Copyright © 2002, 2003 the VideoLAN project
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation ; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts. The text of the license can be found in the appendix GNU Free Documentation License.
v2.0, 2003-09-04
Abstract
This document describes how to use the complete VideoLAN streaming solution.
Table of Contents
- 1. Introduction
- 2. Install the required software and hardware
- 3. Receive and save a stream
- 4. Stream a file
- 5. Stream a DVD
- 6. Stream a DVB channel (satellite or digital terrestial TV)
- 7. Stream from an MPEG encoding card
- 8. Stream from an acquisition card or a webcam
- 9. Advanced use of VLC's stream output (transcoding, multiple streaming, etc...)
- 10. Stream in IPv6
- 11. Video On Demand
- 12. Add a channel information service
- A. GNU Free Documentation License
- 1. PREAMBLE
- 2. APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS
- 3. VERBATIM COPYING
- 4. COPYING IN QUANTITY
- 5. MODIFICATIONS
- 6. COMBINING DOCUMENTS
- 7. COLLECTIONS OF DOCUMENTS
- 8. AGGREGATION WITH INDEPENDENT WORKS
- 9. TRANSLATION
- 10. TERMINATION
- 11. FUTURE REVISIONS OF THIS LICENSE
- 12. ADDENDUM: How to use this License for your documents
List of Figures
Table of Contents
VideoLAN is a complete software solution for video streaming, developed by students of the Ecole Centrale Paris and developers from all over the world, under the GNU General Public License (GPL). VideoLAN is designed to stream MPEG videos on high bandwidth networks.
The VideoLAN solution includes :
VLS (VideoLAN Server), which can stream MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 files, DVDs, digital satellite channels, digital terrestial television channels and live videos on the network in unicast or multicast,
VLC (initially VideoLAN Client), which can be used as a server to stream MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 files, DVDs and live videos on the network in unicast or multicast ; or used as a client to receive, decode and display MPEG streams under multiple operating systems.
Here is an illustration of the complete VideoLAN solution :
More details about the project can be found on the VideoLAN Web site.
VLC works on many platforms : Linux, Windows, Mac OS X, BeOS, *BSD, Solaris, Familiar Linux, Yopy/Linupy and QNX. It can read :
MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 / DivX files from a hard disk, a CD-ROM drive, ...
DVDs and VCDs,
from a satellite card (DVB-S),
MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 streams from the network sent by VLS or VLC's stream output.
VLC can also be used as a server to stream :
MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 / DivX files,
DVDs,
from an MPEG encoding card,
to :
one machine (i.e. to one IP address) : this is called unicast,
a dynamic group of machines that the clients can join or leave (i.e. to a multicast IP address) : this is called multicast,
in IPv4 or IPv6 .
To get the complete list of VLC's possibilities on each plateform supported, see the VLC features page.
Note
VLC doesn't work on Mac OS 9, and will probably never do.
VLS can stream :
an MPEG-1, MPEG-2 or MPEG-4 files stored on a hard drive or on a CD,
a DVD located in a local DVD drive or copied on a hard disk,
a satellite card (DVB-S) or a digital terrestial television card (DVB-T) ,
an MPEG encoding card ;
to:
one machine (i.e. to one IP address) : this is called unicast,
a dynamic group of machines that the clients can join or leave (i.e. to a multicast IP address) : this is called multicast,
in IPv4 or IPv6 .
A Pentium 100 MHz with 32 MB of memory should be enough to send one stream on the network. When streaming a lot of videos stored on a hard drive, the actual limitation is not the processor but the hard drive and the network connection.
VLS works under Linux and Windows. To get the complete list of VLS's possibilities on each plateform supported, see the streaming features page.
You can add a channel information service based on the SAP/SDP standard to the VideoLAN solution. The mini-SAP-server sends announces about the multicast programs on the network in IPv4 or IPv6, and VLCs receive these annouces and automatically add the programs announced to their playlist.
The mini-SAP-server works under Linux and Mac OS X.
To fully understand the VideoLAN solution, you must understand the difference between a codec and a container format
A codec is a compression algorithm, used to reduce the size of a stream. There are audio codecs and video codecs. MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, Vorbis, DivX, ... are codecs
A container format contains one or several streams already encoded by codecs. Very often, there is an audio stream and a video one. AVI, Ogg, MOV, ASF, ... are container formats. The streams contained can be encoded using different codecs. In a perfect world, you could put any codec in any container format. Unfortunately, there are some incompatibilities. You can find a matrix of possible codecs and container formats on the features page
To decode a stream, VLC first demuxes it. This means that it reads the container format and separates audio, video, and subtitles, if any. Then, each of these are passed decoders that do the mathematical processing to decompress the streams .
