Streaming the Linux desktop to Kodi using VLC and RTSP

12th July 2018

A while back, I was asked by a friend how to stream the desktop to -my projector connected to Kodi. I sadly had to admit that I had no -idea, as it was a task I never had tried. Since then, I have been -looking for a way to do so, preferable without much extra software to -install on either side. Today I found a way that seem to kind of -work. Not great, but it is a start.

- -

I had a look at several approaches, for example -using uPnP -DLNA as described in 2011, but it required a uPnP server, fuse and -local storage enough to store the stream locally. This is not going -to work well for me, lacking enough free space, and it would -impossible for my friend to get working.

- -

Next, it occurred to me that perhaps I could use VLC to create a -video stream that Kodi could play. Preferably using -broadcast/multicast, to avoid having to change any setup on the Kodi -side when starting such stream. Unfortunately, the only recipe I -could find using multicast used the rtp protocol, and this protocol -seem to not be supported by Kodi.

- -

On the other hand, the rtsp protocol is working! Unfortunately I -have to specify the IP address of the streaming machine in both the -sending command and the file on the Kodi server. But it is showing my -desktop, and thus allow us to have a shared look on the big screen at -the programs I work on.

- -

I did not spend much time investigating codeces. I combined the -rtp and rtsp recipes from -the -VLC Streaming HowTo/Command Line Examples, and was able to get -this working on the desktop/streaming end.

- -

-vlc screen:// --sout \
-  '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{dst=projector.local,port=1234,sdp=rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp}'
-

- -

I ssh-ed into my Kodi box and created a file like this with the -same IP address:

- -

-echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp \
-  > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
-

- -

Note the 192.168.11.4 IP address is my desktops IP address. As far -as I can tell the IP must be hardcoded for this to work. In other -words, if someone elses machine is going to do the steaming, you have -to update screenstream.m3u on the Kodi machine and adjust the vlc -recipe. To get started, locate the file in Kodi and select the m3u -file while the VLC stream is running. The desktop then show up in my -big screen. :)

- -

When using the same technique to stream a video file with audio, -the audio quality is really bad. No idea if the problem is package -loss or bad parameters for the transcode. I do not know VLC nor Kodi -enough to tell.

- -

Update 2018-07-12: Johannes Schauer send me a few -succestions and reminded me about an important step. The "screen:" -input source is only available once the vlc-plugin-access-extra -package is installed on Debian. Without it, you will see this error -message: "VLC is unable to open the MRL 'screen://'. Check the log -for details." He further found that it is possible to drop some parts -of the VLC command line to reduce the amount of hardcoded information. -It is also useful to consider using cvlc to avoid having the VLC -window in the desktop view. In sum, this give us this command line on -the source end - -

-cvlc screen:// --sout \
-  '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{sdp=rtsp://:8080/}'
-

- -

and this on the Kodi end

- -

-echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/ \
-  > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
-

- -

Still bad image quality, though. But I did discover that streaming -a DVD using dvdsimple:///dev/dvd as the source had excellent video and -audio quality, so I guess the issue is in the input or transcoding -parts, not the rtsp part. I've tried to change the vb and ab -parameters to use more bandwidth, but it did not make a -difference.

- -

I further received a suggestion from Einar Haraldseid to try using -gstreamer instead of VLC, and this proved to work great! He also -provided me with the trick to get Kodi to use a multicast stream as -its source. By using this monstrous oneliner, I can stream my desktop -with good video quality in reasonable framerate to the 239.255.0.1 -multicast address on port 1234: - -

-gst-launch-1.0 ximagesrc use-damage=0 ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1 ! \
-  videoconvert ! queue2 ! \
-  x264enc bitrate=8000 speed-preset=superfast tune=zerolatency qp-min=30 \
-  key-int-max=15 bframes=2 ! video/x-h264,profile=high ! queue2 ! \
-  mpegtsmux alignment=7 name=mux ! rndbuffersize max=1316 min=1316 ! \
-  udpsink host=239.255.0.1 port=1234 ttl-mc=1 auto-multicast=1 sync=0 \
-  pulsesrc device=$(pactl list | grep -A2 'Source #' | \
-    grep 'Name: .*\.monitor$' |  cut -d" " -f2|head -1) ! \
-  audioconvert ! queue2 ! avenc_aac ! queue2 ! mux.
-

- -

and this on the Kodi end

- -

-echo udp://@239.255.0.1:1234 \
-  > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
-

- -

Note the trick to pick a valid pulseaudio source. It might not -pick the one you need. This approach will of course lead to trouble -if more than one source uses the same multicast port and address. -Note the ttl-mc=1 setting, which limit the multicast packages to the -local network. If the value is increased, your screen will be -broadcasted further, one network "hop" for each increase (read up on -multicast to learn more. :)!

- -

Having cracked how to get Kodi to receive multicast streams, I -could use this VLC command to stream to the same multicast address. -The image quality is way better than the rtsp approach, but gstreamer -seem to be doing a better job.

