Local News

[jrockow]

I'm trying to create an Extra to record my local news channel.
I'm using the following file, based on the sample given in the wiki:

  <extras>
    <channel name="69 News">
      <command>ffmpeg.exe</command>
      <args>-i https://www.wfmz.com/live-69news-livestr...25811.html -vcodec copy -acodec copy -f mpegts - </args>
    </channel>
  </extras>

When I try to play the channel I get the following error; Streaming Failed (transcoder exited).
The URL is correct, but obviously I'm not doing something right.
Log files are attached.

[sub]

It looks like you’ve pointed it at a web page, not the video stream you’re wanting to capture.

[jrockow]

I guess I don't understand how it's supposed to work.
I can't find a lot of info about it.
That's the url where I watch the livestream news.
What do I need to do to put that in an Extra?
Or can't that be done?

[sub]

Looking at the page, it looks like the stream url is:

https://live.field59.com/wfmz/wfmz1/chunklist.m3u8

(use that instead of the html url you've used)

[jrockow]

sub,
Thanx again!
Can you tell me how you came up with the .m3u8.
Must it always be a .m3u8 extension?

[sub]

It's not always a .m3u8 stream

I basically opened the Chrome dev tools, then opened the page you specified above, and looked on the Network tab for the video stream being played.

Sometimes it's also not that straight forward, like they include a token or key in the url, or it changes every day etc.

[jrockow]

sub
hate to bother you, but this isn't working again.
I guess the station changed something.

I really would like to learn how to do this myself.
I tried to follow the steps you posted, but got lost on "looked on the Network tab for the video stream being played".
When I click on the Network tab, a lot of data shows up but I don't know how to find the video stream.

Perhaps they did make it more complicated, I can't tell.
If you get a chance please have another look.

If in fact it is more complicated, and I can't follow your instructions, I won't continue to bug you.
Thanx!

[sub]

Are you still able to watch the live video on their website? I can't seem to see any live video there.

[jrockow]

Yes, I can watch it on my PC.
It stopped working (NPVR) just this past Monday.
Just a thought, they might not be live 24/7.
I just usually watch it at 5:30 PM weekdays.

They should be live for the next 50 mins.

[sub]

Sorry, I can't see it. They might be geo-blocking now.

Without being able to see it working myself, it's not really practical to tell you how you extract the video url from it.