• Totem Movie Player Manual

Totem Movie Player Manual

1. Introduction

The Totem Movie Player application is a movie player for the GNOME desktop based on GStreamer framework and xine library, and enables you to play movies or songs.

Totem Movie Player provides the following features:

  • Support a variety of video and audio files.
  • Provide a variety of zoom levels and aspect ratios, and a fullscreen view.
  • Seek and Volume controls.
  • A playlist.
  • Complete keyboard navigation.

Totem Movie Player also comes with additional functionality such as:

  • Video thumbnailer for GNOME.
  • Nautilus properties tab.

2. Getting Started

2.1. To Start Totem Movie Player

You can start Totem Movie Player in the following ways:

Applications menu

Choose Sound & Video ▸ Movie Player.

Command line

To start Totem Movie Player from a command line, type the following command, then press Return:

totem

To view other command line options that are available, type totem --help, then press Return.

2.2. When You Start Totem Movie Player

When you start Totem Movie Player, the following window is displayed.

Figure 1 Totem Movie Player Start Up Window

The Totem Movie Player window contains the following elements:

Menubar.

The menus on the menubar contain all of the commands you need to use in Totem Movie Player.

Display area.

The display area displays the movie or a visualisation of the current song.

Sidebar.

The sidebar displays properties of the file played and acts as playlist. It can also be used by various plugins, such as the MythTV, YouTube and Video Search plugins.

Time elapsed slider.

The time elapsed slider displays the elapsed time of movie or song that is playing. It also enables you to skip forward or backward in a movie or song.

Seek control buttons.

The seek control buttons enables you to move to the next or previous track, and to pause or play a movie or song.

Volume slider.

The volume slider enables you to adjust the volume.

Statusbar.

The statusbar displays status information about the movie or song that is playing.

3. Usage

3.1. To Open a File

To open a video or an audio file, choose Movie ▸ Open (Ctrl+O). The Select Movies or Playlists dialogue is displayed. Select the file(s) you want to open, then click OK.

You can drag a file from another application such as a file manager to the Totem Movie Player window. The Totem Movie Player application will open the file and play the movie or song. Totem Movie Player displays the title of the movie or song in the titlebar of the window and in the playlist in the sidebar.

If you try to open a file format that Totem Movie Player does not recognize, the application displays an error message. This error is most often encountered if you do not have the correct codecs installed. Information on getting codecs working can be found on the Totem Movie Player website.

You can double-click on a video or an audio file in the Nautilus file manager to open it on the Totem Movie Player window.

3.2. To Open a Location

To open a file by URI location, choose Movie ▸ Open Location (Ctrl+L). The Open Location dialog is displayed. Use the drop-down combination box to specify the URI location of file you would like to open (it lists URIs which have previously been opened) – or type one in directly – then click on the Open button.

3.3. To Play a Movie (DVD, VCD or CD)

Insert the disc in your computer's optical drive, then choose Movie ▸ Play Disc.

3.4. To Eject a DVD, VCD or CD

To eject a DVD, VCD, or CD, choose Movie ▸ Eject (Ctrl+E).

3.5. To Pause a Movie or Song

To pause a movie or song that is playing, click on the button, or choose Movie ▸ Play / Pause (Ctrl+Space). You may also use the P key to pause or play a movie. When you pause a movie or song, the statusbar displays Paused and the time elapsed on the current movie or song stops.

To resume playing a movie or song, click on the button, or choose Movie ▸ Play / Pause (Ctrl+Space).

3.6. To View Properties of a Movie or Song

To view properties of a movie or song, choose View ▸ Sidebar to make the sidebar appear, and choose Properties in the drop-down list.

The dialogue contains the following information:

General

Title, artist, album, year and duration of the movie or song, as well as any embedded comment the movie or song has.

Video

Video dimensions, codec, framerate and bitrate.

Audio

Audio codec, channels, sample rate and bitrate.

3.7. To Seek Through Movies or Songs

To seek through movies or songs, you can use the following methods:

To skip forward

To skip forward a movie or song, choose Go ▸ Skip Forward (Right).

To skip backward

To skip backward a movie or song, choose Go ▸ Skip Backward (Left).

To skip to a time

To skip to a specific elapsed time in the movie or song, choose Go ▸ Skip to (Ctrl+K). The Skip to dialog is displayed. Use the spin box to specify the elapsed time (in seconds) to skip to, then click OK.

To move to the next movie or song

To move to the next movie or song, choose Go ▸ Next Chapter/Movie (Alt+Right) or click on the button.

To move to the previous movie or song

To move to the previous movie or song, choose Go ▸ Previous Chapter/Movie (Alt+Left), or click on the button.

3.8. To Change the Zoom Factor

3.8.1. To Change the Video Size

To change the zoom factor of the display area, you can use the following methods:

  • To zoom to fullscreen mode, choose View ▸ Fullscreen (F11). You can also use the F key to toggle fullscreen mode. To exit fullscreen mode, click on the Leave Fullscreen button or press Esc, F11 or F.
  • To zoom to half the size (50%) of the original movie or visualisation, choose View ▸ Fit Window to Movie ▸ Resize 1:2 (Ctrl+0).
  • To zoom to the size (100%) of the original movie or visualisation, choose View ▸ Fit Window to Movie ▸ Resize 1:1 (Ctrl+1).
  • To zoom to double the size (200%) of the original movie or visualisation, choose View ▸ Fit Window to Movie ▸ Resize 2:1 (Ctrl+2).

