Automatic Facebook Live Video

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GlennS

New Member
Using OBS Studio we can successfully stream live videos to Facebook using their Live Producer web page. This involves using a persistent streaming key, scheduling the event in advance and manually previewing the live stream video for about 5 minutes before manually selecting "Go Live" within Live Producer. No problems whatsoever with this technique.

According to (Meta), we should be able to "automatically" go live using this same basic technique, without having to open Live Producer. The only requirements are that the event is scheduled up to one week in advance, we use a persistent stream key and we start streaming within 10 minutes of the scheduled go live time. We cannot get this feature to work as described. OBS Studio acts as if it is connected to the Facebook streaming server but the event never goes live. There are no anomalous messages in OBS Studio or the OBS Studio log file. We have tried varying the time before the event that we start streaming thinking that it may be sensitive within the 10 minute window but this did not produce any results. We also tried overriding the default OBS Studio Facebook live stream settings with the persistent key and server URL that we copied and pasted from Live Producer - still no positive results.

Has anyone been successful in using this FB automatic streaming feature?

Thanks for your help.
 
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Lawrence_SoCal

Active Member
TL;DR version - it isn't an OBS issue
GlennS said:
Using OBS Studio we can successfully stream live videos to Facebook using their Live Producer web page. This involves using a persistent streaming key, scheduling the event in advance and manually previewing the live stream video for about 5 minutes before manually selecting "Go Live" within Live Producer. No problems whatsoever with this technique.
Click to expand...
Uh, Facebook's Scheduled Live Event page for years has said if you aren't streaming 10+ minutes in advance of scheduled start, stream won't start. I followed FB's on-screen guidance and never tried cutting it so tight as 5 minutes

Oh, and using a Persistent stream key is a bad security practice, like logging onto a system with local admin privileges

GlennS said:
According to (Meta), we should be able to "automatically" go live using this same basic technique, without having to open Live Producer. The only requirements are that the event is scheduled up to one week in advance, we use a persistent stream key and we start streaming within 10 minutes of the scheduled go live time.
Click to expand...
FB Scheduled Live events have not required to be scheduled a full week in advance, in my experience for last 2 years. Between hours to days, not sure exact requirement, but it isn't that long in advance to schedule a live event

What has changed towards the end of last years is the Live Producer interface. And we've had all kings of issues since then with FB not auto-starting events, especially in last month, including yesterday (I had to manually start the event a couple of minutes late once I realize that event hadn't gone live though it kinda looked like it had). I'm suspecting a new setting/option on auto-starting that has changed (or just a FB bug?). My task for this week is to figure out was FB changed and didn't make clear/obvious on their interface. In our case, we specifically do not use a persistent key, so prior to stream we log into /Live/Producer, confirm schedule, copy new stream and test stream. Then shutdown preview stream until 15 min before event [I mention this in case this is what is messing up FB for us]. We always keep /Live/Producer up and it is important for our stream that the livestream is monitored, including comments.

GlennS said:
We cannot get this feature to work as described. OBS Studio acts as if it is connected to the Facebook streaming server but the event never goes live. There are no anomalous messages in OBS Studio or the OBS Studio log file. We have tried varying the time before the event that we start streaming thinking that it may be sensitive within the 10 minute window but this did not produce any results. We also tried overriding the default OBS Studio Facebook live stream settings with the persistent key and server URL that we copied and pasted from Live Producer - still no positive results.

Has anyone been successful in using this FB automatic streaming feature?
Click to expand...

So, to your question,
1. Yes, I've been using the auto-start feature in FB for 2 years now.
2. Yesterday, for us all looked perfectly good in OBS, and would. The stream was going to FB, being received, and I could see stream in /Live/Producer preview window with no issue. FB Scheduled Live Event simply didn't start 'Go Live'. This is NOT an OBS issue, and there wouldn't be a native way in OBS, that I'm aware of, to distinguish when a CDN like FB decides to go from Preview to Live as it has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with what OBS is sending. I did notice in FB event Alert log so notices, so a plugin which checked those logs (presuming there is an API to access such) would be doable, but of no value to me as I mentioned as I use the /Live/Producer window and have no need/desire to not use it. I mention this so you know what to look for, for your use case

So, if anyone has insight into new FB Scheduled Live Event settings, especially around auto-starting, please let us know.
If I find something (probably not until later this week), I'll post
 
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Lawrence_SoCal

Active Member
And, without doing anything really different (that I noticed), FaceBook auto-start of a Scheduled Event worked normally/properly yesterday... joy (sarcasm... sorta.. happy it worked, hate it when outcomes change with change in input.. the 'fun' of a free (poorly tested) service).

What I did do differently
- within a Scheduled Event, for last couple of months (??), I went to View Event (previously stayed in /Live/Producer, but lately going to event page, which had button for Setup Live Video, and that button changed when auto start happened. And that hasn't been working of late)
- So yesterday, instead of doing a test steam (with non-persistent stream key for about 1 minute, approx 90 minutes before scheduled start, this time I did NOT do the early 'check' [as I've done for last 2 years]
- then instead of going to View Event, I went to the Edit page (in /Live/Producer).. and just sat there. And auto-start took place approx 20 seconds after scheduled start time (which has been relatively consistent for last 2 years)

oh well, it worked.
 
G

GlennS

New Member
@Lawrence_SoCal,

Thank you for your detailed response including your experiences. I will give it another try in auto-start mode. I had nearly given up and was ready to write a Luna triggered program to hit the "go live" button in Live Producer. Given the inconsistency of FB, I may do that anyway just to have it in my arsenal. Our workflow doesn't support the user having to dabble in FB.
 
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Lawrence_SoCal

Active Member
Well, week 2 of auto-start working as expected/desired. so not sure if
- not running test stream over an hour in advance was causing issue
- or being on a slightly different /live/producer page/link
??
oh well, working for now
 
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