JavaFx MediaPlayer “Could not create player!” error in Ubuntu 14.04

Question

I have installed Ubuntu 14.04 and i\'m getting an error when i instantiate a MediaPlayer.

package mediatest;

import java.io.File;
import javafx.application.         


        

Answer 1

You can manually install the required version of av libraries downloading them from http://www.ubuntuupdates.org/. Search for packages libavutil51, libavformat53, libavcodec53

Download the ones matches the architecture of your JVM and use sudo dpkg -i libav*.deb to install them.

Answer 2

Ubuntu 14 isn't (currently) a supported configuration for Java 8, maybe it will work, maybe it won't (Ubuntu 12 and 13 are supported). Also, do you have the right libraries installed? That it works with VLC, doesn't matter. For Linux, the requirements for Java media are listed in the supported configurations document:

You must install GLIB 2.28 in order to run JavaFX Media.

You must install the following in order to support AAC audio, MP3 audio, H.264 video, and HTTP Live Streaming:

libavcodec53 and libavformat53 on Ubuntu Linux 12.04 or equivalent.

• VP6 video support does not require any third party modules.
• On Linux platforms, installing libavformat automatically causes libavcodec to be installed.

Also, MP4 is just a container format and not all MP4 files are created equal. You need to ensure that in addition to the container type being used, that the media inside the encoder conforms to a supported encoding type and that you are accessing the media using a supported protocol.

If you have some non-ubuntu machine (e.g. a Windows or OS X machine), try running your application to play back your media using that (just to see if your issue is specific to your runtime installation or - if that didn't work - it is likely related to the encoding you are using rather than the runtime).

Answer 3

I had the same issue on Ubuntu 14.04, it seems that the latest version of javaFx which comes with the jdk 8 doesn't recognize libavcodec54 (which comes shipped with Ubuntu 14.04)

To be able to use video: Install the latest version of oracle (8u40) from the Oracle website.

Steps:

1. Download the latest Jdk version for your system from (http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/jdk8-downloads-2133151.html)

2. Decompress the file to /usr/lib/jvm

   tar -xvf jdk-8u40-linux-[arch_type].tar.gz
   mv jdk-8u40 /usr/lib/jvm

3. Set the current java version with:

   update-alternatives --config java
   update-alternatives --config javac

To see more details on the bug see: https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8094633