Yes, 'mplayer -identify' will work, but it also tries to play the video.? Can I tell mplayer to simply display that same information, then exit (so I can capture the output into a file and right a Perl script to RIP the file correctly)? >> Can I assume that 'alang en' will always work right and select the english track? >No, as answered by someone else It wasn't answered in this thread. have to test each file. Then, I'd advise you to use existing scripts, with consequent userbase, because, even keeping inside DVD-Video specifications, you can have to encode many different kind of input. Point me to the existing scripts.? Thank you.