- -

-cvlc screen:// --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{mux=ts,dst=239.255.0.1,port=1234,sdp=sap}'
-

- -

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my -activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address -15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

CasparCG Server for TV broadcast playout in Debian

15th January 2019

The layered video playout server created by Sveriges Television, +CasparCG Server, entered Debian +today. This completes many months of work to get the source ready to +go into Debian. The first upload to the Debian NEW queue happened a +month ago, but the work upstream to prepare it for Debian started more +than two and a half month ago. So far +the +casparcg-server package is only available for amd64, but I hope +this can be improved. The package is in contrib because it depend on +the non-free fdk-aac +library. The Debian package lack support for streaming web pages +because Debian is missing CEF, Chromium Embedded Framework. CEF is +wanted by several packages in Debian. But because the Chromium source +is not available as a build +dependency, it is not yet possible to upload CEF to Debian. I +hope this will change in the future.

+ +

The reason I got involved is that +the Norwegian open channel +Frikanalen is starting to use CasparCG for our HD playout, and I +would like to have all the free software tools we use to run the TV +channel available as packages from the Debian project. The last +remaining piece in the puzzle is Open Broadcast Encoder, but it depend +on quite a lot of patched libraries which would have to be included in +Debian first.

- Tags: debian, english, video. + Tags: english, frikanalen, multimedia, video.

@@ -169,112 +59,50 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

What is the most supported MIME type in Debian in 2018?

9th July 2018

Five years ago, -I -measured what the most supported MIME type in Debian was, by -analysing the desktop files in all packages in the archive. Since -then, the DEP-11 AppStream system has been put into production, making -the task a lot easier. This made me want to repeat the measurement, -to see how much things changed. Here are the new numbers, for -unstable only this time: - -

Debian Unstable:

- -

-  count MIME type
-  ----- -----------------------
-     56 image/jpeg
-     55 image/png
-     49 image/tiff
-     48 image/gif
-     39 image/bmp
-     38 text/plain
-     37 audio/mpeg
-     34 application/ogg
-     33 audio/x-flac
-     32 audio/x-mp3
-     30 audio/x-wav
-     30 audio/x-vorbis+ogg
-     29 image/x-portable-pixmap
-     27 inode/directory
-     27 image/x-portable-bitmap
-     27 audio/x-mpeg
-     26 application/x-ogg
-     25 audio/x-mpegurl
-     25 audio/ogg
-     24 text/html
-

- -

The list was created like this using a sid chroot: "cat -/var/lib/apt/lists/*sid*_dep11_Components-amd64.yml.gz| zcat | awk '/^ -- \S+\/\S+$/ {print $2 }' | sort | uniq -c | sort -nr | head -20"

- -

It is interesting to see how image formats have passed text/plain -as the most announced supported MIME type. These days, thanks to the -AppStream system, if you run into a file format you do not know, and -want to figure out which packages support the format, you can find the -MIME type of the file using "file --mime <filename>", and then -look up all packages announcing support for this format in their -AppStream metadata (XML or .desktop file) using "appstreamcli -what-provides mimetype <mime-type>. For example if you, like -me, want to know which packages support inode/directory, you can get a -list like this:

- -

-% appstreamcli what-provides mimetype inode/directory | grep Package: | sort
-Package: anjuta
-Package: audacious
-Package: baobab
-Package: cervisia
-Package: chirp
-Package: dolphin
-Package: doublecmd-common
-Package: easytag
-Package: enlightenment
-Package: ephoto
-Package: filelight
-Package: gwenview
-Package: k4dirstat
-Package: kaffeine
-Package: kdesvn
-Package: kid3
-Package: kid3-qt
-Package: nautilus
-Package: nemo
-Package: pcmanfm
-Package: pcmanfm-qt
-Package: qweborf
-Package: ranger
-Package: sirikali
-Package: spacefm
-Package: spacefm
-Package: vifm
-%
-

- -

Using the same method, I can quickly discover that the Sketchup file -format is not yet supported by any package in Debian:

- -

-% appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/vnd.sketchup.skp
-Could not find component providing 'mimetype::application/vnd.sketchup.skp'.
-%
-

- -

Yesterday I used it to figure out which packages support the STL 3D -format:

- -

-% appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/sla|grep Package
-Package: cura
-Package: meshlab
-Package: printrun
-%
-

- -

PS: A new version of Cura was uploaded to Debian yesterday.

Learn to program with Minetest on Debian

15th December 2018

A fun way to learn how to program +Python is to follow the +instructions in the book +"Learn to program +with Minecraft", which introduces programming in Python to people +who like to play with Minecraft. The book uses a Python library to +talk to a TCP/IP socket with an API accepting build instructions and +providing information about the current players in a Minecraft world. +The TCP/IP API was first created for the Minecraft implementation for +Raspberry Pi, and has since been ported to some server versions of +Minecraft. The book contain recipes for those using Windows, MacOSX +and Raspian. But a little known fact is that you can follow the same +recipes using the free software construction game +Minetest.

+ +

There is a +Minetest module implementing the same API, making it possible to +use the Python programs coded to talk to Minecraft with Minetest too. +I +uploaded +this module to Debian two weeks ago, and as soon as it clears the +FTP masters NEW queue, learning to program Python with Minetest on +Debian will be a simple 'apt install' away. The Debian package is +maintained as part of the Debian Games team, and +the +packaging rules are currently located under 'unfinished' on +Salsa.

