[jessejlt]

My gfx class is streamed and archived for later viewing. The archived file formats are *.rm, which is Real media. I hate the idea of installing that application because I fear it will hijack all my other media, much like it does on a PC.
Do you know of any alternatives for the mac?

Thanks;
jesse ;-)

[Group51]

Originally posted by jessejlt:
My gfx class is streamed and archived for later viewing. The archived file formats are *.rm, which is Real media. I hate the idea of installing that application because I fear it will hijack all my other media, much like it does on a PC.
Do you know of any alternatives for the mac?

Thanks;
jesse ;-)

It doesn't hijack on the Mac.

[NeXTLoop]

Unfortunately there are no alternatives. RealOne is a locked in format that only Real can support. However, on the plus side, RealOne for the Mac doesn't hijack your media files like it does on the PC. Neither is it spyware or any of the other negative things the PC version is.

[Sod Off Sadr]

Just make sure you go through all the prefs settings and disable cookies etc.

[headbirth]

I thought VLC supported rm or is it ram that it supports?

[yukon]

Both VLC and MPlayer support realmedia formats, at least some of them. The problem is that they're using x86 binaries and reverse engeneered the method of communicating to these codecs. There is as of now only one realmedia codec available for PPC, it works in MPlayer, try a realmedia movie on MPlayer some time (you may need to drop it on the icon rather than the playlist). You might see it play, you probably won't hear audio (I don't believe that's available).

The only real way to play realmedia on OS X, use realplayer or an x86 emulator. sucks, huh? Don't support the format.

edit: it's hard to see audio, unless your synesthetic ;-)

[devrosx]

last mplayer/mencoder binary support all realvideo codecs....
lastbinary140604.zip

this is only binary not mplayer osx version but you can install realcodecs and copy mplayer into mplayer osx (replace MPlayer\ OS\ X\ 2.app/Contents/Resources/mplayer.app/Contents/MacOS/mplayer with new mplayer binary and install realcodecs)
gui and normally use mplayer osx with all reallaudio/video

and it's only for macosx 10.3. and better

[yukon]

Whoa, that's new, thanks

Seriously thanks, compiling these things on a stock OS X system isn't fun ;-)

[grobbins]

Originally posted by Sod Off Sadr:
Just make sure you go through all the prefs settings and disable cookies etc.

There is no particular reason to disable RealPlayer's cookies; they are typically used for restricting access to premium subscription content. You can see them on the Mac by looking inside ~/Preferences/com.RealNetworks.data/RealMediaSDK/cookies.txt.

Similarly, all of the Mac RealPlayer's default settings should show respect for normal user preferences and privacy. The player is a simple drag install, and all of the code is located inside the main application icon.

Alternative players might be able to play back some rm files, though using the actual free RealPlayer will give you access to RealAudio and RealVideo that is embedded in web pages as well, and won't adversely affect your use of QuickTime or Windows Media files.

[[APi]TheMan]

Originally posted by grobbins:
There is no particular reason to disable RealPlayer's cookies; they are typically used for restricting access to premium subscription content. You can see them on the Mac by looking inside ~/Preferences/com.RealNetworks.data/RealMediaSDK/cookies.txt.

Similarly, all of the Mac RealPlayer's default settings should show respect for normal user preferences and privacy. The player is a simple drag install, and all of the code is located inside the main application icon.

Alternative players might be able to play back some rm files, though using the actual free RealPlayer will give you access to RealAudio and RealVideo that is embedded in web pages as well, and won't adversely affect your use of QuickTime or Windows Media files.

If a website uses Windows Media or Real media content I don't visit that site or view that content. I should probably get over it, but I have been getting so spoiled with open source software over the last few years that the commercial software gets me worked up and angry. I don't even touch Netscape, Windows media, Real player, Microsoft Office, etc... Why do we have to rely on the open source developers to create bloat and nag-free software?

I never want to see a "Send me e-mail about related products and services" checkbox checked by default ever again. I don't want to have to go through two or three screens of registration and confirmation dialog boxes when I opt out just to get into an internet browser or media application.

Mplayer, VLC, OpenOffice... I love you.