Computer media players have undergone tremendous changes in the past few decades. The number of extension types on media files has gone up allowing different formats for different kinds of media. Unfortunately, not every media player can stream digital data. One has to download codecs to decode such file formats.

Then, VideoLan Client (VLC) came along. VLC is a free software media player and multimedia framework created by the VideoLAN project. The VLC media player has different versions for different operating systems like Windows, MAC OS and Linux, thus, making it more portable than other media players available .

The good things about the VLC player are first, it allows the user to play damaged, incomplete, or unfinished downloaded content. Secondly, it can be installed or executed from a flash drive allowing more portability for the user. It also allows VLC downloads to personalize the VLC skins and to allow streaming capabilities of the player. The developers of the software also released a program to edit the skins for the player allowing more user-added interface.

This year, VideoLan has already released the latest version of the player named VLC 1.0.5. 
The newest version was released last January 31 and it is developed mostly by upgrading support for the 2009 Apple Remote and fixing the x264 problems for MAC and Windows users, respectively.

It also refurbished problems with the potential crashes displayed in previous versions on Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) and SubStation Alpha (SSA) decoders of the programs. The latest media player version also improved styles for subtitling SubRip format. It also included Malayalam, Macedonian and Nynorsk languages in its translation feature.

Like its predecessors, the latest media player released can use downloaded VLC skins depending on the users preference. Many VLC downloads are also available for features the user may like to add to his or her player.

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