There is a particular thing about MPEG:
MPEG is a codec. There are several versions of it, called MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, ...
MPEG is also a container format, sometimes refered to as MPEG System. There are several types of MPEG: ES, PS, and TS
When you play an MPEG video from a DVD, for instance, the MPEG stream is actually composed of several streams (called Elementary Streams, ES): there is one stream for video, one for audio, another for subtitles, and so on. These different streams are mixed together into a single Program Stream (PS). So, the .VOB files you can find in a DVD are actually MPEG-PS files. But this PS format is not adapted for streaming video through a network or by satellite, for instance. So, another format called Transport Stream (TS) was designed for streaming MPEG videos through such channels.
The user documentation of VideoLAN is made up of 4 documents :
the VideoLAN Quickstart. This document will give you a quick overview of VLC, VLC's stream output, the Video On Demand solution and the channel information service system.
the VideoLAN HOWTO. This document is the complete guide of the VideoLAN streaming solution.
the VLC user guide. This document is the complete guide for VLC.
the VLS user guide. This document is the complete guide for VLS.
the VideoLAN FAQ. This document contains Frequently Asked Questions about VideoLAN.
The latest version of these documents can be found on the documentation page .
You can also have a look at the VideoLAN Wiki. This is a website that everyone can change. We use it to document everything that is not in the "official" documentation: the tips and tricks for each O.S., the graphical interfaces, etc...
If you have problems using VideoLAN, and if you don't find the answer to your problems in the documentation, please look at the online archive of the mailing-lists. There are two English-speaking mailing-lists for the users :
vlc@videolan.org for the questions on VLC ,
streaming@videolan.org for the questions on VLS, mini-SAP-server and the network .
If you want to subscribe or unsubscribe to the mailing-lists, please go to the mailing-list page.
You can also talk with VideoLAN users and developers on IRC : server irc.freenode.net, channel #videolan .
If you find a bug, please follow the instructions on the bug reporting page .
VLC has many different graphical interfaces, that are organized quite differently in order to be in harmony with the guidelines of each operating system supported. Documenting the use of each graphical interface is too long, and some features are only available via the command line interface. Therefore we decided to document only the command line interface, but in many cases it shoud be easy to guess how to use the graphical interface for the same use !
VLS has a command line and a telnet interface, but no graphical interface !
All the commands that show up in this document should be typed inside a terminal. .
Click on Start, Run and type :
cmd Enter (Windows 2000 / XP),
command Enter (Windows 95 / 98 / ME).
The terminal appears Le terminal apparait
Note
Under Windows, you need to be in the directory where the program is installed to run it.
Open a terminal :
In the documentation, we adopt the following conventions for the Unix commands :
commands that should be typed as root have a # prompt :
#command_to_be_typed_as_rootcommands that should be typed as a regular user have a % prompt :
%command_to_be_typed_as_regular_user
Go to Applications, open the folder Utilities and double-click on Terminal :
Note
Under Mac OS X, you need to be in the directory where the program is installed to run it, and start the command with ./ .
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There are VLC binaries available for the many OSes, but not for all supported OSes. If there are no binaries for your OS or if you want to change the default settings, you can compile VLC from sources.
VLC works under Windows 95/98/ME/2000/XP.
Download the self-extracting file from the VLC Windows
download page. Launch the .exe to install
VLC.
Download the Zip file from the VLC BeOS download page. Unzip the file in a directory to install VLC.
Download the Mac OS X package from the VLC
MacOS X download page . Double-click on the icon of the
package : an icon will appear on your Desktop, right beside your
drive(s). Open it and drag the VLC application from the resulting
window to the place where you want to install it (it should be
/Applications).
Add the following lines to your
/etc/apt/sources.list:
deb http://www.videolan.org/pub/videolan/debian $(ARCH)/ deb-src http://www.videolan.org/pub/videolan/debian sources/
Then, for a normal install, do:
#apt-get update#apt-get install gnome-vlc libdvdcss2
Add the following lines to your
/etc/apt/sources.list:
deb http://www.videolan.org/pub/videolan/debian $(ARCH)/ deb-src http://www.videolan.org/pub/videolan/debian sources/
Then, for a normal install, do:
#apt-get update#apt-get install wxvlc libdvdcss2
You should not be using Debian testing unless you perfectly know what you are doing. It is almost impossible to support Debian testing and there are no plans to do it. For more informations on Debian testing, please look: testing page
There are VLC packages for Mandrake 9.1 and cooker.
