Set default Ubuntu video player as VLC?

Question

Is there a way to globally set the default video player in Ubuntu 10.04 (and soon 10.10) to VLC? (unless you really think there is another, higher performance player, in which case do let me know)

Answer 1

• One way is to right click, say on an AVI file, select 'properties' and select the 'Open with' tab. Select VLC or add it and close properties. From then, all AVI files will be opened with VLS.

• For DVDs you can go to Panel menu > System > Preferences > Removable Drives and Media and go to the 'Multimedia' tab and change it from Totem.

Resource from Here

• Detailed Answer would be

1 Click the "System" menu at the top of the screen, then click "Preferences" and "Preferred Applications."

2 Click the "Multimedia" tab.

3 Click the drop-down menu and select "Custom."

4 Type "vlc %f" in the "Command" box.

5 Click "Close" to make VLC your default video player.

Resource from here

Answer 2

Another way is to set VLC-Player as default player for all your video files.

• Click the "System" menu at the top of the screen, then click "Preferences" and "Preferred Applications."
• Click the "Multimedia" tab.
• Click the drop-down menu and select "Custom."
• Type "vlc %f" in the "Command" box.
• Click "Close" to make VLC your default video player.

That´s how I did it according to this website. Worked for me ;-) But I guess subanki´s answer is more specific because it sets the player for the file extension.

Answer 3

According to: http://wiki.videolan.org/How_to_make_VLC_the_default_player

You can do the following:

1. Go to /usr/share/applications/ and find the following two files
   • defaults.list
   • mimeinfo.cache
2. Change all "totem.desktop" to "vlc.desktop"

I personally copied all the totem.desktop lines to ~/.local/share/applications/mimeapps.list and then search and replaced all to "vlc.desktop".

Please note that the format to copy is:

[MIME Type]=[Name of the Desktop Entry file]