Alien Pastures

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Tag: drm (Page 1 of 3)

LibreWolf is now in my Slackware repository

April 28, 2025 / / 14 Comments

Resulting from a request in one of my other blog pages, I have added a Slackware (15.0 and -current, 32bit as well as 64bit) package for LibreWolf.

The LibreWolf version number “137.0.2–1” is a combination of the version of Firefox on which the release is based, and the release iteration of the LibreWolf developer community.

LibreWolf is a custom and independent fork of the Mozilla Firefox browser, with the primary goals of privacy, security and user freedom.

The LibreWolf browser implements sane defaults for increased protection against tracking and fingerprinting techniques, and adds security improvements compared to its Firefox upstream codebase. All telemetry, data collection and other annoyances that come with the Firefox browser have been disabled or removed altogether.
By default, DRM is disabled as well because Digital Rights Management is considered restrictive towards consumers of digital media. You can however enable DRM in the browser settings if you want to watch DRM-protected video content for instance.

One thing to be aware of if you start using LibreWolf is that by default, your cookies and browsing history are deleted every time you close the browser. This behavior can be disabled in the browser settings.

Firefox Sync is disabled by default in Librewolf – again for the sake of protecting your privacy, but this too can be enabled in the browser’s settings.

LibreWolf is on par with other browsers like Brave and Tor Browser when it comes to the level of privacy protection they offer to you, the user. Another comparison: Brave browser is based on Chromium whereas Tor Browser, like LibreWolf, is a fork of Firefox.

I hope that this additional choice of browser in Slackware offers some benefit to you. Note that my package contains natively compiled Slackware binaries. There’s also a LibreWolf entry on SlackBuilds.org but that one merely re-packages a binary AppImage, not specifically built on (or for) Slackware.

Let me know if I missed some feature or functionality when configuring and building the source code. You can find the packages in my repository or any of its mirrors:

Enjoy! Eric

Chromium 83 – packages for Slackware, news about Widevine plugin

May 22, 2020 / / 16 Comments

chromium_iconThe COVID-19 crisis caused Google to change its release calendar for the Chromium browser sources, and they decided to skip the 82 release altogether, in order to focus on keeping the 81.x versions as safe as possible while working on their upcoming 83 release.
And so this week, Chromium 83.0.4103.61 was introduced to the “Stable Channel” with lots of bugs fixed, of which 38 are security fixes. There’s also a lot of new and improved features which are introduced in this release but it seems that many of those are only available in Google’s official Chrome binaries.
One of the notable changes for Chromium users (as opposed to Google Chrome users for which it has always worked this way) is that the Widevine content decryption module is now an official component of the browser. Like with Mozilla Firefox, the Chromium browser will now automatically download the Widevine library into your personal profile and enable access to DRM-protected content. In the URL “chrome://components/” you’ll see Widevine listed as a component, displaying its current version and a “Check for update” button.

Slackware packages for Chromium 83.0.4103.61 are in my package repository already. They are available as 32bit and 64bit versions for both Slackware 14.2 and -current.

Note that because of the changed status of Widevine, a separate “chromium-widevine-plugin” package containing the Widevine DRM library is no longer required. However…
It seems that there is an issue with the online availability of a 32bit Widevine library of the version that Chromium tries to download. As long as that is not fixed and only if you are using the 32bit Chromium browser, keep using my “chromium-widevine-plugin” please.

You can test whether Widevine works on https://bitmovin.com/demos/drm and validating that the page says “Detected using Widevine” and not “Detected NO DRM“). If you can not immediately get Widevine to work with your 32-bit browser, check that the content of the file in your Chromium profile “${HOME}/ .config/chromium/WidevineCdm/latest-component-updated-widevine-cdm” points to the installed location of the chromium-widevine package, like this:

alien@darkstar:~/.config/chromium/WidevineCdm$ cat latest-component-updated-widevine-cdm 
{"Path":"/usr/lib/chromium/WidevineCdm"}

In the profile of a 64-bit browser you will see instead something like this:

alien@darkstar:~/.config/chromium/WidevineCdm$ cat latest-component-updated-widevine-cdm 
{"Path":"/home/alien/.config/chromium/WidevineCdm/4.10.1610.0"}

For newcomers: Widevine is a Content Decryption Module (CDM) used by companies like Netflix and Disney+ to stream video to your computer in a Chromium browser window.

Also note (to the purists among you): even though support for Widevine CDM plugin has been built into my chromium package, that package is still built from Open Source software only. If you do not want theWidevine DRM library to be downloaded at all, you will have to recompile the chromium package after setting “USE_CDM=0” in the chromium.SlackBuild script. This can not be disabled at run-time.