To install them, add the following sources for either Mandrake 9.1 or Cooker (you can use Easy urpmi for that): contrib from the core distribution and plf (Penguin Liberation Front) from the external add-ons.
Then install the required packages with urpmi:
#urpmi libdvdcss2 libdvdplay0 wxvlc vlc-plugin-a52 vlc-plugin-ogg vlc-plugin-mad
Download the RPM package vlc and the packages listed in the required libraries and codecs section (the other packages are just optional) from the VLC Red Hat download page and put them all into the same directory.
Then install the RPM packages you have downloaded:
#rpm -U *.rpm
If you have not installed all the RPM packages included with your distribution, you may be asked to install a few of them first.
The method below is for any Unix system supported by VLC, for which there is no packages available. It explains how to compile and install VLC and the needed libraries from their source code.
You can also compile VLC under Linux this way if you want to modify the default supported modules.
Many libraries are needed :
libdvbpsi (compulsory) ,
mpeg2dec (compulsory) ,
libdvdcss if you want to be able to read encrypted DVDs ,
libdvdplay if you want to have DVD menu navigation ,
a52dec if you want to be able to decode the AC3 (i.e. A52) sound format often used in DVDs ,
ffmpeg, libmad, faad2 if you want to read MPEG 4 / DivX files ,
libogg & libvorbis if you want to read Ogg Vorbis files .
Download the libraries from the VLC sources download page.
For each library :
uncompress :
%tar xvzf library.tar.gzor
%tar xvjf library.tar.bz2configure :
%cd library%./configurecompile and install :
%make#make install
Check that the configuration file /etc/ld.so.conf
contains the following line :
/usr/local/lib
If the line is not present, add-it and then run (as root):
#ldconfig
Download the sources of the lastest release : get the
file vlc-version.tar.gz from the VLC sources
download page. Uncompress-it :
%tar xvzf vlc-version.tar.gz%cd vlc-version
To get the list of configuration options, do :
%./configure --help
Please note that all the modules are described in the Modules section of the VLC User Guide .
Examples of very simple configurations:
if you want a basic VLC, do :
%./configureif you want the Gnome interface instead of the GTK interface (you will need the developement packages of Gnome) :
%./configure --enable-gnome
Then, compile and install :
%make%suPassword:[Root Password]#make install
Please note that the installation (make install command) is not mandatory. You can execute VLC from where you compiled it.
Download the ZIP file from the VLS
Windows download page, unzip-it and run
setup.exe
.
Many libraries are needed for particular uses
libdvbpsi (always needed)
libdvdcss if you want to be able to access encrypted DVDs ,
libdvdread if you want to be able to stream DVDs ,
libdvb if you want to be able to stream from a DVB card (a satellite card or a digital terrestial TV card) .
Download the libraries from the VLS sources download page .
For each library, uncompress, configure (unless for libdvb which doesn't have a ./configure), compile and install :
%tar xvzf library.tar.gz%cd library%./configure%make#make install
Check that the configuration file
/etc/ld.so.conf contains the following line
:
/usr/local/lib
If the line is not present, add-it and then run :
#ldconfig
Download the sources of the latest release : get
the file vls-version.tar.gz from the VLS
sources download page. Uncompress-it and generate
./configure
:
%tar xvzf vls-version.tar.gz%cd vls-version
To get the list of configuration options, do
%./configure --help
Then configure vls :
if you want a basic VLS without DVD support, do :
%./configure --disable-dvdif you want a VLS with DVD support, do :
%./configureif you want a VLS with DVB support, do :
%./configure --enable-dvb --with-dvb=PATH_TO_DVB_DRIVERS --with-libdvb=PATH_TO_LIBDVB
Then, compile and install :
%make#make install
You can also do a make uninstall, make clean or make distclean as needed .
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%vlc -vvv udp:@239.255.12.42
where 239.255.12.42 is the multicast IP address you want to join .
Use one of the following command lines :
%vlc -vvv http://example/stream.xyzwhere http://example/stream.xyz is the HTTP address of the stream ;
%vlc -vvv ftp://example/stream.xyzwhere ftp://example/stream.xyz is the FTP address of the stream ;
%vlc -vvv mms://viptvr.yacast.fr/encoderfranceinfowhere mms://viptvr.yacast.fr/encoderfranceinfo is the MMS address of the stream .
