For sites and integrations where additional security measures are required, VideoWhisper applications support login session check on RTMP side.

This is used to make sure no clients will be able to connect to rtmp server without having previously logged in with the _login.php scripts.
When a new client tries to connect to RTMP server with a session name, rtmp application will check on the web server if that client session exists. If web server does not confirm that client logged in, rtmp server will reject the connection. RTMP server will also check for a webKey that needs to be configured same way on rtmp and web server: this will prevent connections in case of web domain hijacking.
Notes
- This will disable connections from external encoders (ie. FMLE) and players (ie. JwPlayer) to that rtmp address, as these will not provide a session name to check for validity.
- Usually, each installation will require its own rtmp side that checks session info with that installation. Otherwise you will have to tweak scripts to check on all installations.

RTMP Configuration

RTMP side web session check is currently supported for Wowza rtmp side. Download latest version of Wowza rtmp side, deploy to your server and update these settings in conf/videowhisper-web/Application.xml :

…
<Properties>
<Property>
<Name>acceptPlayers</Name>
<Value>true</Value>
</Property>
<Property>
<Name>webLogin</Name>
<Value>http://installation_url/rtmp_login.php?s=</Value>
</Property>
<Property>
<Name>webKey</Name>
<Value>VideoWhisper</Value>
</Property>
<Property>
<Name>webLogout</Name>
<Value>http://installation_url/rtmp_logout.php?s=</Value>
</Property>
</Properties>
</Application>

 

 

Then restart WowzaMediaServer service. For troubleshooting check Wowza access logs. If errors occur in the error logs submit a ticket to VideoWhisper about this.

Web Configuration

Download latest Video Conference php edition and check these integration files:
rtmp.inc.php – stores session info when user authenticates from vc_login.php ; contains $webKey if you want to change it
rtmp_login.php – called by rtmp server to see if a session name is valid (authenticated); also gets canKick permission to allow user to kick clients
rtmp_logout.php – called by rtmp server when client with a session name disconnected (to cleanup session)

Configure settings.php to use the videowhisper-web rtmp address.

To integrate this on other editions or installations you will need to copy the 3 files mentioned above to installation folder and include rtmp.inc.php in the _login.php scripts that authorize the user.
Other changes could be required depending on particularities of each integration.

Sample Demo Configuration

Installation url: http://www.videowhisper.com/demos/vc_web
Using rtmp address: rtmp://videowhisper.com/videowhisper-web

         <Property>
<Name>webLogin</Name>
<Value>http://www.videowhisper.com/demos/vc_web/rtmp_login.php?s=</Value>
</Property>
<Property>
<Name>webKey</Name>
<Value>VideoWhisper</Value>
</Property>
<Property>
<Name>webLogout</Name>
<Value>http://www.videowhisper.com/demos/vc_web/rtmp_logout.php?s=</Value>
</Property>

 

At least Debian 5 (Lenny) required.

Checkout release:
cat /proc/version
uname -a
cat /etc/issue
cat /etc/debian_version

If system is not in English, enable that:
dpkg-reconfigure locales
export LANG=en_US.UTF-8

Update /etc/enviroment

You may need to reboot.

Update:
apt-get update

Install Subversion:
apt-get -y install subversion

Install tools to build your own Debian packages:
apt-get -y install dpkg-dev debhelper dh-make devscripts fakeroot

Install Java (accept sun license if applies):
apt-get -y install java-package
apt-get -y install sun-java6-jre
apt-get -y install sun-java6-jdk
java -version

Install Apache Ant:
wget http://www.apache.org/dist/ant/binaries/apache-ant-1.8.2-bin.tar.gz
tar zxvf apache-ant-1.8.2-bin.tar.gz
mv apache-ant-1.8.2 /usr/local/ant
export ANT_HOME=/usr/local/ant
/usr/local/ant/bin/ant -version

Download the latest development version of Red5:
svn co http://red5.googlecode.com/svn/java/server/trunk red5-trunk

Run ant to build red5:
cd red5-trunk
/usr/local/ant/bin/ant

Deploy red5:
mkdir /usr/local/red5
cp -R dist/* /usr/local/red5/
cd /usr/local/red5
chmod 755 red5.sh

Deploy your custom apps in/usr/local/red5/webapps .
In example VideoWhisper Red5 RTMP application needed to run VideoWhisper solutions.

Start Red5 in background:
cd /usr/local/red5
./red5.sh >> red5.log &

Verify the correct ports are being bound to:
netstat -ant

You need to restart red5 each time you add webapps to /usr/local/red5/webapps or change configuration.