Chromium packages: https://slackware.nl/people/alien/slackbuilds/chromium/ (rsync://slackware.nl/mirrors/people/alien/slackbuilds/chromium/)
Widevine packages: https://slackware.nl/people/alien/slackbuilds/chromium-widevine-plugin/ (rsync://slackware.nl/mirrors/people/alien/slackbuilds/chromium-widevine-plugin/)

Disney+ finally works on Linux!

December 5, 2019 / / 10 Comments

A little more than three weeks after the new Disney+ movie streaming service went officially live, the Disney company has added Linux support to their Widevine DRM protection. No more “Error 83”. No more need to install the Windows version of Chrome in Wine. Watching your favorite movies is now possible in the native Linux browsers – both Mozilla and Google based. Firefox will download the Widevine CDM (content delivery module) automatically, Chrome has the support built-in and for my Chromium package and other Chromium-based browsers you;ll have to install my chromium-widevine-plugin package.

I guess that a sufficiently large group of Linux enthusiasts have been complaining. And with success!

Enjoy! Eric

No Disney+ on Linux

November 10, 2019 / / 13 Comments

With the new version 4.10.1582.1 of the Widevine DRM plugin package for Chromium that I uploaded today (chromium-widevine-plugin) I really hoped that this would fix the playback error on Linux of the new Disney+ streaming service.

As you may know, Disney is preparing for the official launch of its movie streaming service this week tuesday, 12 November. But we in the Netherlands could enjoy a free test period of two months before the go-live and so I watched several episodes of the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. series and the Captain Marvel movie, casting from my phone at first but now via an official app on my smart TV. The bad performance of the app and frequent freezes of the video streams have largely been taken care of and fixed during the test period. If you are a fan of the Disney and Fox movie portfolio or enjoy the Marvel and Star Wars movies, then I guess this new platform is for you. It’s still rather limited in scope of course.

Worse in my opinion is the fact that Disney did the Linux community a disservice. The streaming of video does not work – on any browser. The web site works fine, you can browse and explore, but video playback is not possible and an annoying “Error 83” appears instead.

I had subscribed to Disney+ for the free trial straight away on day one. My son was very pleased with that… and when I noticed that their site would not work on my Linux desktop and laptop I assumed this was a beta issue and that it would get fixed. But then the weeks passed and nothing changed.
First online reports of the Linux incompatibility were reported by a dutch Fedora packager. Another dutch tweaker found out that this is caused by a too restricted setting of the DRM for Disney+. Disney uses Widevine as its DRM provider, just like Netflix, Amazon and others. But they cranked up the security level to a value which is not supported on the Linux platform – although it works just fine on Android.

By now the Disney+ streaming service is about to become available world-wide… and Linux support still has not been fixed. My advice is to refuse to pay for a subscription and instead file complaints with Disney that they ignore a large chunk of potential customer base.

Go and write a letter of complaint and make the Linux fans be heard!

Eric

Chromium 68 with updated Widevine plugin

August 4, 2018 / / 11 Comments

chromium_iconLast week, Chromium 68 was introduced to the “Stable Channel” with lots of bugs fixed, many of those being security fixes (42 in total). And a few days ago an update was released, so I decided to build Chromium 68 for Slackware.

NOTE: starting with Chromium 68, the browser will show a “Not secure” warning on all HTTP pages. Google announced this in a blog post published on February 8th on Google’s Chromium and Online Security blogs.

You’ll find 32bit as well as 64bit packages for Chromium 68.0.3440.84 in my package repository. They are available for both Slackware 14.2 and -current. I have also updated the Chromium Widevine plugin to version 1.4.9.1088. The older version refused to work with Chromium 68. Note that the Widevine plugin is available for 32bit just as for the 64bit browser, so even those running older computers (or those of you who are in need of a 32bit OS) can enjoy DRM movie playback.

For newcomers: Widevine is a Content Decryption Module (CDM) used by Netflix to stream video to your computer in a Chromium browser window. With my chromium and chromium-widevine-plugin packages you no longer need Chrome (or Firefox if you dislike that browser), to watch Netflix.

Also note (to the purists among you): even though support for Widevine CDM plugin has been built into my chromium package, that package is still built from Open Source software only. As long as you do not install the chromium-widevine-plugin package, your system will not be tainted by closed-source code.

Chromium packages: https://slackware.nl/people/alien/slackbuilds/chromium/ (rsync://slackware.nl/mirrors/people/alien/slackbuilds/chromium/)
Widevine packages: https://slackware.nl/people/alien/slackbuilds/chromium-widevine-plugin/ (rsync://slackware.nl/mirrors/people/alien/slackbuilds/chromium-widevine-plugin/)

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