If the path of the video file contains spaces, then vlc doesn't load the subtitles file found in the same directory as it is supposed to. The reason of the problem seems to be the value of the field Exec in the file /usr/share/applications/vlc.desktop. Currently it is "vlc %U" which means that file paths are converted to URL's and apparently spaces encoded as %20 confuse vlc. One workaround is to change Exec to "vlc %F". Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Create a video file called "foo bar.avi" 2. Create a subtitle file called "foo bar.srt" 3. Double click the video file Actual Results: If you right click on the image area, there will be no option to select subtitles in the context menu. Emerge info: Portage 2.1.4.4 (default/linux/x86/2008.0, gcc-4.1.2, glibc-2.6.1-r0, 2.6.24-gentoo-r8 i686) ================================================================= System uname: 2.6.24-gentoo-r8 i686 Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU T7300 @ 2.00GHz Timestamp of tree: Thu, 14 Aug 2008 01:34:01 +0000 app-shells/bash: 3.2_p33 dev-java/java-config: 1.3.7, 2.1.6 dev-lang/python: 2.5.2-r6 sys-apps/baselayout: 1.12.11.1 sys-apps/sandbox: 1.2.18.1-r2 sys-devel/autoconf: 2.13, 2.61-r2 sys-devel/automake: 1.5, 1.7.9-r1, 1.8.5-r3, 1.9.6-r2, 1.10.1 sys-devel/binutils: 2.18-r3 sys-devel/gcc-config: 1.4.0-r4 sys-devel/libtool: 1.5.26 virtual/os-headers: 2.6.23-r3 ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="x86" CBUILD="i686-pc-linux-gnu" CFLAGS="-march=prescott -O2 -pipe -fomit-frame-pointer" CHOST="i686-pc-linux-gnu" CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/kde/3.5/env /usr/kde/3.5/share/config /usr/kde/3.5/shutdown /usr/share/config" CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/env.d /etc/env.d/java/ /etc/fonts/fonts.conf /etc/gconf /etc/revdep-rebuild /etc/terminfo /etc/texmf/web2c /etc/udev/rules.d" CXXFLAGS="-march=prescott -O2 -pipe -fomit-frame-pointer" DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles" FEATURES="distlocks metadata-transfer sandbox sfperms strict unmerge-orphans userfetch" GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://ftp.ndlug.nd.edu/pub/gentoo/ ftp://ftp.ndlug.nd.edu/pub/gentoo/ " LANG="en_US.utf8" LDFLAGS="-Wl,-O1" MAKEOPTS="-j3" PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages" PORTAGE_RSYNC_OPTS="--recursive --links --safe-links --perms --times --compress --force --whole-file --delete --stats --timeout=180 --exclude=/distfiles --exclude=/local --exclude=/packages" PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp" PORTDIR="/usr/portage" PORTDIR_OVERLAY="/usr/local/portage" SYNC="rsync://192.168.1.2/gentoo-portage" USE="X aac acl acpi alsa avahi bash-completion berkdb bluetooth bzip2 cairo cdr cli cracklib crypt cups curl dbus dri dvd dvdr esd exif fam fbcon firefox flac fortran gdbm gif gnome gnome-keyring gpm gtk hal howl iconv ipv6 isdnlog java jpeg jpeg2k kerberos ldap libedit libnotify libsamplerate mad matroska midi mmx mp3 mudflap musepack musicbrainz ncurses networkmanager nls nntp nptl nptlonly nsplugin ocaml ogg opengl openmp pam pcre perl png ppds pppd pulseaudio python readline reflection samba session spell spl sqlite sqlite3 sse sse2 ssl svg sysfs tcpd tetex threads tiff truetype unicode v4l v4l2 vcd vorbis wavpack wifi x264 x86 xinerama xml xorg xv xvid zlib" ALSA_CARDS="hda-intel" ALSA_PCM_PLUGINS="adpcm alaw asym copy dmix dshare dsnoop empty extplug file hooks iec958 ioplug ladspa lfloat linear meter mmap_emul mulaw multi null plug rate route share shm softvol" APACHE2_MODULES="actions alias auth_basic authn_alias authn_anon authn_dbm authn_default authn_file authz_dbm authz_default authz_groupfile authz_host authz_owner authz_user autoindex cache dav dav_fs dav_lock deflate dir disk_cache env expires ext_filter file_cache filter headers include info log_config logio mem_cache mime mime_magic negotiation rewrite setenvif speling status unique_id userdir usertrack vhost_alias" ELIBC="glibc" INPUT_DEVICES="keyboard mouse synaptics" KERNEL="linux" LCD_DEVICES="bayrad cfontz cfontz633 glk hd44780 lb216 lcdm001 mtxorb ncurses text" USERLAND="GNU" VIDEO_CARDS="nvidia nv vesa fbdev" Unset: CPPFLAGS, CTARGET, EMERGE_DEFAULT_OPTS, INSTALL_MASK, LC_ALL, LINGUAS, PORTAGE_COMPRESS, PORTAGE_COMPRESS_FLAGS, PORTAGE_RSYNC_EXTRA_OPTS
please report this upstream: https://trac.videolan.org/vlc I'm not sure if this is the right fix, vlc should accept url-encoded paths afaik
