I am generally very wary of suggesting the use of 3rd party repositories. I rarely, if ever, use them myself, even if it’ll make installing an application a bit simpler. The bottom line for this is that I want my machine to be as supported as it can be, so I generally only use the official Ubuntu repositories (main restricted universe multiverse). Adding this repository will add unsupported packages to your system, but it is considered far more trusted than other repositories.

Medibuntu is the one repository that I find I can suggest to people, and this solves most all of the non-free issues people have. Everything from DVD playback to non-free codecs–even Google Earth!

A breakdown of what is available via Medibuntu:

• Non-Free Media Codecs (w32codecs, libdvdcss, etc)
• Acroread
• Google Earth
• RealPlayer
• Skype
• Popular Media Players without stripped codecs (amarok, xmms, mplayer, kaffeine, k3b)

Adding the Medibuntu Repo

To add the Medibuntu repository we’ll need to grab the sources.list available there. Note: the following is for Ubuntu 7.10 “Gutsy”. Replace gutsy.list with feisty.list, etc for your version:

sudo wget http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/gutsy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list

We’ll also need the key in order to validate the packages as they come in:

wget -q http://packages.medibuntu.org/medibuntu-key.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add - && sudo apt-get update

Installing Packages

So the heavy lifting is now done, now for a few examples of adding some of these codecs or applications.

To install DVD playback use:

sudo aptitude install libdvdcss2

To install non-free codec support:

sudo aptitude install w32codecs

(w64codecs for 64bit, ppc-codecs for PPC architecture)

More documentation is available at the Ubuntu Community Medibuntu Wiki.

Installation via apturl

If you’ve added the repository in the above step you can now install any of the below by clicking on the link. These will install from the Medibuntu repository ONLY if you’ve configured them as above. These packages are not distributed or downloaded from my servers:

Adobe Reader – Adobe’s PDF Reader

Adobe Reader Plugins – Ability to complete fillable forms

Adobe Mozilla Plugin – Adobe Plugin for Firefox, Galeon, Konqueror

Google Earth – Google Earth : Explore, Search and Discover

Win32 Codecs – nonfree media playback (wma, realplayer, quicktime)

Amarok – The popular media player + mp3/mp4 integration

Skype – VOIP with Skype

ffmpeg – Multimedia player, server and encoder (mp3,mp4,h264,amr support)

Ubuntu Restricted Extras

You may also want to read my previous, Installing Ubuntu Restricted Extras for a wider list of the packages that are not installed by default.

Disclaimer: These are not in base Ubuntu for a reason. Either they are patent encumbered or not free software.

Patent and copyright laws operate differently depending on which country you are in. Please obtain legal advice if you are unsure whether a particular patent or restriction applies to a media format you wish to use in your country.