Automate 24/7 Stream for a scheduled Playlist

bcoyle

Member
Today, I'm running a live test on youtube for the app
 

Lamo

New Member
Dude, I just need to know if I can create an Amazon movie playlist; or movie playlist of any kind, that I can program to start casting from my chromebook to my neighbor's tv (already have access) at a certain time every morning. My neighbor has dementia, and I live onsite, so I'm default caregiver from 8pm to 8am. Her life does not exist without a movie on, and I've created a playlist on Cox Cable Contour that consists of 9 movies, which should get her through the night, and into the morning until the hired caregiver comes. But, contour suddenly added a cursed screen saver situation that can, only at its farthest stretches, keep this screen saver mode at bay for 5 hours of inactivity. So if she wakes up, and the stupid screen saver has kicked in, then I get a the dreaded knock. We're talking no sleep here - 2am-6am - is fair game. I'm desperate. So, if I can figure out a way to program a playlist from anywhere; on any application, to start casting from this stupid, piece of crap chromebook at a predetermined time, I would be far less likely to yell at random people on the street because I haven't slept in like a month. Please help
 

bcoyle

Member
Dude, I just need to know if I can create an Amazon movie playlist; or movie playlist of any kind, that I can program to start casting from my chromebook to my neighbor's tv (already have access) at a certain time every morning. My neighbor has dementia, and I live onsite, so I'm default caregiver from 8pm to 8am. Her life does not exist without a movie on, and I've created a playlist on Cox Cable Contour that consists of 9 movies, which should get her through the night, and into the morning until the hired caregiver comes. But, contour suddenly added a cursed screen saver situation that can, only at its farthest stretches, keep this screen saver mode at bay for 5 hours of inactivity. So if she wakes up, and the stupid screen saver has kicked in, then I get a the dreaded knock. We're talking no sleep here - 2am-6am - is fair game. I'm desperate. So, if I can figure out a way to program a playlist from anywhere; on any application, to start casting from this stupid, piece of crap chromebook at a predetermined time, I would be far less likely to yell at random people on the street because I haven't slept in like a month. Please help
I don't have a good answer for you. Do you have the movies themselves on your computer or are you just linking to somewhere else. I don't know anything about contour.
 

Tomasz Góral

Active Member
Hello, i prepared very simply video scheduler.


Two parts, one web site to control list video file, second must be run in browser source as local file, to play video file.

Now i test only in 27.1.3 with this params: --autoplay-policy=no-user-gesture-required --allow-file-access-from-files --enable-local-file-accesses

In 27.2.x not working.
 
Last edited:

bcoyle

Member
Hello, i prepared very simply video scheduler.


Two parts, one web site to control list video file, second must be run in browser source as local file, to play video file.

Now i test only in 27.1.3 with this params: --autoplay-policy=no-user-gesture-required --allow-file-access-from-files --enable-local-file-accesses

In 27.2.x not working.
What do you have in mind
Tried your page, but required a password????
 

Mo_Nipple

New Member
Hey, I figured I'd throw my solution in here for anyone else scouring through this 4 year old thread. There is some good stuff in here so I suggest you read through it but for me this is what I landed on.

I am the editor for https://www.youtube.com/lolcoach and had the idea of having a 24/7 stream of reruns as a fun project, an extra way to get the channel onto the youtube algorithm, and an extra place to for sponsored ads.

These were the things I wanted the stream to achieve
  • I wanted it to pick a random video from a list and play it
  • I wanted the ability to automatically add new videos to the pool of selectable files
  • I wanted to be able to queue ads or special videos like adult swim style bumpers either manually or automatically
  • I did NOT want to have to schedule these videos whatsoever. Completely Random.
  • I wanted to be able to automatically update the scroller/lower third to the name of the video currently playing
  • I wanted to update the description with a link to the current video playing
  • I want to be able to interrupt the feed with an actual live broadcast
  • I want chat to be able to vote on the next video
  • I want videos to smoothly transition from one to another
That's a lot to figure out and I haven't quite got the last five down but what I found was literally the answer to almost everything.


The github does a pretty good job of explaining what it does and how to set it up so i won't type it in here. I'll just say that I have VLC-Scheduler running with VLC set to automatically start in full screen with no controls visible (just the video), in OBS I have a window capture of VLC and an audio device capture of a virtual cable (https://www.4kdownload.com/products/videodownloader/8) that VLC audio output is being pointed to. I have 4k-video-downloader (https://www.4kdownload.com/products/videodownloader/8) looking at the youtube channel and downloading new uploads to the directory that vlc scheduler is using. That's it.

I'm starting as simple as possible for now and as I come up with solutions I'll be replying in this thread.
 

bcoyle

Member
Running my station right now - for at least a couple of hours
 

bcoyle

Member
Hey, I figured I'd throw my solution in here for anyone else scouring through this 4 year old thread. There is some good stuff in here so I suggest you read through it but for me this is what I landed on.

I am the editor for https://www.youtube.com/lolcoach and had the idea of having a 24/7 stream of reruns as a fun project, an extra way to get the channel onto the youtube algorithm, and an extra place to for sponsored ads.

These were the things I wanted the stream to achieve
  • I wanted it to pick a random video from a list and play it
  • I wanted the ability to automatically add new videos to the pool of selectable files
  • I wanted to be able to queue ads or special videos like adult swim style bumpers either manually or automatically
  • I did NOT want to have to schedule these videos whatsoever. Completely Random.
  • I wanted to be able to automatically update the scroller/lower third to the name of the video currently playing
  • I wanted to update the description with a link to the current video playing
  • I want to be able to interrupt the feed with an actual live broadcast
  • I want chat to be able to vote on the next video
  • I want videos to smoothly transition from one to another
That's a lot to figure out and I haven't quite got the last five down but what I found was literally the answer to almost everything.


