Support for Silverlight applications

[matti]

Moonlight v2 is out. Can we please get it pre-loaded into Mint? Makes sense to me just like support of MS Codecs etc. Built by Novell and Microsoft, it is the legal way of being able to interact with Silverlight applications.

The reason for my personal interest goes something like this: I want to switch/ have switched from Windows to Linux. Therefore running Mint AND Windows is not an option. There are some killer (web-) applications that every Linux distro maker needs to keep their eyes on and provide support if they wish to expand their user base and step out of "me too" moniker. The opportunity areas are currently in apps like Netflix, Hulu, and undoubtedly other subscription based online video streaming services. By definition most of them are based on Silverlight or Java.

I could of course go out and buy an LG-BD390 or a PS3 and figure out how to make them play nice with Mint. Most of the new linux users would not. They would look at Mint, find out that their favorite video streams will not play on Mint (or any other distro currently) and stay with Windows.

The proper way to do it is to spend effort and resources to provide the prerequisites in Mint (Moonlight etc) and fix or have the DRM issue fixed or negotiated out of the way.

How about it?

[remoulder]

Netflix, Hulu

You know there are a lot of people out there using computers who are NOT American!

[matti]

You are right, of course, and no, I'm not an American.
Don't hold me to exact numbers but if my tired old memory serves me right, EU has some 350 million people, US some 350 million and rest of the world "little" more than that. Irrespective of nationalities we are talking perhaps 1/3 of the global market place, which should be nothing to sneeze at, don't you think?

Microsoft Silverlight is used globally and in numerous languages, so if you like videos, sooner or later you too will be impacted for lack of support.

[emorrp1]

To be fair, Moonlight v2 was only released on 17th December (after Helena was released) and Moonlight v1 support has been included in Mint since at least Gloria, so I don't know how much more support you're after (see http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=47&t=31954)

[remoulder]

EU has some 350 million people, US some 350 million and rest of the world "little" more than that.

With respect ISTR that there are about 6 billion people in the world, so how do you get 350 million as 1/3? My point was that the video services you chose to illustrate your request are AFAIK only available in the US.

[matti]

To be fair, Moonlight v2 was only released on 17th December (after Helena was released) and Moonlight v1 support has been included in Mint since at least Gloria, so I don't know how much more support you're after (see http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=47&t=31954)

Fair is good. Bowing my head in shame.
Moonlight V1 was way too flaky, V2 works and allows you to stream stuff that does not require login. From users' perspective it is still a no-go since after the login, the streaming does not work. I suspect some AX based DRM might be the culprit.

Any chance of getting one of your US-based folks to take a look at what it would take to make it work?
Any chance of updating the repository with V2 or is that in Ubuntu repos? If latter, I will raise a flag there too.

Hulu has solved their issue by providing a Linux "Hulu Desktop" application. What would it take to get that one into your repositories as well? As a dumb user, I don't know the process that you must follow.

[emorrp1]

No worries, it is often a culture-shock. With Mint, we run a DIY method, if you want something done and no-one else steps up and says they're interested in doing it, then it won't get done. For instance, I live in England, so I won't particularly benefit from it even if I had the time. Now we did have a community repository project for things like this, but we're trying to move to working closer with Ubuntu, so it might involve launchpad ppas. As far as I can tell, moonlight v2 hasn't even made it into Ubuntu's Lucid repos yet, so simply being patient might be enough, oitherwise you need to look at packaging with launchpad ppas.

[remoulder]

Have been unable to find a PPA for moonlight v2. The one run by directx keeps cropping up but I didn't see the plugin on there separately, only mono. You can add the Moonlight 2 plugin to Firefox here.

[DrHu]

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Silverli ... 0163.shtml
http://www.infoworld.com/d/developer-wo ... be-air-216

I wouldn't be counting on Silverlight being that important
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/nb ... _flash.php
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10098963-93.html

[Gramps50]

The 1st I had heard of Silverlight was the other day when I logged into the website of a gym that I joined. To view the instructional videos and some other stuff you needed to install Silverlight. So I went and did a serarch and found yet another thing that Microsoft is trying to shove down our throats. If they want to mess up Windows that is fine I really don't care, but I WILL NOT install some of their crap just so I can see something on the web which has standards which are not connected to MS. I did write to the webmaster and complain about it too.

If Moonlight is a deb I can install if I want that is fine, I wouldn't like the idea that it was installed and activated by default. As far as I am concerned Novell isn't any better than MS in fact they are partners in crime.

End soapbox mode

[emorrp1]

I wouldn't like the idea that it was installed and activated by default

Well, in that case, I hope you're not using Gloria or Helena, as they both have it installed and activated by default. It's the code that is free and is what Clem judges it on, rather than some ideology/company influence worries (mono is more likely to be taken out because of space issues than because of patent issues)

[matti]

Competition is good. Multiple platforms is good. Standards rule in interfaces and interactions rather than specific tools, operating systems or companies being "standard". I'm sure both Adobe and Microsoft will not agree with that statement

Bring them on and let the market sort them out. Lack of traction with developers and users will drive the laggards to obscurity... I am the first one to wish that a large number of users would have the wherewithal to stand up and complain to Netflix and its peers about forcing Microsoft DRM on us but in the meanwhile, the reality is that they do. I for one would like to still watch movies using my favorite platform, Linux Mint, and tools built in it. Thanks for listening and being there. You guys have done a marvelous job.

matti
"Migrating Windows users to Mint, one senior at a time."

[srkelley]

It's not so much the drm that bugs me. It's the fact that Microsoft and Novell are working on this together and they release Moonlight in a state that is always inferior to the current Silverlight version. Microsoft has the source to Silverlight! Novell is bringing them linux expertise! It may not be easy to produce something to run on every distro, but they could just produce it to lsb standards. I believe that they are, but I haven't checked their proper sites in a while. It's not great that a service like Netflix checks the os and then tells you that you can't use the service you're paying for because they don't like something about it. At worse we should get a screen that says "You're experience may not be optimal due to the current state of Moonlight", then stream. I know that they wouldn't phrase it like that, but something similar to that should happen.