Close Red5:
cd /usr/local/red5
./red5-shutdown.sh

Or kill Red5 processes:
ps aux | grep red5
kill $process_id

Then start it again:
cd /usr/local/red5
./red5.sh >> red5.log &

You can publish a rtmp stream to a rtmp address and then playback with an external player like JWPlayer.
If you publish StreamName to rtmp address rtmp://your-rtmp-address-here then you will need to configure JW Player:
var flashvars = { file: StreamName.flv, streamer: rtmp://your-rtmp-address-here, autostart:”true”, type:”rtmp”}

Webcam video streams can be published from web with a video Live Streaming broadcasting script. With the VideoWhisper Live Streaming soulution, StreamName is channel name (in example Studio586). Important: As latest VideoWhisper solutions also support P2P streaming, these need to be configured with alwaysRTMP=1 parameter in their _login.php or equivalent script so streams are always published to RTMP server.

If you want to publish for other devices special encoders and codecs would be required. Using an external encoder you can encode with codecs and settings not available in browser flash player (due to flash limitations). Not all encoders and versions are compatible with all rtmp servers and versions. Some require special configuration and usage instructions.

Adobe Flash Media Live Encoder can be used for Adobe Media Interactive server and is also reported to work with Wowza.

Wowza & Wirecast documentation and support is available for Wowza Media Server hosting.

Note that when publishing H.264, video player should be configured to play StreamName.mp4 instead of StreamName.flv .

Measure connection capabilities

To configure flash applications streaming you will first need to determine the connections that most users will have. So test first with your connection and also request other users to test.

So let’s consider this situation determined by http://www.speedtest.net (measure speed to a server close to the location of your streaming server):
Download: 9.43Mbp/s
Upload: 0.49Mbps

This looks like ADSL (in this situation upload bandwidth is 20 times lower than total connection bandwidth).

0.49 Mbps = 502 Kbps (kilobits per second)
8 bits = 1 byte,  so that means you can upload with 62 kb/s  (kilobytes per second)

As you can see, usually, connection is the cause of quality and latency limitations. A server with 1000Mbps connection will theoretically be able to handle up to 2000 x 0.49Mbps streams, so the server is not the problem with your tests, unless you’re on a shared plan and other clients are maxing out the resources.

How to configure flash videochat applications?

Considering you also have to upload audio and other data on that connection, you could setup camBandwidth to 49152 bytes/s (allocate for the compressed video stream).
On chat systems buffering should be reduced to 0.1 so delays are minimized. On 1 way streaming systems, you can use higher buffering to increase fluency in case of connection turbulence.

Flash streaming applications vs Skype

Skype desktop application uses different technology than these web based applications limited by browser based flash technology limitations . Skype uses:
-  p2p connections between all users and also uses fast 3rd users as proxies (not using server – so if you are in the same local network with the other tester or with a 3rd skype client with better connection, it uses the local bandwidth)
-  better codecs to get better quality for same bandwidth (flash player currently encodes only h263 and external encoders must be used to encode h264)

First know your system to know what to install.

Use uname -a to see if you need to download 32 or 64 bits versions.

Get SUSE release: cat /etc/SuSE-release

INSTALL JDK

Install latest JDK from http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp .

Use chmod a+x to make downloaded file executable and execute it.

Make sure latest version is used:

ln -s /usr/java/latest /usr/local/jdk
ln -s /usr/java/latest/jre /usr/local/jre
rm /usr/bin/java
ln -s /usr/java/latest/bin/java /usr/bin/java
export JAVA_HOME=/usr/java/latest/

INSTALL SVN

Get SVN from: http://software.opensuse.org/search?baseproject=ALL&p=1&q=subversion

Install RPMs with:  rpm -iv package.rpm

Install any dependencies as required. Search from http://software.opensuse.org/search .

INSTALL ANT

wget http://www.apache.org/dist/ant/binaries/apache-ant-1.8.0-bin.tar.gz
tar zxvf apache-ant-1.8.0-bin.tar.gz
mv apache-ant-1.8.0 /usr/local/ant

Configure
export ANT_HOME=/usr/local/ant
ln -s /usr/local/ant/bin/ant /usr/local/bin/ant

Replace old ant
rm /usr/bin/ant
ln -s /usr/local/ant/bin/ant /usr/bin/ant

Check ant version:
ant –version

INSTALL Red5

Get latest Red5 :
svn co http://red5.googlecode.com/svn/java/server/trunk red5

Build Red5 :
cd red5
ant prepare
ant dist

Move Red5:
cd ..
mv red5 /opt/red5

OPERATE RED5

Start Red5 (when need or on server reboot):
cd /opt/red5/dist
./red5.sh > start.log &

Install/update applications in the /opt/red5/dist/webapps folder .  For changes to take effect, Red5 must be restarted:

1. Check if red5 is running:
ps aux | grep red5

2. Go to its folder and shut red5 down:
cd /opt/red5/dist
./red5-shutdown.sh

3. See if it’s still running or not:
ps aux | grep red5

4. Restart it, and also make it output the logs into a file of your choice:
./red5.sh > start.log &

5. Make sure it’s back online:
ps aux | grep red5

This post shows how to install Wowza on a server where there is another RTMP server, already installed, i.e. Red5. Run 2 rtmp servers at same time and allow applications to connect on both simultaneously.

