Forum OpenACS Q&A: OpenACS as video server

I was wondering if someone is using OpenACS as a server for videos similar to youtube?

The goal is simple: Let people upload videos, let them tag the videos and maybe even categorize them according to the lessons they were taken in.

But I was wondering about video conversion (so they are all in one format) and streaming (so they don't have to be downloaded). Although this is not purely OpenACS, maybe someone has already done this.

At the moment we just use plain file storage and this works for us (more or less), but there might be better solutions around. Thanks for any tips, ideas, hints

Hi, Malte!

You can see our system:

http://mmedia.uv.es

It is a Apache + PHP + PostgreSQL system, integrated with our OpenACS installation. The file uploads are done since Aula Virtual (OpenACS). File storage is not integrated in OpenACS file-storage.

Video conversion to FLV is done in batch with open source tools (ffmpeg, ...).

We are doing streaming with Flash Media Server 2.

Regards,
Agustin

Yes.

There is one interface to ffmpeg in PHP.
Moreover, we want mmedia server in a separate server
and access to the files with other Apache servers, serving
files with automounts (samba, FTP, ...).

Regards,
Agustin

Hi,

Does anyone have a ballpark figure for how much Flash Streaming Server 2 costs? Also, are there any free alternatives out there which would work for a relatively low use system?

Thanks.

There are a number of free Flash Server replacements that may do what you need. Alternatively use the Flash Server in demo mode, which gets you 10 simultaneous streams for free.

There is also Red5, http://osflash.org/red5 and Wowza, which is free for 10 streams then a much cheaper price than Adobe: http://www.wowzamedia.com/ .

First of all thanks a lot for all the tips and the videos package which I will try out once I get back to this pet project of mine. For the time being I have the users convert the images to iPod compatible format (not Flash) and let them upload the videos happily. After all, most of the users own an iPod with video and would like to have the videos directly available for that media, that's why we are using the bigger mp4 format (short clips anyway...).

But as this is supposed to be expanded I will make sure I get my head around this and the flash option soonish (okay, this year 😊).

Thanks again
Malte

Hi Malte,

As we are also working at this video integration (as you can see in Alessandro Landim's post up in this thread) maybe we can share some efforts to help you on that.

I agree with you that we can't ignore the Ipod format, but in our video approach all you have to do is the ffmpeg output for the video. Maybe we can use both formats: the MP4 for podcasts and FLV for browsers.

However, there are somethings we have to think: I don't know how is the Internet environment where you work, but here in Brasil bandwith is a major problem. If I have an MP4 file, most people just can't download it. The FLV has three advantages:

1 - It's compatible with all browsers
2 - The bandwith use is really lower
3 - Adobe is going to open the Flash format

And there's also another thing to think: today, most people use the Ipods for podcasts in a WiFi environment. Soon, they will be using their phone's browsers, and these browsers will have flash support too. So, I still think FLV is a better approach.