VLC can save the stream to the disk. In order to do this, use the Stream Output of VLC : you can do it via the graphical interface, or you can add to the command line the following argument :
--sout file/muxer:stream.xyz
where :
muxer is one of the formats supported by VLC's stream output, i.e. :
avi for AVI format ,
ogg for OGG format ,
ps for MPEG2-PS format ,
ts or ts_dvbpsi for MPEG2-PS format (the latter uses libdvbpsi for the task) .
and
stream.xyzis the name of the file you want to save the stream to, with the right extension .
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%vlc -vvv video1.xyz --sout udp:192.168.0.42 --ttl 12
where :
video1.xyzis the file you want to stream ,192.168.0.42 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or a multicast IP address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
If you want to stream the file continuously, add the --loop option .
%vls -vv -d udp:192.168.0.42 file:video1.xyz --ttl 12
where :
video1.xyzis the file you want to stream ,192.168.0.42 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or a multicast IP address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
When you want to stop VLS, use the key combination Ctrl+c.
If you want to stream the file continuously, add the --loop option .
Note
VLS can stream MPEG files that meet two critera :
the file must be MPEG PS (Program Stream) or MPEG TS (Transport Stream), that contain video and audio multiplexed. VLS cannot stream MPEG ES (Elementary Stream), i.e. a file with only audio or video .
In order to know if an MPEG file is MPEG PS, MPEG TS or MPEG ES, read the file with VLC and look at the messages (select in the menu View / Messages, or use the command line vlc -vvv) .
If you see a line :
[00000107] main module debug: using demux module "ts_dvbpsi"
it means the file is MPEG TS .
If you see a line :
[00000109] main module debug: using demux module "ps"
it means the file is MPEG PS .
If you see a line :
[00000109] main module debug: using demux module "es"
it means the file is MPEG ES, VLS can't stream it. .
the sequence header of the video must repeat itself regularly, which is often the case with MPEG-2, but very rare with MPEG-1. There is no easy way to know if the sequence header is repeated regularly. Files with a .vob extension are normally MPEG-2 files and files with .mpg or .mpeg extension or usually MPEG-1 files .
You can download this streamable MPEG-2 PS file for your tests : presentation_short.vob .
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Note
Under Unix/Linux, you must have write access to the device
corresponding to your DVD drive. For that, you should be in the
disk or cdrom group (look
at the permissions in /dev). If you're not, add
yourself to the group
:
#adduser your_login disk_or_cdrom
and then restart your session .
%vlc -vvv dvdold:/dev/dvd --sout udp:192.168.0.12 --ttl 12
where :
/dev/dvdis the name of your DVD drive (putD:under Windows ifDis the letter of your DVD drive) or the directory where you copied your DVD ,192.168.0.42 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or a multicast IP address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
If you want to stream the DVD continuously, add the --loop option .
Note
This is possible under GNU/Linux only .
%vls -vv -d udp:192.168.0.42 dvd:/dev/dvd --ttl 12
where :
/dev/dvdis the name of your DVD drive or the directory where you copied your DVD ,192.168.0.42 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or a multicast IP address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
If you want to stream the DVD continuously, add the --loop option .
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Note
This is possible under GNU/Linux only .
If you want to be able to stream from a DVB card (a satellite card or a digital terrestial TV card), you need to install the DVB drivers:
if you use a Linux 2.6.x kernel, you just need to compile the right modules ;
if you are using a Linux 2.4.x kernel, you must download the latest release of the DVB drivers from the DVB drivers download page of the LinuxTV Project.
Uncompress the tarball and follow the instructions
written in the INSTALL file to compile and install
the drivers
.
Put a .dvbrc file containing
the DVB channels (satellite or digital terrestial TV channels) you
want to stream in your home directory (some are provided in the
libdvb tarball for the satellite channels)
.
Run VLS with the following command line :
%vls -vv -d udp:192.168.0.42 dvb:"EUROSPORT" --ttl 12
where :
"EUROSPORT" is the channel you want to stream as written in your
~/.dvbrcfile ,192.168.0.42 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or a multicast IP address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
Note
For this, you must use the CVS version of VLC and compile it with ./configure --enable-dvb This feature should still be considered as experimental.
%vlc -vvv --program 8211 dvb:12597000:0:3:27500000 --sout udp:192.168.0.12 --ttl 12
where :
8211is the PID of the DVB channel you would like to stream, expressed as a decimal number ;12597000is the frequency of the transponder you want to stream from in Hz;0is the polarization (0 for vertical, 1 for horizontal) ;3is the FEC (3 for 3/4, 9 for auto) ;27500000is the transponder symbol rate in Hz ;192.168.0.12 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the multicast IP address.
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers).
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Note
This is possible under GNU/Linux only .
VideoLAN supports two MPEG-2 encoding cards :
Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-250,
Visiontech Kfir.
The Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-250 gives much better results and is cheaper than the Visiontech Kfir .
First, you will have to patch your kernel to support the v4l2 API (Video 4 Linux version 2). The patch is available on the Video4Linux HQ .
Once your kernel is ready, install the CVS version of the Linux drivers for the Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-250. They are hosted on ivtv.sourceforge.net. Then, you will have to create the device and load the modules; for this, please refer to the documentation shipped with the drivers .
Note
You must add --enable-pvr
to ./configure to use this
feature. You may want to change the value of
CR_MAX_AVERAGE_COUNTER to 1000
in src/input/input_clock.c to work around a problem
with the card
.
%vlc -vvv pvr:/dev/video0:norm=secam:size=720x576:frequency=576250: bitrate=3000000:maxbitrate=4000000 --sout udp:192.168.0.42 --ttl 12
where :
/dev/video0 is the device corresponding to the encoding card ,
norm=secam is name of the standard of the analogic signal (possible values are pal, secam, and ntsc) ,
size=720x576 is the size of the video you want to stream ,
frequency=567250 is the frequency in kHz of the channel you want to stream ,
bitrate=3000000 is the average bitrate of the stream ,
maxbitrate=4000000 is the maximum bitrate of the stream ,
192.168.0.42 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or a multicast IP address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
There is no command line interface for this input for the moment, so you will have to use the configuration file .
You cannot set-up the parameters of the drivers (norm, size, frequency, bitrate, etc...) with VLS: for that, you will have to use the program ptune.pl that come with the drivers. Please refer to the documentation shipped with the drivers to learn how to use this program .
Here is a typical configuration file
vls.cfgto run VLS with a Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-250
encoding card
:
# vls.cfg (VLS configuration file) # Example of the VideoLAN HOWTO for the Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-250 encoding card BEGIN "Inputs" pvr = "video" END BEGIN "pvr" # Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-250 device Device = "/dev/video0" # Stream type Type = "Mpeg2-PS" END BEGIN "Channels" channel1 = "network" END BEGIN "channel1" # Unicast or multicast IP address DstHost = "192.168.0.42" # Destination port DstPort = "1234" # If it's a multicast IP address, uncomment the line below #Type = "multicast" # If it's a multicast IP address, set the "Time To Live" below #TTL = "12" END BEGIN "LaunchOnStartUp" command1 = "start video channel1 pvr" END
Once you have adapted the configuration file above, run VLS :
%vls -vv -f vls.cfg
If you want to be able to stream from a Visiontech Kfir card, you need to install its Linux drivers. Download the latest release of the drivers from the drivers download page of the LinuxTV web site .
Uncompress the tarball and follow the instructions
written in the INSTALL file to compile and install
the drivers
.
Note
If you have a VIA chipset, you need to disable USB in the BIOS .
%vlc -vvv kfir:/dev/video --sout udp:192.168.0.42 --ttl 12
where :
/dev/videois the device corresponding to the Kfir card ,192.168.0.42 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or a multicast IP address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
There is no command line interface for this input for the moment, so you will have to use the configuration file .
Here is a typical configuration file
vls.cfgto run VLS with a VisionTech Kfir
encoding card
:
# vls.cfg (VLS configuration file) # Example of the VideoLAN HOWTO for the Visiontech Kfir encoding card BEGIN "Inputs" kfir = "video" END BEGIN "kfir" # Visiontech Kfir device Device = "/dev/video" # Stream type (default is "Mpeg2-PS") Type = "Mpeg2-PS" END BEGIN "Channels" channel1 = "network" END BEGIN "channel1" # Unicast or multicast IP address DstHost = "192.168.0.42" # Destination port DstPort = "1234" # If it's a multicast IP address, uncomment the line below #Type = "multicast" # If it's a multicast IP address, set the "Time To Live" below #TTL = "12" END BEGIN "LaunchOnStartUp" command1 = "start video channel1 kfir" END
Once you have adapted the configuration file above, run VLS :
%vls -vv -f vls.cfg
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Note
This is possible under GNU/Linux only .
If you want to stream from an acquisition card or a webcam, a video4linux driver must be available for it. You can find more information about video4linux and supported devices here .
Compile the right module for your device, and insert it into your kernel (Some video4linux modules are shipped with the 2.4.x Linux kernels). You can test your device by using any of the listed programs in the Video: TV and PVR/DVR section of this page .
Note that v4l2 modules will also work with VLC .
Note
You must add --enable-v4l to ./configure to use this feature .
