A few things. First I have a question...
The majority of Flash videos that I watch, YouTube and the like, save a file to my computer FlashXX* which I can save to my hard drive, or load into the video player I wish. This feature is fantastic due the times when the streaming player plays back the video poorly, I can just open up in my video player and everything is perfect. My question is this:
Why is it that some streaming players do not save a FlashXX, or other noticeable file to my computer?
For instance: southparkstudios.com, dailyshow.com, colbertnation.com?
The playback in these players is horrible for my little machine and wireless 3G, and I would like to play them in VLC instead.
Do these video players save the file to some other file name? Through some other process than firefox's plugin container libflashplayer.so?
They definitely use Flash... the only difference I see is these players only buffer to one minute's worth... is this the issue? Is it a client`side versus server`side issue? Is there a way to watch these videos streaming through my VLC?
I've tried the
documentation...
---
Now, as for sites that do save their Flash video to /tmp/ I have written a script to find and use these files.
If you want to know which video files are being currently saved to your computer, type `ffxx`.
Want to watch one in VLC? Type `ffxx -vlc FILE_NAME(ish)`.
Want to copy it to your computer so you can watch it offline? `ffxx -cp FILE_NAME(ish) YOUR_COPY_NAME`.
...(ish) meaning you can really just type whatever makes that filename unique disregarding caps.
...if you want to use a different media player, just change the necessary code.
Code:
#!/bin/bash
ffxx () {
file /proc/*/fd/* 2>/dev/null | grep FlashXX | cut -f1 -d:
file /tmp/* 2>/dev/null | grep FlashXX | cut -f1 -d:
}
helper () { echo -e "usage: `basename $0` finds and manipulates Flash files on your computer\nusage: running `basename $0` without any options will display all available Flash video\nusage: `basename $0` [options] FILE\n -cp : copies the file specified by the second parameter to current directory\n -vlc : plays the file specified by the second parameter in VLC\n -h : displays this help dialogue\n EXAMPLE: ./ffxx -cp 17 FILE_NAME.flv"
}
if [ $# -eq 0 ]; then
ffxx
else
if [ $# -eq 2 ]; then
case "$1" in
"-vlc") vlc `ffxx | grep -i $2`;;
"-h") heler;;
*) helper;;
esac
elif [ $# -eq 3 ]; then
case "$1" in
"-cp") cp `ffxx | grep -i $2` $3;;
*) helper;;
esac
else
helper
fi
fi
Code:
# ls
# ffxx
/proc/1712/fd/17
# ffxx -cp 17
# ls
17
...if you have an older Flash plug-in it will save in /tmp/. As of version 10.3.183.10, September 30 2011, you will find your file as a symbolic link to the (deleted) file because Flash deletes the original file utilising the fact that while the plugin process is using the stream's file the system does not delete the inode storing its information.
...you can rename the file as you so please, or add an extra parameter to do it for you. These files load into VLC without extensions, but to see them in the Open prompt you will have to click All Files(*), or give them the proper extension .flv, or be a bit tricky and give them a false extension of a known video type, like .avi. All works fine.
