How to install most used codecs in Linux

Common Codecs
These are the most common Codecs and are a good to have on you Linux system

Open Codecs
Most codecs have source code for them nowadays. Here is a fairly large, but very incomplete list. Most are not necessary for most users.

Binary Codecs

 * Download Binary codecs from mplayer's website
 * http://www.mplayerhq.hu/
 * binary codecs the common location for copying them is
 * /usr/local/lib/codecs
 * however some programs look for certain codes at
 * /usr/local/lib/win32
 * If you install prefix is /usr then the codecs should be copied
 * /usr/lib/codecs
 * /usr/lib/win32
 * The best way to cover all these cases is to copy all binary codecs to
 * /usr/lib/codecs
 * Then make symbolic links to the other directories
 * ln -s /usr/lib/codecs /usr/lib/win32
 * ln -s /usr/lib/codecs /usr/local/lib/win32
 * ln -s /usr/lib/codecs /usr/local/lib/codecs

Installing Codecs in Gentoo
To list all the codec library packages available in Gentoo To install the ones you want To install the binary packages described above To add the codecs to all installed programs
 * Execute: ls /usr/portage/media-libs/
 * or visit: Gentoo media-libs
 * Execute: emerge PACKAGE_NAME
 * Execute: emerge win32codecs
 * Edit /etc/make.conf
 * Edit the USE flag
 * Example: USE="quicktime real gif jpeg mpeg matroska xanim png tiff svg a52 aac exif mp3 ogg vorbis theora xpm wmf win32codecs x264 flac postscript xvid mad mp2 divx encode" #Media


 * Gentoo media-libs

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