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Modrinth App Linux Videos Not Working and Link Invocation Bug Report #6274

@aegeada

Description

@aegeada

Please confirm the following.

  • I checked the existing issues for duplicate problems
  • I have tried resolving the issue using the support portal
  • I have ensured my Modrinth App installation is up to date

What version of the Modrinth App are you using?

0.14.1

What operating systems are you seeing the problem on?

Linux

Describe the bug

Environment Details

OS: Linux (Ubuntu/Debian based, e.g., Linux Mint / Zorin OS)
Application Source: Flathub (Verified Official Release)
Application ID: com.modrinth.ModrinthApp
Application Version: 0.14.1 (Runtime: org.gnome.Platform/x86_64/49)
Default Browser: Zen Browser (and tested with Google Chrome)

The Problem

Primary Issue: Embedded Video Failure (Error 153): YouTube videos embedded via markdown on mod/modpack description pages completely fail to play inside the app, throwing: "Error 153: Video player configuration error". The primary expectation is for these videos to play directly within the application. This failure is likely due to a missing codec or DRM support issue within the runtime's embedded Chromium webview.

Secondary Issue: Missing Video URL Data and Broken Fallback: When the embedded player crashes with Error 153, clicking "Watch on YouTube" or any fallback action does absolutely nothing. Right-clicking the text reveals a standard webview context menu (Open link, Copy link location, etc.), but selecting "Copy link location" only yields the generic root URL: "https://www.youtube.com/". This indicates that due to the player configuration error, the specific video ID/URL string is never successfully loaded or exposed to the webview interface, rendering all fallback link triggers useless.

Steps to reproduce

  1. Open the Modrinth App (Flathub version).

  2. Navigate to the "Discover content" section and select any mod or modpack that features an embedded YouTube video on its main description page (e.g., "Vanilla Perfected").

  3. Observe the embedded video player area immediately throwing "Error 153: Video player configuration error" instead of loading the video preview.

  4. Left-click on the "Watch on YouTube" link. Observe that it is completely unresponsive and no external browser opens.

  5. Right-click on the "Watch on YouTube" text, select "Copy link location", and paste it into a text editor. Observe that it only copies the root domain "https://www.youtube.com/" instead of the actual video URL.

Expected behavior

Embedded YouTube videos should play directly and seamlessly inside the Modrinth App UI without throwing configuration/codec errors.

If a video fails or if a user prefers an external view, a standard left-click on "Watch on YouTube" or any external link should successfully utilize the XDG desktop portal to trigger the host system's default web browser automatically.

Additional context

What Has Been Tested and Ruled Out (Troubleshooting Steps Taken)

We have thoroughly investigated the sandboxing and system side to ensure it is not a local misconfiguration. The following troubleshooting steps were taken but did not resolve the issue:

Sandbox Permissions Checked: Inspected via Flatseal. Notably, the "Talk" (D-Bus Bus Name) section for Modrinth is completely empty, indicating the package manifest does not request D-Bus communication flags for external invocation by default.

D-Bus and Portals Overridden: Explicitly granted portal and bus permissions using flatpak override commands for talk-name=org.freedesktop.portal.Desktop, socket=session-bus, and socket=fallback-x11. Despite these overrides, a left-click still fails to invoke the host browser.

XDG-Desktop-Portal Reinstalled: Reinstalled xdg-utils, xdg-desktop-portal, and xdg-desktop-portal-gtk, then restarted the portal service via systemctl user restart command. The issue persists.

Terminal Log Observation: Running the app directly via terminal shows zero log outputs, errors, or warnings when the "Watch on YouTube" button is left-clicked. The application layer fails to emit an external shell open request (such as shell.openExternal or window.open) to the host OS wrapper.

Browser Independent: The link redirection issue occurs regardless of whether the default browser is set to Chromium-based (Chrome) or Firefox-based (Zen Browser).

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