+ +

You will most likely need to install several of the Minetest +modules in Debian for the examples included with the library to work +well, as there are several blocks used by the example scripts that are +provided via modules in Minetest. Without the required blocks, a +simple stone block is used instead. My initial testing with a analog +clock did not get gold arms as instructed in the python library, but +instead used stone arms.

+ +

I tried to find a way to add the API to the desktop version of +Minecraft, but were unable to find any working recipes. The +recipes +I found are only +working with a standalone Minecraft server setup. Are there any +options to use with the normal desktop version?

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address @@ -283,7 +111,7 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

- Tags: debian, english, isenkram. + Tags: debian, english.

@@ -291,74 +119,30 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

Debian APT upgrade without enough free space on the disk...

8th July 2018

Quite regularly, I let my Debian Sid/Unstable chroot stay untouch -for a while, and when I need to update it there is not enough free -space on the disk for apt to do a normal 'apt upgrade'. I normally -would resolve the issue by doing 'apt install <somepackages>' to -upgrade only some of the packages in one batch, until the amount of -packages to download fall below the amount of free space available. -Today, I had about 500 packages to upgrade, and after a while I got -tired of trying to install chunks of packages manually. I concluded -that I did not have the spare hours required to complete the task, and -decided to see if I could automate it. I came up with this small -script which I call 'apt-in-chunks':

- -

-#!/bin/sh
-#
-# Upgrade packages when the disk is too full to upgrade every
-# upgradable package in one lump.  Fetching packages to upgrade using
-# apt, and then installing using dpkg, to avoid changing the package
-# flag for manual/automatic.
-
-set -e
-
-ignore() {
-    if [ "$1" ]; then
-	grep -v "$1"
-    else
-	cat
-    fi
-}
-
-for p in $(apt list --upgradable | ignore "$@" |cut -d/ -f1 | grep -v '^Listing...'); do
-    echo "Upgrading $p"
-    apt clean
-    apt install --download-only -y $p
-    for f in /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb; do
-	if [ -e "$f" ]; then
-	    dpkg -i /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb
-	    break
-	fi
-    done
-done
-

- -

The script will extract the list of packages to upgrade, try to -download the packages needed to upgrade one package, install the -downloaded packages using dpkg. The idea is to upgrade packages -without changing the APT mark for the package (ie the one recording of -the package was manually requested or pulled in as a dependency). To -use it, simply run it as root from the command line. If it fail, try -'apt install -f' to clean up the mess and run the script again. This -might happen if the new packages conflict with one of the old -packages. dpkg is unable to remove, while apt can do this.

- -

It take one option, a package to ignore in the list of packages to -upgrade. The option to ignore a package is there to be able to skip -the packages that are simply too large to unpack. Today this was -'ghc', but I have run into other large packages causing similar -problems earlier (like TeX).

- -

Update 2018-07-08: Thanks to Paul Wise, I am aware of two -alternative ways to handle this. The "unattended-upgrades ---minimal-upgrade-steps" option will try to calculate upgrade sets for -each package to upgrade, and then upgrade them in order, smallest set -first. It might be a better option than my above mentioned script. -Also, "aptutude upgrade" can upgrade single packages, thus avoiding -the need for using "dpkg -i" in the script above.

Non-blocking bittorrent plugin for vlc

12th December 2018

A few hours ago, a new and improved version (2.4) of +the VLC +bittorrent plugin was uploaded to Debian. This new version +include a complete rewrite of the bittorrent related code, which seem +to make the plugin non-blocking. This mean you can actually exit VLC +even when the plugin seem to be unable to get the bittorrent streaming +started. The new version also include support for filtering playlist +by file extension using command line options, if you want to avoid +processing audio, video or images. The package is currently in Debian +unstable, but should be available in Debian testing in two days. To +test it, simply install it like this:

+ +

+apt install vlc-plugin-bittorrent
+

+ +

After it is installed, you can try to use it to play a file +downloaded live via bittorrent like this: + +

+vlc https://archive.org/download/Glass_201703/Glass_201703_archive.torrent
+

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address @@ -367,7 +151,7 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

- Tags: debian, english. + Tags: english, verkidetfri, video.

@@ -375,32 +159,55 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

The worlds only stone power plant?

30th June 2018

So far, at least hydro-electric power, coal power, wind power, -solar power, and wood power are well known. Until a few days ago, I -had never heard of stone power. Then I learn about a quarry in a -mountain in -Bremanger i -Norway, where -the -Bremanger Quarry company is extracting stone and dumping the stone -into a shaft leading to its shipping harbour. This downward movement -in this shaft is used to produce electricity. In short, it is using -falling rocks instead of falling water to produce electricity, and -according to its own statements it is producing more power than it is -using, and selling the surplus electricity to the Norwegian power -grid. I find the concept truly amazing. Is this the worlds only -stone power plant?

