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The interface might not be the prettiest, but I don't think it's "horribly unfriendly". Can you contrast it with another player? I have been using vlc for a lon

by why-el 14y ago

The interface might not be the prettiest, but I don't think it's "horribly unfriendly". Can you contrast it with another player? I have been using vlc for a long time now and although I just switched to Mac OS, I can't say that I find other players on the platform particularly appealing. But again I think it depends on what you do it. In my case its usually either in minimized mode or playing a movie on full screen mode, making my contact with its UI very limited.

krupan 14y ago
mplayer, for example, is just as capably at playing just about any media format, but is definitely far more user-unfriendly than vlc
- sasha-dv 14y ago
  I disagree. Regarding user-friendliness they are about the same to me. Can you point out something that I maybe missed that makes mplayer "definitely far more user-friendly than vlc"? (not rude, just curious) edit: missed a word
  - mbell 14y ago
    Let's start with the fact that mplayer is a command line only interaction program, if you want to discuss real usability, which GUI for mplayer are you using?
- Edootjuh 14y ago
  While it does require some terminal skills, as far as playing or streaming any media file and skipping left and right a bit (the largest part of my contact with a media player) or shuffling through a music library goes, I find it far easier to work with. I feel that people too often confuse a user-friendly interface with an intuitive or noob-friendly one. But I guess seeing as most programs' user base's large majority are non-technical people that's fair.
SatvikBeri 14y ago
I agree. It's ugly, but the interface loads quickly, makes it easy to skip ads/chapters/include subtitles (even if those subtitles are .srt's), easy to change playback speed, etc. Just like with website design-it's the UX that matters, not how pretty the app is.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
gocard 14y ago
I couldn't find an easy way to disable subtitles completely for all videos I watched. After searching through the forums, the way to do that is to set the default subtitle track in the advanced Input/Codecs settings to a really high number, or you have to go to the advanced Video section and disable "sub pictures". WTF. It's those kind of things that drive me crazy. They do a lot of great things to make their system flexible, and then stop just short of making it usable. Instead of calling it "sub pictures", just call it "sub titles", and it'd be obvious to me how to disable sub titles. Or in the codecs section, have a checkbox to disable subtitles (which would set the default track to some high number for me). I would consider that "unfriendly".

by why-el 14y ago

krupan 14y ago

mplayer, for example, is just as capably at playing just about any media format, but is definitely far more user-unfriendly than vlc

sasha-dv 14y ago
I disagree. Regarding user-friendliness they are about the same to me. Can you point out something that I maybe missed that makes mplayer "definitely far more user-friendly than vlc"? (not rude, just curious) edit: missed a word
- mbell 14y ago
  Let's start with the fact that mplayer is a command line only interaction program, if you want to discuss real usability, which GUI for mplayer are you using?
Edootjuh 14y ago
While it does require some terminal skills, as far as playing or streaming any media file and skipping left and right a bit (the largest part of my contact with a media player) or shuffling through a music library goes, I find it far easier to work with. I feel that people too often confuse a user-friendly interface with an intuitive or noob-friendly one. But I guess seeing as most programs' user base's large majority are non-technical people that's fair.

SatvikBeri 14y ago

I agree. It's ugly, but the interface loads quickly, makes it easy to skip ads/chapters/include subtitles (even if those subtitles are .srt's), easy to change playback speed, etc. Just like with website design-it's the UX that matters, not how pretty the app is.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

gocard 14y ago

I couldn't find an easy way to disable subtitles completely for all videos I watched. After searching through the forums, the way to do that is to set the default subtitle track in the advanced Input/Codecs settings to a really high number, or you have to go to the advanced Video section and disable "sub pictures". WTF. It's those kind of things that drive me crazy. They do a lot of great things to make their system flexible, and then stop just short of making it usable. Instead of calling it "sub pictures", just call it "sub titles", and it'd be obvious to me how to disable sub titles. Or in the codecs section, have a checkbox to disable subtitles (which would set the default track to some high number for me). I would consider that "unfriendly".