First install Wowza Media Server. Update version if necessary.

cd /root/tmp
wget http://www.wowzamedia.com/downloads/WowzaMediaServer-2-0-0/WowzaMediaServer-2.0.0.rpm.bin
chmod a+x WowzaMediaServer-2.0.0.rpm.bin
./WowzaMediaServer-2.0.0.rpm.bin

Then fill your Wowza Media Server license ( a free developer license for 10 connections can be used for testing):

cd /usr/local/WowzaMediaServer/bin
./startup.sh

Change rtmp port in /usr/local/WowzaMediaServer-2.0.0/conf/VHost.xml from 1935 to some other port not in use (i.e. 1936):

<Root>
<VHost>
<HostPortList>
<HostPort>
<ProcessorCount>4</ProcessorCount>
<IpAddress>*</IpAddress>
<!– Separate multiple ports with commas –>
<!– 80: HTTP, RTMPT –>
<!– 554: RTSP –>
<Port>1936</Port>

Run Wowza in background. You can also add this to /etc/rc.d/rc.local to have it running on each server restart:

cd /usr/local/WowzaMediaServer/bin
./startup.sh > start.log &

Now you’ll be able to access wowza rtmp applications with rtmp://your-server:1936/your-wowza-application while red5 applications will be accessible the old way with  rtmp://your-server/your-red5-application .

An example of 2 rtmp servers running on same linux server is the VideoWhisper Webcam Video Recorder.

Red5 Video Recorder
Wowza Video Recorder

For more details check the home page of VideoWhisper web based Video Recorder.

This post shows how to install latest Red5 from svn trunk on Linux Ubuntu.

For other linux flavors (i.e. Centos) see this comprehensive tutorial Install Red5 and JDK on Centos.

This installation was done from windows so we used  WinSCP and PuTTy (free software)  and was inspired from online tutorials.
This installation was done fluently: if you go to other folders and do other tasks during the installation make sure you return to the right folder before resuming.

If you’re doing this remotely comment any line referring to cdrom as source from /etc/apt/sources.list .

Some prerequisites:
add-apt-repository ppa:sun-java-community-team/sun-java6
apt-get update
apt-get upgrade
apt-get install locate
updatedb

Installed required packages one by one:

apt-get install subversion
apt-get install java-package
apt-get install sun-java6-jdk
apt-get install ant

Used arrows to browse to the Ok and confirm on jdk installation dialogs.

Verified installed java version:
java -version

Downloaded latest Red5:
mkdir -p ~/svn/red5
cd ~/svn/red5
svn co http://red5.googlecode.com/svn/java/server/trunk red5

Build Red5 with Ant:
export JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun/
export ANT_HOME=/usr/share/ant/
cd ~/svn/red5/red5
/usr/share/ant/bin/ant

Installed Red5:
mkdir /usr/share/red5
cp -R dist/* /usr/share/red5/
cd /usr/share/red5
chmod 755 red5.sh
chmod 755 red5-shutdown.sh

Started Red5:
./red5.sh > start.log &

Verified opened ports:
netstat -ant

To install a new rtmp application you need to:

1. Copy application to /usr/share/red5/webapps (i.e. /usr/share/red5/webapps/videowhisper as explained on VideoWhisper RTMP Applications)
2. Shutdown red5
   cd /usr/share/red5
   ./red5-shutdown.sh
3. Restart red5
   ./red5.sh > restart.log &

An alternative to doing the red5 installation yourself would be to order red5 installation .

If you don’t have the time and experience to run your own server or vps, you should use managed red5 hosting .

VideoWhisper.com upgraded the Live Streaming application bringing several improvements and optimizations requested by users.

Some of the improvements:

• advanced webcam settings (change realtime resolution, framerate, audio rate)
• fullscreen button for video watching interface
• fullscreen on click for embedded plain video stream interface
• generate updated jpg snapshots for each live stream
• timers (displayed on each interface depending on settings) can be used to control access, integrate in pay per view systems
• multiple new options and parameters passed from script side

Also some RTMP application improvements should be mentioned like external player support and live video archiving as FLV for the Red5 application.

Upgrades are available for download on VideoWhisper.com and do not involve any costs for free or paid licenses.

First edition available with the upgrade is the PHP edition. The rest should follow shortly.