Retten til kontant betaling er en rettighet som mÃ¥ brukes for Ã¥ beholdes

11th December 2018

FNs +menneskerettighetserklÃ¦ring artikkel 13 fÃ¸rste punkt lyder som +fÃ¸lger:

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my -activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address -15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

+Enhver har rett til Ã¥ bevege seg fritt og til fritt Ã¥ velge +oppholdssted innenfor en stats grenser. +

+ +

Det er altsÃ¥ en menneskerett Ã¥ kunne bevege seg fritt i landet. +For Ã¥ bevege seg fritt i landet, sÃ¥ mÃ¥ en kunne bevege seg uten Ã¥ bli +sporet. Det vil i dagens samfunn innebÃ¦re Ã¥ bevege seg uten Ã¥ legge +igjen digitale spor og uten Ã¥ vÃ¦re radiomerket. Hvis en vet at ens +bevegelser, hvor en befinner seg nÃ¥r, og hvem som befinner seg i +nÃ¦rheten, blir samlet inn og gjort tilgjengelig for fremmede, det vÃ¦re +seg myndighetene eller private organisasjoner, sÃ¥ kan en ikke lenger +bevege seg fritt. Dette gjÃ¸r at det er en forutsetning for Ã¥ ha glede +av retten til Ã¥ bevege seg fritt i landet at en motstÃ¥r fristelsen til +Ã¥ legge igjen digitale spor nÃ¥r en betaler for seg. Rettigheter som +ikke blir brukt, blir fjernet. Den eneste mÃ¥ten i dag Ã¥ unngÃ¥ Ã¥ legge +igjen digitale spor nÃ¥r en betaler for seg, er Ã¥ betale med kontanter, +samt takke nei til Ã¥ legge igjen navn og adresse (slik f.eks. ElkjÃ¸p +ber om — jeg sier de kan legge inn Â«anonym anonymÂ» nÃ¥r +datasystemet deres trenger et navn). Personlig anbefaler jeg Ã¥ +konsekvent bruke kontant betaling nÃ¥r man beveger seg rundt, for Ã¥ +bidra til forsvaret av menneskerettighetene i Norge. Kanskje noe ogsÃ¥ +for deg? Merk at det ikke er tilstrekkelig for Ã¥ unngÃ¥ sporing Ã¥ +betale med kontanter, men det er et lite steg i riktig retning.

+ +

Det er flere andre argumenter i tillegg til +menneskerettighetsargumentet for Ã¥ bruke kontanter. I gÃ¥r hadde +Dagbladet en utmerket kommentar av sin journalist John Olav Egeland om +hvilket +kontantlÃ¸st +diktatur som venter oss hvis mange nok slutter Ã¥ insistere pÃ¥ Ã¥ +betale med kontanter. Jeg anbefaler deg Ã¥ lese den.

+ +

Som vanlig, hvis du bruker Bitcoin og Ã¸nsker Ã¥ vise din stÃ¸tte til +det jeg driver med, setter jeg pris pÃ¥ om du sender Bitcoin-donasjoner +til min adresse +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b. +Merk, betaling med bitcoin er ikke anonymt. :)

- Tags: english. + Tags: norsk, personvern.

@@ -408,57 +215,36 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

Add-on to control the projector from within Kodi

26th June 2018

My movie playing setup involve Kodi, -OpenELEC (probably soon to be -replaced with LibreELEC) and an -Infocus IN76 video projector. My projector can be controlled via both -a infrared remote controller, and a RS-232 serial line. The vendor of -my projector, InFocus, had been -sensible enough to document the serial protocol in its user manual, so -it is easily available, and I used it some years ago to write -a -small script to control the projector. For a while now, I longed -for a setup where the projector was controlled by Kodi, for example in -such a way that when the screen saver went on, the projector was -turned off, and when the screen saver exited, the projector was turned -on again.

- -

A few days ago, with very good help from parts of my family, I -managed to find a Kodi Add-on for controlling a Epson projector, and -got in touch with its author to see if we could join forces and make a -Add-on with support for several projectors. To my pleasure, he was -positive to the idea, and we set out to add InFocus support to his -add-on, and make the add-on suitable for the official Kodi add-on -repository.

- -

The Add-on is now working (for me, at least), with a few minor -adjustments. The most important change I do relative to the master -branch in the github repository is embedding the -pyserial module in -the add-on. The long term solution is to make a "script" type -pyserial module for Kodi, that can be pulled in as a dependency in -Kodi. But until that in place, I embed it.

- -

The add-on can be configured to turn on the projector when Kodi -starts, off when Kodi stops as well as turn the projector off when the -screensaver start and on when the screesaver stops. It can also be -told to set the projector source when turning on the projector. - -

If this sound interesting to you, check out -the -project github repository. Perhaps you can send patches to -support your projector too? As soon as we find time to wrap up the -latest changes, it should be available for easy installation using any -Kodi instance.

- -

For future improvements, I would like to add projector model -detection and the ability to adjust the brightness level of the -projector from within Kodi. We also need to figure out how to handle -the cooling period of the projector. My projector refuses to turn on -for 60 seconds after it was turned off. This is not handled well by -the add-on at the moment.

Why is your site not using Content Security Policy / CSP?

9th December 2018

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of watching on Frikanalen the OWASP +talk by Scott Helme titled +"What Weâve Learned From +Billions of Security Reports". I had not heard of the +Content +Security Policy standard nor its ability to "call home" when a +browser detect a policy breach (I do not follow web page design +development much these days), and found the talk very illuminating.