%vlc -vvv v4l:/dev/video:norm=secam:frequency=543250:size=640x480:channel=0:adev=/dev/dsp:audio=0 --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=3000,ab=256,vt=800000,keyint=80,deinterlace}:std{access=udp,mux=ts,url=239.255.12.13}' --ttl 12
where :
/dev/videois the device corresponding to your acquisition card or your webcam ,norm=secam is name of the standard of the analogic signal (possible values are pal, secam, and ntsc) ,
frequency=543250 is the frequency of the channel in khz (Warning : for VLC < 0.6.1, Frequency is channel frequency in MHz multiplied by 16) ,
size=640x480 is the size of the video you want (you can also put the standard size like subqcif (128x96), qsif (160x120), qcif (176x144), sif (320x240), cif (352x288) or vga (640x480)) ,
channel=0 is the number of the channel (usually 0 is for tuner, 1 for composite and 2 for svideo) ,
adev=/dev/dsp is the audio device ,
audio=1 is the number of the audio channel (usually 0 is for mono and 1 for stereo) ,
vcodec=mp4v is the video format you want to encode in (mp4v is MPEG-4, mpgv is MPEG-1, and there is also h263, DIV1, DIV2, DIV3, I420, I422, I444, RV24, YUY2),
acodec=mpga is the audio format you want to encode in (mpga is MPEG audio layer 2, a52 is A52 i.e. AC3 sound) ,
vb=3000 is the video bitrate in Kbit/s ,
ab=256 is the audio bitrate in Kbit/s
vt=800000 is the video bitrate tolerance in bit/s ,
keyint=80 is the maximum interval between two "I" images in number of images ,
deinterlace tells VLC to deinterlace the video on the fly ,
192.168.0.42 is either :
the IP address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the DNS name the machine you want to unicast to ;
or a multicast IP address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
Note
You need the CVS version of VLS. When you compile it, you must do a ./bootstrap and ./configure --enable-v4l --with-ffmpeg=PATH (where PATH is the absolute path to the directory where you compiled ffmpeg, and not the relative path !) .
There is no command line interface for this input for the moment, so you will have to use the configuration file .
Here is a typical configuration file
vls.cfgto run VLS with a v4l device
:
# vls.cfg (VLS configuration file)
# Example of the VideoLAN HOWTO for the Video for Linux input
BEGIN "Inputs"
webcam = "v4l"
END
BEGIN "webcam"
# V4L device
Device = "/dev/video"
# Channel Source : Webcam is often "0"
# TV Card, may be Tuner(0), Composite(1), Svideo(2)
Channel = "0"
# Norm: PAL=0, NTSC=1, SECAM=2
Norm = "0"
# Frequency of the channel in Mhz, multiplied by 16 (tuner cards only)
Frequency = "7668"
# Size possibilities: can be either:
# - empty string : default size
# - width x height
# - subQCIF(128x96), QSIF(160x120), QCIF(176x144), SIF(320x240),
# CIF(352x288), VGA (640x480)
Size = ""
# DeInterlace: "0" = no ; "1" = yes
DeInterlace = "0"
# Video compression format: "mpeg1" or "mpeg4"
Compression = "mpeg4"
# Video bitrate (approx.) in kbps
Bitrate = "500"
# Quality: "1.0" (good) to "31.0" (bad)
Quality = "1.0"
# Sound device
AudioDevice = "/dev/dsp"
# Audio compression format: "mp2", "mp3" or "ogg"
AudioCompression = "mp2"
# Audio bitrate in kpbs
AudioBitrate = "64"
# Audio frequency ("16000", "22050", "24000", "32000", "44100" or "48000")
AudioFreq = "16000"
# Audio channel: "1" = mono ; "2" = stereo
AudioChannel = "2"
END
BEGIN "Channels"
channel1 = "network"
END
BEGIN "channel1"
# Unicast or multicast IP address
DstHost = "192.168.0.42"
# Destination port
DstPort = "1234"
# If it's a multicast IP address, uncomment the line below
#Type = "multicast"
# If it's a multicast IP address, set the "Time To Live" below
#TTL = "12"
END
BEGIN "LaunchOnStartUp"
command1 = "start video channel1 webcam"
END
Once you have adapted the configuration file above, run VLS :
%vls -vv -f vls.cfg
Table of Contents
Please refer to the command line interface chapter of the VLC user guide to learn the syntax of VLC's stream output. You can find the VLC user guide on the documentation page .