The github does a pretty good job of explaining what it does and how to set it up so i won't type it in here. I'll just say that I have VLC-Scheduler running with VLC set to automatically start in full screen with no controls visible (just the video), in OBS I have a window capture of VLC and an audio device capture of a virtual cable (https://www.4kdownload.com/products/videodownloader/8) that VLC audio output is being pointed to. I have 4k-video-downloader (https://www.4kdownload.com/products/videodownloader/8) looking at the youtube channel and downloading new uploads to the directory that vlc scheduler is using. That's it.

I'm starting as simple as possible for now and as I come up with solutions I'll be replying in this thread.
Hi. Sorry I didn't see this earlier. It seems you have spent a lot of effort on your solution with a lot of nice features. I think the feature that everyone wants is : automation with little or no manual interaction. My app is more like a network tv station. I felt it important that the viewers have a EPG ( tv guide) and could expect "hogans heros" or "nevada history" to start at specific times. In your case that would be "coaching with Joe" - monday to friday at 9pm and "the best of gaming" at 10pm. After working on my solution for a while, I would not want to give it up and switch to another, but I think we can talk features and solutions. Thanks for the pointer to downloader. If you wish to PM me or just continue here, please let me know.
 
Hey, I figured I'd throw my solution in here for anyone else scouring through this 4 year old thread. There is some good stuff in here so I suggest you read through it but for me this is what I landed on.

The github does a pretty good job of explaining what it does and how to set it up so i won't type it in here. I'll just say that I have VLC-Scheduler running with VLC set to automatically start in full screen with no controls visible (just the video), in OBS I have a window capture of VLC and an audio device capture of a virtual cable (https://www.4kdownload.com/products/videodownloader/8) that VLC audio output is being pointed to. I have 4k-video-downloader (https://www.4kdownload.com/products/videodownloader/8) looking at the youtube channel and downloading new uploads to the directory that vlc scheduler is using. That's it.

I'm starting as simple as possible for now and as I come up with solutions I'll be replying in this thread.
it says it is not maintained, ar eyou the person who created this?
 

bcoyle

Member
@hammerheaddown ,@Mo_Nipple . Seems like a very good question. I see the github post is a year ago. But I do realize that this thread is about ideas. Personally I enjoy hearing what other people think about the subject. Some align with what I'm doing, some don't. But no one has really done a 24/7 yet , because it's basically a big job. Even providing documentation for other people to use is a time sink.
 
well i have actually converted it to using SRT streaming since it is less than a second of latency in most cases..

SRT Streaming can be be ingested directly from the FFMPEG streaming playlist

still working out some kinks in the playlist but it will use FFMPEG and it's Concat Demuxer. working on creating the playlist into a csv file and then reading that csv into ffmpeg.
 

bcoyle

Member
well i have actually converted it to using SRT streaming since it is less than a second of latency in most cases..

SRT Streaming can be be ingested directly from the FFMPEG streaming playlist

still working out some kinks in the playlist but it will use FFMPEG and it's Concat Demuxer. working on creating the playlist into a csv file and then reading that csv into ffmpeg.
Seems like you are having fun.
 

bcoyle

Member
well i have actually converted it to using SRT streaming since it is less than a second of latency in most cases..

SRT Streaming can be be ingested directly from the FFMPEG streaming playlist

still working out some kinks in the playlist but it will use FFMPEG and it's Concat Demuxer. working on creating the playlist into a csv file and then reading that csv into ffmpeg.
I'm always interested in what people will do with their tool after they finish it. i.e. what is the dream? Mine is a type of community public tv station.
 
Been working on this a lot and tweaking it..

basically a whole new rewrite of the code, adding a lot of error handling too.

I will have tow available, one that is working with the current time to choose to play video etc and one that is just a looping streamer, complete with playout log that shows times of played files.

you will be able to create a file in google docs or excel and save as a comma separated text file and load it up.

Just completed today that you can update that playlist as needed as well,it will check for updates to the playlist

just a quick update and should have something together soon for testing
 

bcoyle

Member
Been working on this a lot and tweaking it..

basically a whole new rewrite of the code, adding a lot of error handling too.

I will have tow available, one that is working with the current time to choose to play video etc and one that is just a looping streamer, complete with playout log that shows times of played files.

you will be able to create a file in google docs or excel and save as a comma separated text file and load it up.

Just completed today that you can update that playlist as needed as well,it will check for updates to the playlist

just a quick update and should have something together soon for testing
I like that you have created something useful in a short period of time. My app is taking so darn long, that I think people give up on it.
 
so many things that can go wrong using the timestamp version

what i have found is that you lose about 4-6 seconds between fade out and fade back in... but it looks much better with the fades... FFMPEG has some overhead i cant do anything about. I have to check the next time and calculate when to start the fadeout and the length b4 next video .

it is all the code to check times that causes about 2-3 seconds of delay. this method does make sure your shows start at 12:00:00 it will start at 12:03 and end at 12:57 making sure the next starts correctly. it also seeks ahead 2-3 seconds just to be safe

The alternative is just do all the work and be sure all videos are exactly as you want, load them up in playlist and get about 2-3 seconds of delay. this does ZERO calculations just plays it as is so you could have stuff that runs over the time you'd like so if you want to have a show start at 12:00:00 this method could have you starting at 12:03 and throughout the day have you 1-2 minutes out of whack. no seeking of time and if its 60 long the next video would start at say 13:06 and next hour at 14:12

the timestamp version sticks with the 12:03 start/fade-in and end at 12:57:00 fade out . EVERY hour or how ever you shows run

so I have two versions... 1 less work 2-3 seconds extra between videos and 1 that is more work to be sure all videos are EXACT times you want
 
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