trying to install netflix desktop in Linux Mint

[dantheman876]

I cannot install netflix desktop in Linux Mint. It want me to add ppa's. I never had a problem adding ppa's in Ubuntu but when I switched to Mint every time I add a ppa and run a apt-get update I get error messages like this one for example:

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/pipelight/stab ... ce/Sources 404 Not Found

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/pipelight/stab ... 4/Packages 404 Not Found

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/pipelight/stab ... 6/Packages 404 Not Found

E: Some index files failed to download. They have been ignored, or old ones used instead.

any help would be much appreciated.

[killer de bug]

yes the address of the ppa is obviously wrong. You are missing clearly the name of the release in the address.
Could you please post here the result of

Code: Select all

inxi -r

[gary428509]

TO INSTALL NETFLIX IN LINUX SIMPLY INSTALL GOOGLE CHROME 37 OR LATER.

[killer de bug]

Stay calm. No need to shout.

[Havrebollen]

Did you get netflix desktop to work in Mint? I prefered the method of using chromium with editing the user agent string which works like a charm.

[gary428509]

Yes I got Netflix to work in Linux Mint even easier. Install Google Chrome then install Netflix directly into the browser. This will only work in Google Chrome however because Google Chrome now uses HTML5 and EME which is an equivalent of DRM. Now no more Terminals or complicated hacks are needed. Try it. You'll be pleasantly surprised.

[oldgranola]

gary,
Could you please post details? I installed chromium via the app manager and tried with and without specifying the user agent and couldn't get it to work. Netflix still wants drm and it doesn't look like there is anything for that in chromium for linux that I can see.

However, I do have a netflix desktop app that uses mozilla and it works fine. I think its a wine/silverlight implementation but I don't remember doing anything fancy. I wish I had kept the instructions handy....

[oldgranola]

OK I got it done. Garyxxx left out some details.
1st you have to use google chrome beta or dev not the very nice open source chromium for linux available from your app manager. Download the file 64bit or 32 and install using gdebi or whatever by double clicking on it. https://www.google.com/chrome/browser/beta.html
2nd optional? get the user agent switcher extension https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/user-agent-switcher-for-c/ . Right click on the user agent icon, I made a tag 'netflix' under chromium and used the string
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/41.0.2228.0 Safari/537.36 and tag "ie"
Switch to that user agent setting and went to netflix. I didn't have to change anything at netflix for plaback but I did read one might need to specify html5 from silverlight.

At first I didn't get a video but it appeard after a bit. probably detecting html5???

I'm testing both desktop app/mozilla vs chrome b beta to compare...unscientific

So it wasn't so simple to me as I wasted a lot of time trying to get stable chromium to work and finally stumbled on this website. http://www.webupd8.org/2014/08/how-to-enable-html5-playback-for.html . Don't follow their directions for for updating ubuntu just download google chrome beta as noted above after first making sure your LM17 mint is all up to date.
Cheers

[gary428509]

You guys are really over complicating this. I said Google Chrome not Chromium. Also you no longer need to select between Silverlight and HTML5 in the Netflix playback settings anymore. Now it is done automatically. Forget Wine forget Chromium.