+ +

The mechanism allow a web site owner to use HTTP headers to tell +visitors web browser which sources (internal and external) are allowed to +be used on the web site. Thus it become possible to enforce a "only +local content" policy despite web designers urge to fetch programs +from random sites on the Internet, like the one +enabling +the attack reported by Scott Helme earlier this year.

+ +

Using CSP seem like an obvious thing for a site admin to implement +to take some control over the information leak that occur when +external sources are used to render web pages, it is a mystery more +sites are not using CSP? It is being +standardized under W3C these +days, and is supposed by most web browsers

+ +

I managed to find a +Django middleware for implementing CSP and was happy to discover +it was already in Debian. I plan to use it to add CSP support to the +Frikanalen web site soon.

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address @@ -467,7 +253,7 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

- Tags: english, multimedia, video. + Tags: english, standard, web.

@@ -475,71 +261,46 @@ activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address

youtube-dl for nedlasting fra NRK med undertekster - nice free software

28th April 2018

I VHS-kassettenes -tid var det rett frem Ã¥ ta vare pÃ¥ et TV-program en Ã¸nsket Ã¥ kunne se -senere, uten Ã¥ vÃ¦re avhengig av at programmet ble sendt pÃ¥ nytt. -Kanskje Ã¸nsket en Ã¥ se programmet pÃ¥ hytten der det ikke var -TV-signal, eller av andre grunner ha det tilgjengelig for fremtidig -fornÃ¸yelse. Dette er blitt vanskeligere med introduksjon av -digital-TV og webstreaming, der opptak til harddisk er utenfor de -flestes kontroll hvis de bruker ufri programvare og bokser kontrollert -av andre. Men for NRK her i Norge, finnes det heldigvis flere fri -programvare-alternativer, som jeg har -skrevet -om -fÃ¸r. -SÃ¥ lenge kilden for nedlastingen er lovlig lagt ut pÃ¥ nett (hvilket -jeg antar NRK gjÃ¸r), sÃ¥ er slik lagring til privat bruk ogsÃ¥ lovlig i -Norge.

- -

Sist jeg sÃ¥ pÃ¥ saken, i 2016, nevnte jeg at -youtube-dl ikke kunne -bake undertekster fra NRK inn i videofilene, og at jeg derfor -foretrakk andre alternativer. Nylig oppdaget jeg at dette har endret -seg. Fordelen med youtube-dl er at den er tilgjengelig direkte fra -Linux-distribusjoner som Debian -og Ubuntu, slik at en slipper Ã¥ -finne ut selv hvordan en skal fÃ¥ dem til Ã¥ virke.

- -

For Ã¥ laste ned et NRK-innslag med undertekster, og fÃ¥ den norske -underteksten pakket inn i videofilen, sÃ¥ kan fÃ¸lgende kommando -brukes:

New and improved Frikanalen Kodi addon version 0.0.3

8th November 2018

If you read my blog regularly, you probably know I am involved in +running and developing the Norwegian +TV channel Frikanalen. It is an open channel, allowing everyone +in Norway to publish videos on a TV channel with national coverage. +You can think of it as Youtube for national television. +In addition to distribution on RiksTV and Uninett, Frikanalen is also +available as a Kodi addon. The last few days I have updated the code +to add more features. A +new +and improved version 0.0.3 Frikanalen addon was just made +available via the Kodi repositories. This new version include a +option to browse videos by category, as well as free text search +in the video archive. It will now also show the video duration in the +video lists, which were missing earlier. A new and experimental +link to the HD video stream currently being worked on is provided, for +those that want to see what the CasparCG +output look like. The alternative is the SD video stream, generated +using MLT. CasparCG is controlled by our +mltplayout +server which instead of talking to mlt is giving PLAY instructions +to the CasparCG server when it is time to start a new program.

+ +

By now, you are probably wondering what kind of content is being +played on the channel. These days, it is filled with technical +presentations like those from NUUG, +Debconf, Makercon, and TED, +but there are also some periods with +EMPT TV and +P7. -

-youtube-dl --write-sub --sub-format ttml \
-  --convert-subtitles srt --embed-subs \
-  https://tv.nrk.no/serie/ramm-ferdig-gaa/MUHU11000316/27-04-2018
-

- -

URL-eksemplet er dagens toppsak pÃ¥ tv.nrk.no. Resultatet er en -MP4-fil med filmen og undertekster som kan spilles av med VLC. Merk -at VLC ikke viser frem undertekster fÃ¸r du aktiverer dem. For Ã¥ gjÃ¸re -det, hÃ¸yreklikk med musa i fremviservinduet, velg menyvalget for -undertekst og sÃ¥ norsk sprÃ¥k. Jeg testet ogsÃ¥ '--write-auto-sub', -men det kommandolinjeargumentet ser ikke ut til Ã¥ fungere, sÃ¥ jeg -endte opp med settet med argumentlisten over, som jeg fant i en -feilrapport i youtube-dl-prosjektets samling over feilrapporter.