Transcode the input stream and send it to a multicast IP address with the associated SAP announce :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128,deinterlace}: standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=239.255.12.42,sap=TestStream}'
Display the input stream, transcode it and send it to a multicast IP address with the associated SAP announce :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#duplicate{dst=display,dst= "transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128,deinterlace}: standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=239.255.12.42,sap=TestStream}"}'
Transcode the input stream, display the transcoded stream and send it to a multicast IP address with the associated SAP announce :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128,deinterlace}: duplicate{dst=display,dst=standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=239.255.12.42,sap=TestStream}}'
Send a stream to a multicast IP address and a unicast IP address :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#duplicate{dst= standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=239.255.12.42,sap=TestStream}, dst=standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=192.168.1.2}}'
Display the stream and send it to two unicast IP addresses :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#duplicate{dst=display,dst= standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=192.168.1.12}, dst=standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=192.168.1.42}}'
Transcode the input stream, display the transcoded stream and send it to a multicast IP address with the associated SAP announce and an unicast IP address :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128,deinterlace}: duplicate{dst=display,dst=standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=239.255.12.42,sap=TestStream}, dst=standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=192.168.1.2}}'
Display the input stream, transcode it and send it to two unicast IP addresses :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#duplicate{dst=display, dst="transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}: duplicate{dst=standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=192.168.1.2}, dst=standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=192.168.1.12}"}'
Send the input stream to a multicast IP address and the transcoded stream to another multicast IP address with the associated SAP announces :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#duplicate{dst= standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=239.255.1.2,sap=OriginalStream}, dst="transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}: standard{access=udp,mux=ts,url=239.255.1.3,sap=TranscodedStream}"}'
Stream in HTTP :
on the server, run :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#standard{access=http,mux=ogg,url=server.example.org:8080}'on the client(s), run :
%vlc http://server.example.org:8080
Transcode and stream in HTTP :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}: standard{access=http,mux=ogg,url=server.example.org:8080}'
For example, if you want to stream an audio CD in Ogg/Vorbis over HTTP :
%vlc -vvv cdda:/dev/cdrom --sout '#transcode{acodec=vorb,ab=128}: standard{access=http,mux=ogg,url=server.example.org:8080}'
Separate audio and video in two PS files :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#es{access=file,mux=ps,url_audio=audio-%c.%m,url_video=video-%c.%m}'
Extract the audio track of the input stream to a TS file :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#es{access_audio=file,mux_audio=ts,url_audio=audio-%c.%m}'
Stream in unicast the audio track on a port and the video track on another port :
on the server side :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#es{access=rtp,mux=ts,url_audio=192.168.1.2:1212,url_video=192.168.1.2:1213}'on the client side: to receive the audio :
%vlc udp:@:1212to receive the video :
%vlc udp:@:1213
Stream in multicast the video and dump the audio in a file :
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#es{access_video=udp,mux_video=ts,url_video=239.255.12.42, access_audio=file,mux_audio=ps,url_audio=audio-%c.%m}'
Note
You can also combine the es module with the other modules to set-up even more complex solution .
Table of Contents
Note
You will need an IPv6-aware operating system, like Linux 2.4.21 with the ipv6 module loaded, Windows XP Service Pack 1 or Mac OS X version 10.2 or higher. Please look at the features pages on the VideoLAN web site to know about the status of IPv6 in VLC and VLS for each O.S .
Warning
If you are using VMware under Linux, you will have to stop VMware and unload the VMware kernel modules, because we noticed it prevented IPv6 streaming !
%vlc -vvv video1.xyz --ipv6 --sout udp:[ff08::1] --ttl 12
where :
video1.xyzis the file you want to stream (you can also put dvdold:/dev/dvd to stream a DVD or any other input configuration) ,ff08::1 is either :
the IPv6 address of the machine you want to unicast to ;
or the multicast IPv6 address .
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of your IP packets (which means that the stream will be able to cross 11 routers) .
Note
Under Unix/Linux, you may have to protect the square brackets around the IPv6 address :
%vlc -vvv video1.xyz --ipv6 --sout udp:\[ff08::1\] --ttl 12
Note
You may have to specify the output network interface :
%vlc -vvv video1.xyz --ipv6 --sout udp:[ff08::1%eth0] --ttl 12
where eth0 is the name of the network interface (under Linux the network interfaces are named ethX, under Mac OS X it's enX and under Windows it's X, where X is the appropriate number) .
You will need to use the configuration
file vls.cfg. Please, see the VLS user guide to know how to
write one for IPv6 streaming in unicast or multicast
.
