If you’ve ever wanted an alternative to Windows Media Player, then VideoLAN Client (VLC) is what you want.
VLC is a media player, streamer, and encoder for Unix, Windows, Mac OS X, BeOS, QNX, and PocketPC. It can play most audio and video codecs (MPEG 1/2/4, DivX, WMV, Vorbis, AC3, AAC, etc.), has support for VCD, SVCD, and DVD (with menus), and can read or dump streams from a network source (HTTP, UDP, DVB, MMS, etc). It can also act as a server and send streams through a network, with optional support for audio and video transcoding.
You can find more information on VideoLAN Client at http://www.videolan.org. Downloads, feature details and more screenshots are also listed there.
Apple has acknowledged it has problems with the video software used in the latest shipment of MacBooks and MacBook Pros.
Early customers of the Penryn refresh of the Apple notebooks had complained of flickering images during a QuickTime video playback on MacBooks and MacBook Pros shipping with the latest version of Mac OS X Leopard, according to our colleagues over at MacFixIt.
Several discussion threads have sprung up over on Apple’s user forums, and some customers report that Apple has now acknowledged the problem and is working on a fix.
MacFixIt reports that fix should come with Mac OS X 10.5.3, currently in the works. AppleInsider has reported that Apple has been a little more active than usual with the release of new builds of 10.5.3 to developers, suggesting that the next version might arrive sooner rather than later. Mac OS X 10.5.2 was shipped in February.
Apple has issued an update for the Mac and Windows versions of QuickTime.
The update addresses 11 vulnerabilities in the multimedia player software, nine of which could be exploited by an attacker to remotely execute code on a target system.
All the flaws affect Windows XP and Vista systems. Eight of the vulnerabilities also affect the Mac OS X version of QuickTime.
Five remote code execution flaws could be exploited by way of specially-crafted movie files.
Such files could also be used to execute another flaw which allows for the launching of external URLs, which Apple said could allow for information disclosure.
Three of the flaws could be exploited by way of Pict files and used by an attacker for remote code execution.
The remaining two flaws include a remote code execution flaw in the handling of QuickTime VR files and a flaw which could allow Java applets to obtain elevated privileges.
The QuickTime update can be obtained via Apple’s Software Update utility or at the Apple Downloads site.