- -

Denne stÃ¸tten i youtube-dl gjÃ¸r det svÃ¦rt enkelt Ã¥ lagre -NRK-innslag, det vÃ¦re seg nyheter, filmer, serier eller dokumentater, -for Ã¥ ha dem tilgjengelig for fremtidig referanse og bruk, uavhengig -av hvor lenge innslagene ligger tilgjengelig hos NRK. SÃ¥ fÃ¥r det ikke -hjelpe at NRKs jurister mener at det er -vesensforskjellig -Ã¥ legge tilgjengelig for nedlasting og for streaming, nÃ¥r det rent -teknisk er samme sak.

- -

Programmet youtube-dl stÃ¸tter ogsÃ¥ en rekke andre nettsteder, se -prosjektoversikten for -en -komplett liste.

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my +activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

- Tags: multimedia, nice free software, norsk, video, web. + Tags: english, frikanalen, kodi, video.

@@ -547,27 +308,42 @@ komplett liste.

Stortingsflertallet gÃ¥r inn for ny IP-basert sensurinfrastruktur i Norge

24th April 2018

VG, -Dagbladet -og -NRK -melder i dag at flertallet i Familie- og kulturkomiteen pÃ¥ Stortinget -har bestemt seg for Ã¥ introdusere en ny sensurinfrastruktur i Norge. -Fra fÃ¸r har Norge en Â«frivilligÂ» sensurinfrastruktur basert pÃ¥ -DNS-navn, der de stÃ¸rste ISP-ene basert pÃ¥ en liste med DNS-navn -forgifter DNS-svar og omdirigerer til et annet IP-nummer enn det som -ligger i DNS. NÃ¥ kommer altsÃ¥ IP-basert omdirigering i tillegg. NÃ¥r -infrastrukturen er pÃ¥ plass, er sensur av IP-adresser redusert et -spÃ¸rsmÃ¥l om hvilke IP-nummer som skal blokkeres. Listen over -IP-adresser vil naturligvis endre seg etter hvert som myndighetene -endrer seg. Det er ingen betryggende tanke.

Time for an official MIME type for patches?

1st November 2018

As part of my involvement in +the Nikita +archive API project, I've been importing a fairly large lump of +emails into a test instance of the archive to see how well this would +go. I picked a subset of my +notmuch email database, all public emails sent to me via +@lists.debian.org, giving me a set of around 216 000 emails to import. +In the process, I had a look at the various attachments included in +these emails, to figure out what to do with attachments, and noticed +that one of the most common attachment formats do not have +an +official MIME type registered with IANA/IETF. The output from +diff, ie the input for patch, is on the top 10 list of formats +included in these emails. At the moment people seem to use either +text/x-patch or text/x-diff, but neither is officially registered. It +would be better if one official MIME type were registered and used +everywhere.

+ +

To try to get one official MIME type for these files, I've brought +up the topic on +the +media-types mailing list. If you are interested in discussion +which MIME type to use as the official for patch files, or involved in +making software using a MIME type for patches, perhaps you would like +to join the discussion?

+ +

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my +activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

- Tags: norsk, sikkerhet. + Tags: debian, english, standard.

@@ -575,40 +351,79 @@ endrer seg. Det er ingen betryggende tanke.

En grunn til Ã¥ takke nei til usikker digital post

2nd April 2018

Brevpost er beskyttet av straffelovens bestemmelse som gjÃ¸r det -kriminelt Ã¥ Ã¥pne andres brev. Dette fÃ¸lger av (ny) straffelovs -Â§ 205 -(Krenkelse av retten til privat kommunikasjon), som sier at Â«Med -bot eller fengsel inntil 2 Ã¥r straffes den som uberettiget ... c) -Ã¥pner brev eller annen lukket skriftlig meddelelse som er adressert -til en annen, eller pÃ¥ annen mÃ¥te skaffer seg uberettiget tilgang til -innholdet.Â» Dette gjelder sÃ¥vel postbud som alle andre som har -befatning med brevet etter at avsender har befatning med et lukket -brev. Tilsvarende stÃ¥r ogsÃ¥ tidligere utgaver av den norske -straffeloven.

- -

NÃ¥r en registrerer seg pÃ¥ usikre digitale postkasselÃ¸sningene, som -f.eks. Digipost og e-Boks, og slik tar disse i bruk, sÃ¥ gir en de som -stÃ¥r bak lÃ¸sningene tillatelse til Ã¥ Ã¥pne sine brev. Dette er -nÃ¸dvendig for at innholdet i digital post skal kunne vises frem til -mottaker via tjenestens websider. Dermed gjelder ikke straffelovens -paragraf om forbud mot Ã¥ Ã¥pne brev, da tilgangen ikke lenger er -uberettiget. En gir altsÃ¥ fremmede tilgang til Ã¥ lese sin -korrespondanse. I tillegg vil bruk av slike usikre digitale -postbokser fÃ¸re til at det blir registrert nÃ¥r du leser brevene, hvor -du befinner deg (vha. tilkoblingens IP-adresse), hvilket utstyr du -bruker og en rekke annen personlig informasjon som ikke er -tilgjengelig nÃ¥r papirpost brukes. Jeg foretrekker at det er -lovmessig beskyttelse av min korrespondanse, som jo inneholder privat -og personlig informasjon. Det bidrar til litt bedre vern av personlig -integritet i dagens norske samfunn.

