The easiest way to rip DVDs ever.

I like to back up my DVDs for ease of watching on my computer. This was hindered when I switched to Linux, as I had no idea how to do it on Linux. Now, after a while, I have come up with the exact perfect way to rip DVDs.

This guide assumes you have done nothing to begin. (I think! I’ve done a lot to my computer, so no guarantees!)

Step 1: Enable DVD Playback

• Add the Medibuntu repository to get libdvdcss2. [link]
• now, install libdvdcss2 from medibuntu and libdvdread3.
• now, open a terminal and run ‘sudo /usr/share/doc/libdvdread3/install-css.sh’ That enables the DVD playback.
• Download the Handbrake CLI from [here]. Make sure to get the Linux one. Extract it to some folder. Your home directory will work just fine.
• Now you should be ready.

Step 2: Ripping. (this is the one you do every time you want to rip a DVD)

• Insert the DVD. If a movie player comes up, close it.
• Go to a terminal. Run ‘./HandBrakeCLI -i /media/cdrom0/ -o DesiredFileName.mp4’. This assumes that Handbrake is extracted to your home directory and you are in your home directory. Also it assumes your DVD drive is on /media/cdrom0/. I t may be cdrom, or something else. I only tested it by myself. Put your desired filename (plus .mp4 at the end), as the final argument.

This uses the Default Handbrake preset. It’s pretty quick, comes out to 700mb-1.3gb, with excellent quality. It should autocrop as well. For other presets and advanced options, see the documentation. I personally like the default. If you have an ipod, there are presets for that as well so it will play better and at a smaller size on it.

Each rip takes a while, depending on your processor. My Intel Core2 Duo 2.0gHz laptop can rip a movie in about half an hour. YMMV.

This happens to take around half the time of doing this the easiest way I found on Windows.

Daniel

Suspend!

Finally, I got the courage to test suspend and hibernate under Hardy. I am rejoiced to announce that it works better!

My previous issues stemmed from the ATI graphics card in my computer. Suspend worked perfectly, except the screen wouldn’t turn back on…

Now, when I suspend it works perfectly (albeit a bit ugly). It restores great. Suspend is all I ever used anyways, so I am overjoyed. Hibernate still dies miserably, eventually returning me to the screen mostly unharmed, but not turning off.

Overall, I am happy. Now if only I can figure out how to get the open-source driver working (although this isn’t too bad).

No more msttcorefonts!

It seems that one of the first things many ‘Ubuntu for Windoze users’ tutorials include installing msttcorefonts, the Microsoft fonts.

Don’t do it.

You will be amazed at how much better the Internet looks when there is no Comic Sans, no Arial. Arial is really a quite ugly font, you know?

Still need them for some reason? I do, because all of my papers for school needed to be written in Times New Roman. That is no longer an issue, thanks to the Liberation fonts. It’s a set of Liberation Sans, Liberation Serif, and Liberation Mono. They are almost identical, in size and style, to Arial, Times New Roman, and Courier New, the only fonts that you should ever need from msttcorefonts. As a bonus, the fonts are open-source, and available with a simple apt-get ttf-liberation.

Good Riddance to msttcorefonts.

WordPress hates apt:// URLS. Just ‘sudo apt-get ttf-liberation’.)