%vlc -vvv --ipv6 udp:@[ff08::1]
Note
Under Unix/Linux, you may have to protect the square brackets around the IPv6 address :
%vlc -vvv --ipv6 udp:@\[ff08::1\]
Note
You may have to specify the output network interface :
%vlc -vvv video1.xyz --ipv6 --sout udp:[ff08::1%eth0] --ttl 12
where eth0 is the name of the network interface (under Linux the network interfaces are named ethX, under Mac OS X it's enX and under Windows it's X, where X is the appropriate number) .
Table of Contents
With Video On Demand (VOD), the user can start the video when he wants, make pauses, go forward and back in the video. It is of course the best in video streaming and the dream for every user.
VOD is a very big consumer of resources for the server and the network. VOD is unicast, not multicast : this means that the network and server resources needed are directly proportional to the number of clients.
The design of VideoLAN's VOD solution is very simple. The idea is to do HTTP streaming, i.e. stream an MPEG video encapsulated in HTTP. The regulation of the bitrate between the client and the server is done automatically by TCP. With HTTP version 1.1, there is the possibility to seek in a file downloaded, that's what we use to seek in the video.
On the VOD server, you need a running Web server. For example, you can use a Linux server running Apache. Other operating systems and other Web servers should work too, but we have never tested.
Make your MPEG-1, MPEG-2 or MPEG-4 / DivX files available to the clients on the Web server.
For example, we have a Web server whose DNS name
is localserver. On this server,
we put an MPEG file video1.mpg
which will be available to the clients at the URL
http://localserver/video1.mpg.
Table of Contents
Typing multicast addresses is not very fun... that's why you need a channel information service ! VideoLAN has implemented a channel information service based on the SAP/SDP standard. The SAP announces about the multicast programs are sent on the network (via the multicast address 224.2.127.254 reserved for this purpose). On the client side, VLCs receive these annouces and automatically add the programs announced to their playlist.
VLC can send the SAP announces associated with the programs it is streaming. VLS can't do that, but an independant program, the mini-SAP-server, can send the announces for the programs sent by VLS.
To send announces with VLC, you need to use the complex syntax of VLC's stream output, like this:
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#standard{access=udp,url=239.255.12.42,sap="Test Stream"}' --ttl 12
where video1.xyz is the file you want
to stream, 239.255.12.42 is the multicast IP
address you want to stream on, Test Stream is
the name that will be used for this program in the SAP announces and
12 is the value of the TTL (Time To Live) of the
stream and of the SAP announces.
To do the SAP announces in IPv6, just add the sap_ipv=6 option:
%vlc -vvv input_stream --sout '#standard{access=udp,url=239.255.12.42,sap="Test Stream",sap_ipv=6}' --ttl 12
Note
The mini-SAP-server is only available for Linux and Mac OSX.
Download the latest version of the mini-SAP-server from the streaming download page.
Install-it:
%tar xvzf miniSAPserver-version.tar.gz%cd miniSAPserver-version%./configure (if version >= 0.2.3)%make
Edit the configuration file sap.cfg shipped
with the tarball. It should contain a global section with the Time To
Live (TTL) and the IP version (IPv4 or IPv6) used for the SAP announces
and a section per program announced. Use the comments to understand each
parameter.
The Time To Live option indicates the maximum number of routers that the SAP announce packets can cross before being dropped.
If the announces are sent in IPv4 :
%vlc -vvv --extraintf sapIf the announces are sent in IPv6 :
%vlc -vvv --extraintf sap --sap-ipv6
Then open the playlist: you should see the names of the programs announced in SAP. When you double-click on the name of a program, VLC will subscribe to the multicast address and start to play the stream !
Table of Contents
- 1. PREAMBLE
- 2. APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS
- 3. VERBATIM COPYING
- 4. COPYING IN QUANTITY
- 5. MODIFICATIONS
- 6. COMBINING DOCUMENTS
- 7. COLLECTIONS OF DOCUMENTS
- 8. AGGREGATION WITH INDEPENDENT WORKS
- 9. TRANSLATION
- 10. TERMINATION
- 11. FUTURE REVISIONS OF THIS LICENSE
- 12. ADDENDUM: How to use this License for your documents
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Copyright (c) YEAR YOUR NAME. Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License".
If you have Invariant Sections, Front-Cover Texts and Back-Cover Texts, replace the "with...Texts." line with this:
with the Invariant Sections being LIST THEIR TITLES, with the Front-Cover Texts being LIST, and with the Back-Cover Texts being LIST.
If you have Invariant Sections without Cover Texts, or some other combination of the three, merge those two alternatives to suit the situation.
If your document contains nontrivial examples of program code, we recommend releasing these examples in parallel under your choice of free software license, such as the GNU General Public License, to permit their use in free software.