Measuring the speaker frequency response using the AUDMES free software GUI - nice free software

22nd October 2018

+ +

My current home stereo is a patchwork of various pieces I got on +flee markeds over the years. It is amazing what kind of equipment +show up there. I've been wondering for a while if it was possible to +measure how well this equipment is working together, and decided to +see how far I could get using free software. After trawling the web I +came across an article from DIY Audio and Video on +Speaker +Testing and Analysis describing how to test speakers, and it listing +several software options, among them +AUDio MEasurement +System (AUDMES). It is the only free software system I could find +focusing on measuring speakers and audio frequency response. In the +process I also found an interesting article from NOVO on +Understanding +Speaker Specifications and Frequency Response and an article from +ecoustics on +Understanding +Speaker Frequency Response, with a lot of information on what to +look for and how to interpret the graphs. Armed with this knowledge, +I set out to measure the state of my speakers.

+ +

The first hurdle was that AUDMES hadn't seen a commit for 10 years +and did not build with current compilers and libraries. I got in +touch with its author, who no longer was spending time on the program +but gave me write access to the subversion repository on Sourceforge. +The end result is that now the code build on Linux and is capable of +saving and loading the collected frequency response data in CSV +format. The application is quite nice and flexible, and I was able to +select the input and output audio interfaces independently. This made +it possible to use a USB mixer as the input source, while sending +output via my laptop headphone connection. I lacked the hardware and +cabling to figure out a different way to get independent cabling to +speakers and microphone.

+ +

Using this setup I could see how a large range of high frequencies +apparently were not making it out of my speakers. The picture show +the frequency response measurement of one of the speakers. Note the +frequency lines seem to be slightly misaligned, compared to the CSV +output from the program. I can not hear several of these are high +frequencies, according to measurement from +Free Hearing Test +Software, an freeware system to measure your hearing (still +looking for a free software alternative), so I do not know if they are +coming out out the speakers. I thus do not quite know how to figure +out if the missing frequencies is a problem with the microphone, the +amplifier or the speakers, but I managed to rule out the audio card in my +PC by measuring my Bose noise canceling headset using its own +microphone. This setup was able to see the high frequency tones, so +the problem with my stereo had to be in the amplifier or speakers.

+ +

Anyway, to try to role out one factor I ended up picking up a new +set of speakers at a flee marked, and these work a lot better than the +old speakers, so I guess the microphone and amplifier is OK. If you +need to measure your own speakers, check out AUDMES. If more people +get involved, perhaps the project could become good enough to +include in Debian? And if +you know of some other free software to measure speakers and amplifier +performance, please let me know. I am aware of the freeware option +REW, but I want something +that can be developed also when the vendor looses interest.

+ +

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my +activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

- Tags: norsk, personvern, surveillance. + Tags: english, nice free software.

@@ -616,34 +431,67 @@ integritet i dagens norske samfunn.

Self-appointed leaders of the Free World

22nd March 2018

The leaders of the worlds have started to congratulate the -re-elected Russian head of state, and this causes some criticism. I -am though a little fascinated by a comment from USA senator John McCain, -sited -by The Hill and others: +

Web browser integration of VLC with Bittorrent support

21st October 2018

Bittorrent is as far as I know, currently the most efficient way to +distribute content on the Internet. It is used all by all sorts of +content providers, from national TV stations like +NRK, Linux distributors like +Debian and +Ubuntu, and of course the +Internet archive. + +

Almost a month ago +a new +package adding Bittorrent support to VLC became available in +Debian testing and unstable. To test it, simply install it like +this:

-
"An American president does not lead the Free World by -congratulating dictators on winning sham elections."
-

+apt install vlc-plugin-bittorrent
+

While I totally agree with the senator here, the way the quote is -phrased make me suspect that he is unaware of the simple fact that USA -have not lead the Free World since at least before its government -kidnapped a -completely innocent Canadian citizen in transit on his way home to -Canada via John F. Kennedy International Airport in September 2002 and -sent him to be tortured in Syria for a year.

Since the plugin was made available for the first time in Debian, +several improvements have been made to it. In version 2.2-4, now +available in both testing and unstable, a desktop file is provided to +teach browsers to start VLC when the user click on torrent files or +magnet links. The last part is thanks to me finally understanding +what the strange x-scheme-handler style MIME types in desktop files +are used for. By adding x-scheme-handler/magnet to the MimeType entry +in the desktop file, at least the browsers Firefox and Chromium will +suggest to start VLC when selecting a magnet URI on a web page. The +end result is that now, with the plugin installed in Buster and Sid, +one can visit any +Internet +Archive page with movies using a web browser and click on the +torrent link to start streaming the movie.

+ +

Note, there is still some misfeatures in the plugin. One is the +fact that it will hang and +block VLC +from exiting until the torrent streaming starts. Another is the +fact that it +will pick +and play a random file in a multi file torrent. This is not +always the video file you want. Combined with the first it can be a +bit hard to get the video streaming going. But when it work, it seem +to do a good job.

