Handbrake can also rip dvds, if you give it the external libraries needed to decode them. The UI is great for finding the track with the actual movie and pulling in all the audio tracks and subtitles you want.
I have used this in the past, but I've never been able to get the subtitles to sync up properly. Typically they're copied over, but the first subtitle will start as soon as the video starts (as opposed to when the first spoken words start) and end when the video ends, with all the rest of the subtitles spaced out apparently according to the correct proportions, just at the wrong times.
I've tried fiddling around with when the subtitles should start, but because the subtitles end up stretched out so much, that makes all the later subtitles wrong. And I'm typically ripping a bunch of TV shows, so I want to do as little manual work as possible for each episode, because that all adds up quickly.
Do you know if I'm missing a library or a setting somewhere? Maybe I just need to try again with the latest version and see if it's been fixed over time.
HandBrake requires a patched version of libavcodec/libavformat libraries. Some Linux distributions like to link it to their system libavcodec/libavformat versions, and this breaks many things, DVD subtitles too.
However, if you are using a version that's linked with the right libraries, it's probably a bug that should be reported.
Subtitles are an issue because even if they're "correct" from source (as a synced track) they often have other issues, raw subtitles are still very much YMMV (Your Mileage May Vary).
If you care enough about subtitles and are converting for future reference then it's worth using SubtitleEdit to correct | align | correct case | spell check | generate translations | etc and then merge final (video + audio) tracks from HB with SubtitleTracks using (say) MKV Toolnix.
These are tools that can be streamlined and batched (with some degree of learning curve).
> so I want to do as little manual work as possible for each episode
I typically transcode Audio+Video, seperate out subtitles automatically along with "most common least destructive" touchups scripted and then watch.
You can achieve this by dropping input file in a watched folder and having the results plopped out in a "to be viewed" folder.
Most of the time everything is A-OK .. when the syncing is out I correct it via SubtitleEdit and continue watching.
You can save Episode.mkv and Episode.srt together, or batch bind the srt into the mkv as you store OR you can go to town with multiple subtitles if you're a media meta data nerd.
Check out Subtitle Speech Synchronizer [1]. This uses speech recognition to listen to the audio track, and make whatever corrections to the subtitles, outputting it as a .srt file. Works great.
Additionally, vobcopy (with those libraries you've mentioned) is a great CLI video dvd ripper to clone the top level directory tree to disk rather than immediately transcode. I've used it many times to save old family DVD video stuff. From disk I can transcode it into modern formats with tools like Handbrake or Avidemux, depending on the recipient's needs.
I've tried fiddling around with when the subtitles should start, but because the subtitles end up stretched out so much, that makes all the later subtitles wrong. And I'm typically ripping a bunch of TV shows, so I want to do as little manual work as possible for each episode, because that all adds up quickly.
Do you know if I'm missing a library or a setting somewhere? Maybe I just need to try again with the latest version and see if it's been fixed over time.