JTVLANServer is the component that plugs into TV Scheduler Pro and adds live TV viewing and streaming functionality. JTVLANServer includes a dedicated and preconfigured copy of VLC Media Player (version 0.8.6i), wich is used as a streaming server.
- A Microsoft 2000/XP/Vista operating system
- A working installation of TV Scheduler Pro
To install JTVLANServer you first need to check that:
- you have a fully configured and functional TV Scheduler PRO installation
To install JTVLANServer just launch the installer. When prompted, locate the TV Scheduler PRO installation directory. This is very important: JTVLANServer must be installed inside the TV Scheduler PRO installation directory.
When installation completes, JTVLANServer must be configured to work properly. By default setup will prompy to launch the JTVLANServer configuration utility. Just click the "Finish" button to exit setup and enter the configiration utility.
On the first tab, you must configure the Temp and Recording directories. The Temp directory will be used to store temporary files during the capture and streaming phase. The Recording directory will store the client-requested server-side recordings.
Then you will need to configure TV Scheduler PRO to run JTVLAN. Just click the button named 'Configure TV Scheduler Pro to run JTVLAN' to do this automatically. Once the configuration is completed you should see a message saying that TV Scheduler PRO is already configured:
JTVLANServer uses VideoLAN as a streaming server, so it can use every streaming option made available by VideoLAN (the reference version used by JTVLANServer is 0.8.6i). While the default configuration uses HTTP streaming of the TS mux, it is also possibile to setup Unicast/Multicast UDP, RTP, MMS streaming, with or without transcoding of the original stream.
To configure streaming options switch to the "Streaming" tab:
You can select one of the following configirations: HTTP, UDP Unicast/Multicast or "Custom". The first two options are straightforward to configure.
Using the "Custom" option, it is possible to fine tune the configuration by directly controlling the --sout command line argument of VLC Media Player (view Advanced streaming using the command line section of the VideoLAN documentation).
Once the configuration is completed just click the 'OK' button. You will be prompted to restart automatically the TV Scheduler Pro service:
just confirm this action and the server will be restarted automatically and the JTVLAN plugin will be activated.
JTVLANClient is a Java application which is able to remotely control JTVLANServer over the network and to receive and play live TV.
- Operating System: Microsoft 2000/XP/Vista, Linux, Mac
- Java JRE or JDK version 6
- VLC Media Player (version 0.9.8 preferred)
Before installing JTVLANClient please make sure that the requirements are met. Also it is important to know the directory where VLC Media Player has been installed since this data is required to properly configure the application.
To install on Windows system just run the installer and complete the standard installation procedure. When installation is completed you should first run the JTVLANClient configuration utility, so it is recommended to leave the checkbox checked to launch it automatically.
The first tab of the configuration utility will prompt for all the necessary data to configure JTVLANClient.
It is very important to enter the exact details to connect to TV Scheduler Pro ("TV Scheduler Connection" box). Use the "Test Connection" button to verify you entered the correct data. Please note that the server should already have JTVLANServer on it to successfully do the test.
If streaming has been configured as "HTTP" or "UDP Unicast/Multicast" on the server-side, then the Automatic streaming configuration setting will work and no further streaming configuration is needed. On the othe hand, if on the server streaming has been configured as "Custom", then a custom URL should be entered on the client to match the server side settings.
Finally it is important to configure the path to the VLC Media Player executable file and to the local recordings directory.
To install JTVLANClient on Linux or Mac machines
- Extract the distribution archive (jtvlanclient-1.0.0.zip) in a folder of your choice
- Run the configuration utility launching the jtvlansetup.sh (shell script)
- Enter all the required configuration as described in the previous section
- On Windows machine just launch the Start Menu shortcut or the jtvlanclient.exe program
- On Linux and Mac launching the jtvlanclient.sh shell script
This feature is experimental.
- Even if there are several capture cards available, JTVLAN will use only a single capture card at a time. This approach is obvilously limiting the possibility to have several clients playing independently different channels. This has been chosen in order to avoid adding too much complexity and heavy logic on the server side of JTVLAN and possibly compromise the reliability of WebScheduler itself. It is possible that multiple cards will be handled by future versions of JTVLAN though.
- The basic approach can be described as a master-slave. When several clients are connected to the same server and the server is idle, each client is able to start playback in the usual way. When the first client starts playing or recording a given channel, he becomes the master of the stream, while all the other client will enter in slave mode.
- The master client will behave as an ordinary JTVLAN client: it can stop the stream, change channel, start/stop recording and so on.
- While in slave mode, clients will not have the possibility to select a channel and start playing it (actually the channel list is disabled). This is because the server is already playing a given channel (selected by the maser client) and the clients can only tune to that stream.
- Clients are always aware about what the server is actually doing and what channel it is playing. This information is always displayed in the bottom status line, so that it is always clear, if the server is playing, what channel is currently available.
- Slave clients can start/stop the stream (and change local playback settings like deinterlacing, aspect ratio and so on) without affecting the server status.
- When the master stops playing, every slave client that was already playing the stream will remain in slave playing mode and will wait for a new stream to become available. In this way slave clients will be able to follow the stream during channel changes (which implies a restart of the stream). Instead, slave clients that were not playing the stream will automatically return in mormal mode and will be able to start streaming and become masters themselves.