+ +

For the Debian packaging, I would love to find a good way to test +if the plugin work with VLC using autopkgtest. I tried, but do not +know enough of the inner workings of VLC to get it working. For now +the autopkgtest script is only checking if the .so file was +successfully loaded by VLC. If you have any suggestions, please +submit a patch to the Debian bug tracking system.

USA might be running ahead, but the path they are taking is not the -one taken by any Free World.

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my +activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

- Tags: english. + Tags: english, verkidetfri, video.

@@ -651,63 +499,80 @@ one taken by any Free World.

Facebooks ability to sell your personal information is the real Cambridge Analytica scandal

21st March 2018

So, Cambridge Analytica is getting some well deserved criticism for -(mis)using information it got from Facebook about 50 million people, -mostly in the USA. What I find a bit surprising, is how little -criticism Facebook is getting for handing the information over to -Cambridge Analytica and others in the first place. And what about the -people handing their private and personal information to Facebook? -And last, but not least, what about the government offices who are -handing information about the visitors of their web pages to Facebook? -No-one who looked at the terms of use of Facebook should be surprised -that information about peoples interests, political views, personal -lifes and whereabouts would be sold by Facebook.

- -

What I find to be the real scandal is the fact that Facebook is -selling your personal information, not that one of the buyers used it -in a way Facebook did not approve when exposed. It is well known that -Facebook is selling out their users privacy, but a scandal -nevertheless. Of course the information provided to them by Facebook -would be misused by one of the parties given access to personal -information about the millions of Facebook users. Collected -information will be misused sooner or later. The only way to avoid -such misuse, is to not collect the information in the first place. If -you do not want Facebook to hand out information about yourself for -the use and misuse of its customers, do not give Facebook the -information.

- -

Personally, I would recommend to completely remove your Facebook -account, and take back some control of your personal information. -According -to The Guardian, it is a bit hard to find out how to request -account removal (and not just 'disabling'). You need to -visit -a specific Facebook page and click on 'let us know' on that page -to get to the -real account deletion screen. Perhaps something to consider? I -would not trust the information to really be deleted (who knows, -perhaps NSA, GCHQ and FRA already got a copy), but it might reduce the -exposure a bit.

- -

If you want to learn more about the capabilities of Cambridge -Analytica, I recommend to see the video recording of the one hour talk -Paul-Olivier Dehaye gave to NUUG last april about - -Data collection, psychometric profiling and their impact on -politics.

- -

And if you want to communicate with your friends and loved ones, -use some end-to-end encrypted method like -Signal or -Ring, and stop sharing your private -messages with strangers like Facebook and Google.

Release 0.2 of free software archive system Nikita announced

18th October 2018

This morning, the new release of the +Nikita +Noark 5 core project was +announced +on the project mailing list. The free software solution is an +implementation of the Norwegian archive standard Noark 5 used by +government offices in Norway. These were the changes in version 0.2 +since version 0.1.1 (from NEWS.md): + +

Fix typos in REL names
Tidy up error message reporting
Fix issue where we used Integer.valueOf(), not Integer.getInteger()
Change some String handling to StringBuffer
Fix error reporting
Code tidy-up
Fix issue using static non-synchronized SimpleDateFormat to avoid + race conditions
Fix problem where deserialisers were treating integers as strings
Update methods to make them null-safe
Fix many issues reported by coverity
Improve equals(), compareTo() and hash() in domain model
Improvements to the domain model for metadata classes
Fix CORS issues when downloading document
Implementation of case-handling with registryEntry and document upload
Better support in Javascript for OPTIONS
Adding concept description of mail integration
Improve setting of default values for GET on ny-journalpost
Better handling of required values during deserialisation
Changed tilknyttetDato (M620) from date to dateTime
Corrected some opprettetDato (M600) (de)serialisation errors.
Improve parse error reporting.
Started on OData search and filtering.
Added Contributor Covenant Code of Conduct to project.
Moved repository and project from Github to Gitlab.
Restructured repository, moved code into src/ and web/.
Updated code to use Spring Boot version 2.
Added support for OAuth2 authentication.
Fixed several bugs discovered by Coverity.
Corrected handling of date/datetime fields.
Improved error reporting when rejecting during deserializatoin.
Adjusted default values provided for ny-arkivdel, ny-mappe, + ny-saksmappe, ny-journalpost and ny-dokumentbeskrivelse.
Several fixes for korrespondansepart*.
Updated web GUI: +
- Now handle both file upload and download.
- Uses new OAuth2 authentication for login.
- Forms now fetches default values from API using GET.
- Added RFC 822 (email), TIFF and JPEG to list of possible file formats.

+ +

The changes and improvements are extensive. Running diffstat on +the changes between git tab 0.1.1 and 0.2 show 1098 files changed, +108666 insertions(+), 54066 deletions(-).

+ +

If free and open standardized archiving API sound interesting to +you, please contact us on IRC +(#nikita on +irc.freenode.net) or email +(nikita-noark +mailing list).

+ +

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my +activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

- Tags: english, personvern. + Tags: english, nuug, offentlig innsyn, standard.

@@ -722,6 +587,13 @@ messages with strangers like Facebook and Google.