplayer -playlist test.m3u8. The gmplayer, the gui interface, will NOT accept the same playlist with the load and open file buttons on the gmplayer interface. Please re-examine this defect. If you use the command line and pass # gmplayer -playlist test.m3u8 it will also start playing correctly. ONLY when attempting to load from the gmplayer buttons does this fail. So you solution is what is failing!

[ib]

Please carefully read my comment where I explained the filter to be used with the load and open file buttons! (Change from Popular audio and video files to Playlists.)

[BrianA_MN]

Please provide a step by step, like I have done to explain your "filter"?

I have started #gmplayer in an KDE xsession. After the interface opens, click the three dots buttons (located in the upper left quadrant between the "S" and "PL" buttons) to load a file, switch the filtered mode to "All Files". Select the test.m3u8 file from the ~/Music directory. Then click the "PL" button and make sure the test.m3u8 file is "Add" to the "Select" list, click OK. Now on the gmplayer gui press the ">

" button. Nothing will play.

If this is the wrong procedure, I'm open to correction of the proper procedure. If this is a valid procedure then there is something wrong with the gmplayer interface.

Again from the command line interface (CLI) passing "mplayer -playlist ~/Music/test.m3u8" will play the test file. OR doing the same with gmplayer will play the list, but I can not get it to play from the gmplayer gui interface.

[ib]

You really should carefully read what I wrote.

After the interface opens, click the three dots buttons (located in the upper left quadrant between the "S" and "PL" buttons) to load a file, switch the filtered mode to "All Files".

You must switch the filtered mode to "Playlists"!

[BrianA_MN]

The only time the "Playlist" filter appears is if I start Mplayer, and then right click on the mplayer screen and ignore the minicontrols (which I call gmplayer). However even with a right click (ignoring the minicontrols) on the big MPLAYER screen, then switching to playlist and selecting the test.m3u8 file there is still nothing which will play. Infact mplayer locks up.

In the gmplayer minicontrol panel there is no "Playlist" filter. If I select "All Subtitles" then the playlist files appear and can be loaded. The file title appears in the minicontrol window. But pressing the play button in the minicontrol panel results in nothing.

Have you attempted to use the steps that I've provided? If you do, what is your result?

[ib]

So what version of gmplayer are you using?

[BrianA_MN]

When I open gmplayer and click on the minicontrol panel "MPLAYER" logo the following pops up:

MPlayer 1.2.1-5.3.0 (C) 2000-2016 MPlayer Team

GUI development has been sponsored by UHU-Linux:

​http://www.uhulinux.hu/

[ib]

Open File Selector

[ib]

Open File Selector

[ib]

Playlist Selection

[ib]

Open URL

[ib]

First of all, your version is approx. 2 1/2 years old and lacks approx. 500 changes/fixes since.

Secondly, the right place to ask about usage is the mailing list.

Open the file selector:

or using the default menu (right mouse button click):

and filter playlists:

In your case, the easiest way is to directly open the URL:

[BrianA_MN]

This bug report is that a standard playlist can not be read and played by gmplayer, not how the minicontrol functions. Please try to make the playlist that I've posted earlier and try opening it with the minicontroller or mplayer. If it plays for you then great, then I have a local problem. If it doesn't play, then please realize this is a bug with mplayer not supporting playlist standards. Or at least acknowledge that mplayer doens't support standard playlists.

I use Slackware 14.2 whose current distribution is MPlayer 1.2.1, which was released in January 2016, 1.3.0 was released one month later and no newer release has been made since. This is not a user instruction issue, this is a bug in mplayer reading and using standard playlists. If a playlist bug was addressed in 1.3.0 then please show me the release note showing it was addressed.

I"ve tried to use the eject button to pull up. load and then play. That results in mplayer lockup and nothing played. Also using the eject button on the minicontrols to pull-up playlists doesn't follow expected results, because every "physical" audio or cd player eject button simply causes the player to stop playing and eject the current CD/DVD.

Please leave this bug request open until it is properly resolved. If this bug is a duplicate then please refer to that bug so I can correct my standard playlist to conform to what mplayer expects.

Thank you.

[reimar]

I am not sure selecting "playlists" in the open menu helps?
I still get "Playlist parsing disabled for security reasons. Ignoring file."
However it's still in the playlist, and explicitly pressing play results in trying to play it as a media file - which of course fails. In such an old version, it might well have resulted in a hang on top of it, that at least is not the case in current versions.
gmplayer -playlist test.m3u8
does work however, so this seems more of an issue with the file open dialog and playlist management...

[ib]

Replying to reimar:

I am not sure selecting "playlists" in the open menu helps?

I am.

I still get "Playlist parsing disabled for security reasons. Ignoring file."

Well, I explicitly downloaded MPlayer 1.2.1 to ensure that the GUI's playlist support (added in svn r34947 2012-05-21 and r34976 2012-05-30) worked (and it still works in current svn trunk) as described. I'm using it all the time.

There may have been improvements and fixes since, but even v1.2.1 plays test.m3u8.

[BrianA_MN]

@reimar and @ib, thank you for continuing to help troubleshoot. I've decided to try only starting gmplayer from user's bash to see any logging output, then loading the test.m3u8 as described above. When I do that I see in bash the "Playlist parsing disabled for security reasons. Ignoring File." But if I then try to load any URL embedded playlist it won't play and it doesn't flash any new warning. If I load a valid local mp3 or aa it will play the file. So I guess my issue is that the security feature blocking standard playlists with embedded URL referencing. Which is a good security measure, but one that should show the warning in the minicontrol window so users know they can't play a URL based playlist. But what about the NO security issue when using (g)mplayer -playlist ~/Music/test.m3u8? Why isn't' that also blocked? Perhaps there was a fix in 1.3.0? Is it just a confusing idiosyncrasy of the the two OR is this a bug that shouldn't block in the minicontrol?
@ip when you say
"There may have been improvements and fixes since, but even v1.2.1 plays test.m3u8."
was that from the mini-controller or from bash?

[ib]

Replying to BrianA_MN:

Please add allow-dangerous-playlist-parsing=yes to your ~/.mplayer/config.

should show the warning in the minicontrol window so users know they can't play a URL based playlist

I'm going to disable the playlist feature in that case.

[BrianA_MN]

Please add allow-dangerous-playlist-parsing=yes to your ~/.mplayer/config.

should show the warning in the minicontrol window so users know they can't play a URL based playlist

I'm going to disable the playlist feature in that case.

Thank you for the code to add to the config, that fixed the issue.
I'm wondering if you have any thoughts about why the CLI command "mplayer -playlist ~/Music/test.m3u8" was playing the URL playlist and not giving the warning?
Cheers.

[ib]

Replying to BrianA_MN:

why the CLI command "mplayer -playlist ~/Music/test.m3u8" was playing the URL playlist and not giving the warning?

-playlist implicitly enables allow-dangerous-playlist-parsing

[ib]

Please add allow-dangerous-playlist-parsing=yes to your ~/.mplayer/config.

Starting from svn r38113 it is recommended to set Allow loading of playlists in the GUI's preferences dialog (Misc tab) instead.

Without either of these settings there won't be a file selector filter for playlists in the first place.

[BrianA_MN]

Thank you for all the support and help. I've found the support more than generous once I was writing the correct terms.