The latest VLC 2 (Video Lan Client) got support for MPRIS v2 dbus which means it can use the Ubuntu Sound Menu and the GNOME Shell Mediaplayer extension. However this isn't enabled by default. In this guide I will show you how to integrate VLC with Unity.
Here is how the Sound Menu looks like without VLC. Only Rythmbox is present, the default music player of Ubuntu.
Open VLC and go to Tools > Preferences, select "All" under "Show settings", navigate to Interface > Control Interface and check the box next to "D-Bus control interface".
Save your changes and restart VLC. Here is how the Sound Menu looks like now. You can see the album covert and there are play/stop/audio controls for VLC.
Unfortunatelly if you want to revert the changes you can't just untick the D-Bus control interface check box. Open a terminal and type:
sudo apt-get install dconf-tools
Now run dconf-editor and navigate to com > canonical > indicator > sound. There you will see a list with the interested media players. Remove VLC from the list and relogin into your account.
Of course in the same way you can remove any media player which is shown in Ubuntu Sound Menu such as Rythmbox, Banshee, Audacious, etc.
