How to install the MPEG-4 AAC decoder and the H.264 decoder in Ubuntu?

A digital audio encoding format called MPEG-4 Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) is used to compress audio files while preserving their high audio quality. It is a widely used audio compression format that adheres to the ISO/IEC MPEG-4 standard and is specified for use in a variety of audio and video applications, such as mobile devices, digital television, and internet streaming.

AAC is a lossy audio format, which means that in order to reduce the file size, some of the original audio data is lost during the encoding process. However, the quantity of data lost may be managed, and the audio quality that results, especially at higher bitrates, can be excellent.

Digital television, online streaming, and video conferencing are just a few of the applications that use the H.264 video encoding standard. It uses a lossy compression method, which means that some of the original video data are lost during encoding in order to reduce the file size.

Problem: 

When we newly install the Ubuntu operating system, we can immediately take advantage of its many features, such as its easy-to-use user interface and access to thousands of applications. However, you may encounter a problem in which video or multimedia is not playable. If you install the VLC media player but still you will get the problem because of the absence of the MPEG-4 AAC decoder and H.264 decoder. 

Solution:

To solve this issue, you must install two packages, namely libavcodec-extra and ubuntu-restricted-extras. Alternatively, you can install it from the Ubuntu software center. Installing these packages will add the necessary libraries and allow you to play various video formats. With libavcodec-extra and ubuntu-restricted-extras installed, VLC should be able to play any media format it encounters. The process of installing the packages is fairly straightforward.

Step-by-step instructions:

Step 1: Open the Terminal on your ubuntu system

Step 2: Next, run the following Command:

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras

The Ubuntu Linux operating system comes with a set of software called Ubuntu Restricted Extras. It includes a selection of well-known programs and media codecs that, for reasons of legal or technological propriety, are not present in the standard Ubuntu installation.

Software like the Adobe Flash Player plugin, Microsoft TrueType fonts, and numerous media codecs like MP3 and H.264 are all part of the package. Due to licensing concerns, some codecs which are necessary to play specific types of audio and video files are not part of the standard Ubuntu installation.

Step 3: Enter the password and hit enter for authentication

Step 4: Try another command

sudo apt-get install libavcodec54 libav-tools ffmpeg

libavcodec54, libav-tools, and ffmpeg are all software libraries and tools that are used for working with audio and video data. They are open-source projects that provide a variety of functions for encoding, decoding, transcoding, and manipulating audio and video streams. libavcodec54 is a library of audio and video codecs that is part of the libav project. It includes a wide range of codecs for encoding and decoding various audio and video formats, such as H.264, MP3, and many others. libav-tools is a package of command-line tools that are part of the libav project. It includes a variety of tools for working with audio and video data, such as avconv, which is a command-line tool for transcoding audio and video streams. ffmpeg is also a command-line tool for working with audio and video data. It is a separate project from libav, but it includes many of the same codecs and features. ffmpeg is widely used for a variety of tasks, such as converting audio and video files from one format to another, creating video from still images, and much more.

Conclusion: 

In summary, these tools and libraries are useful for working with audio and video data and are often used for tasks such as transcoding, converting, and manipulating audio and video files. By installing the proper audio and video codecs, we are able to access multimedia content on our computers.