3.8.2. To Change the Video Aspect Ratio

To switch between different aspect ratios, choose View ▸ Aspect Ratio (A). The supported aspect ratios available are:

  • Auto
  • Square
  • 4:3 (TV)
  • 16:9 (Widescreen)
  • 2.11:1 (DVB)

The default aspect ratio is Auto.

3.9. To Adjust the Volume

To increase the volume, choose Sound ▸ Volume Up (Up) or move the volume slider to the right. To decrease the volume, choose Sound ▸ Volume Down (Down) or move the volume slider to the left.

To adjust the sound volume, you can also use the volume button. Press the volume button and choose the volume level with the slider.

3.10. To Make the Window Always On Top

To make the Totem Movie Player window always on top of other application windows, choose Edit ▸ Plugins. Select the Always on Top plugin to enable it. The Totem Movie Player window will now stay on top of all other windows while a movie is playing, but not while audio or visualisations are playing.

To stop the window always being on top, disable the Always on Top plugin again.

3.11. To Show or Hide Controls

To show or hide the Totem Movie Player window controls, choose View ▸ Show Controls (Ctrl+H), or press the H key. You can also right-click on the Totem Movie Player window, then choose Show Controls (Ctrl+H) from the popup menu.

If the Show Controls option is selected, Totem Movie Player will show the menubar, time elapsed slider, seek control buttons, volume slider and statusbar on the window. If the Show Controls option is unselected, the application will hide these controls and show only the display area.

3.12. To Manage the Playlist

3.12.1. To Show or Hide the Playlist

To show the playlist, choose View ▸ Sidebar, or click the Sidebar button, and choose Playlist on the top of the sidebar. The Playlist dialog is displayed.

To hide Playlist, choose View ▸ Sidebar or click on the Sidebar button again.

3.12.2. Manage a Playlist

You can use the Playlist dialogue to do the following:

To add a track or movie

To add a track or movie to the playlist, click on the Add button. The Select Movies or Playlists dialog is displayed. Select the file that you want to add to the playlist, then click Add.

To remove a track or movie

To remove a track or movie from the playlist, select the items to remove from the filename list box, then click on the Remove button.

To save the playlist to a file

To save the playlist to a file, click on the Save Playlist button. The Save Playlist dialog is displayed; specify the filename as which you want to save the playlist, and click Save.

To move a track or movie up the playlist

To move a track or movie up the playlist, select the item from the filename list box, then click on the Move Up button.

To move a track or movie down the playlist

To move a track or movie down the playlist, select the item from the filename list box, then click on the Move Down button.

3.12.3. To Select or Unselect Repeat Mode

To enable or disable repeat mode, choose Edit ▸ Repeat Mode.

3.12.4. To Select or Unselect Shuffle Mode

To enable or disable shuffle mode, choose Edit ▸ Shuffle Mode.

3.13. To Choose Subtitles

To choose the language of the subtitles, select View ▸ Subtitles and choose the subtitle language you want to display.

To disable the display of subtitles, select View ▸ Subtitles ▸ None.

By default, Totem Movie Player will choose the same language for the subtitles as the one you normally use on your computer.

Totem Movie Player will automatically load and display subtitles if the file which contains them has the same name as the video file played and the extension asc, txt, sub, smi, or ssa.

3.14. To Take a Screenshot

To take a screenshot of the movie or visualisation that is playing, choose Edit ▸ Take Screenshot. The Save Screenshot dialog is displayed. Choose a location and insert the filename as which you want to save the screenshot, then click the Save button to save the screenshot.

Totem Movie Player will display a preview of the screenshot which is to be saved on the left-hand side of the Save Screenshot dialog.

4. Preferences

To modify the preferences of Totem Movie Player, choose Edit ▸ Preferences. The Preferences dialogue contains the following tabbed sections:

4.1. General

Networking

Select network connection speed from the Connection speed drop-down list box.

TV-Out
  • No TV-out: select this option if you have no TV-out connection (Selected by default if you don't have an TV-out interface).
  • TV-out in fullscreen by Nvidia (NTSC): select this option if you want TV-out connection in NTSC.
  • TV-out in fullscreen by Nvidia (PAL): select this option if you want TV-out connection in PAL.
Text Subtitles
  • Font: select this option to change the font used to display subtitles.
  • Encoding: select this option to change the encoding used to display subtitles.

4.2. Display

Display

Select the resize option if you want Totem Movie Player to automatically resize the window when a new video is loaded.

Visual Effects
  • Visual: select this option to show visual effects while an audio file is playing.
  • Type of visualisation: select type of visualisation from the drop-down list box.
  • Visualisation size: select visualisation size from the drop-down list box.
Colour balance
  • Brightness: use the slider to specify the level of brightness.
  • Contrast: use the slider to specify the level of contrast.
  • Saturation: use the slider to specify the level of saturation.
  • Hue: use the slider to specify the level of hue.

4.3. Audio

Audio Output

Select audio output type from the Audio output type drop-down list.

5. About Totem Movie Player

Totem Movie Player is written by Bastien Nocera (), Julien Moutte () for GStreamer backend, and Guenter Bartsch (). To find more information about Totem Movie Player, please visit the Totem Movie Player Home Page.

To report a bug or make a suggestion regarding the Totem Movie Player application or this manual, follow the directions in the GNOME Feedback Page.

This program is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public licence as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the Licence, or (at your option) any later version. A copy of this licence can be found at this link, or in the file COPYING included with the source code of this program.