Installation instructions
| Project: | Dash Media Player |
| Version: | 6.x-1.0 |
| Component: | Documentation |
| Category: | support request |
| Priority: | normal |
| Assigned: | Unassigned |
| Status: | closed |
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This looks like an amazing module and the author has done an excellent job putting it together from the demos I viewed on his website. However I can see one big problem with it. The issue with this module is that probably less than 5% of people can get it to work because of the absolutely terrible installation instructions. I read a thread here on the drupal forums where this problem was raised back in october 2008 and it seems nothing has improved. Does the author not want this player to be widely used?
One issue with the instructions, and there are many others, is that they seem to be for linux and the only time I saw the author mention windows was when replying to comments on his site where people kept having the same problem over and over again with 'conversion failed' when running cron after uploading a video. A huge amount of people, even if they have their site hosted on a linux server, do their local development on a windows machine.
Also, what is the deal with ffmpeg, from what I can see, if you are developing your site locally, which is what tons of people do, you need to download and compile it to get dash player to work. It doesn't come with windows(obviously), does it come preinstalled with linux? Of course nothing is mentioned about this in the installation instructions except when the author replies to all the people who can't get it to work because 'conversion failed'. Then he just says the "FFMPEG path that you have is incorrect... this will need to be fixed within the FlashVideo settings to point to a Windows executable ( example... C:\ffmpeg.exe)". That reads to me like ffmpeg is already installed somewhere on my system as if it's a codec that comes with windows by default. When in actual fact, it seems as if sorce code needs to be downloaded and compiled which your average drupal user, or even more advanced drupal user who knows php, will not be able to do.
I would have been interested in purchasing at least 3 commercial licenses for this player based on the demo I viewed on the author's site. However it seems to be more trouble than its worth trying to install it. I think it would be great if the author could get together with somebody who could write out clear and concise installation instructions that cover different circumstances, such as windows vs linux and installing online vs locally.
#1
This is definitely a known issue, and a huge task, but please know that this is a top priority for me to fix. I have been planning a site redesign / documentation improvements for some time now. I have also even tossed up the idea of an auto-installer, but that too is going to take massive amounts of code to get working right. I will do my best to get this resolved.
Thanks for your input.
Travis.
#2
Cheers mate, thats sounds good. Hope I didn't come across too harsh, you've done some excellent work with these modules, I was just a bit frustrated yesterday.
Anyway I wonder in the meantime could you give me some advice on this issue, which is the same as what alot of other people were experiencing. Im using windows and developing locally with wamp. I have ffmpeg.exe and its working correctly as i tested it with a simple command line statement and it converted a video no problem. However when I try to convert with the flashvideo module however I am getting this error message that seems to be a big obstacle to alot of people.
* FlashVideo successfully created: testvid_51.jpg* Conversion failed.
* Command: c:\ffmpeg\bin\ffmpeg.exe -i "C:\Program Files\wamp\www\drupal-6.10/sites\default\files/testvid.mpg" -f flv -acodec mp3 -ar 22050 -ab 64k -ac 1 "C:\Program Files\wamp\www\drupal-6.10/sites\default\files/testvid_51.flv"
* Cron ran successfully.
From some posts you've made on your site I take it the problem is the mixture of backslashes and forward slashes in the file paths? If so, how can this be corrected as the forward slashes in 'drupal-6.10/sites' and '/testvid.mpg' are not configurable with the flashvideo module. For example, when I uploaded this file the following entry is created in the filepath column of the files table in the database - sites\default\files/testvid.mpg. Any advice is greatly appreciated.
#3
Well Ive got this flashvideo working on windows/wamp now. The main problem was the mixing of backslashes and forward slashes in the filepath. Here's what I did for the people who are running into the same problem.
1). Set your ffmpeg field in FlashVideo->Universal Settings to c:\{Your directory}\ffmpeg.exe ----- mine was c:\ffmpeg\bin\ffmpeg.exe
2). Go to approximatley line 946 in flashvideo.module and find where it says
$filepath = getcwd() .'/'. $file->filepath;. Add in this code right after it -$filepath = str_replace('/', '\\', $filepath);to change the forward slashes to backslashes.2). Go to approximatley line 977 in flashvideo.module and find where it says
$output_path = getcwd() .'/'. $newfile->filepath;. Add in this code right after it -$output_path = str_replace('/', '\\', $output_path);to change the forward slashes to backslashes.3). It still wasn't working for me after this and when I printed out the $ffmpeg_data variable the text ended with a phrase like 'unknown encoder: mp3'. I then went to admin/settings/flashvideo and on the content type I use for video I clicked 'Edit settings for this content type.' Then in FFMPEG settings I changed the text in 'ffmpeg command' to "-i @input @output". I then ran cron and the video converted successfully. Audio was working too even thought I deleted the text in the ffmpeg command field.
#4
Alright... I have made some improvements to the install process. I have recorded some videos that can be found at http://www.tmtdigital.com/node/37.
Enjoy!
Travis.
#5
Automatically closed -- issue fixed for 2 weeks with no activity.