Blackmagic Forum

Hi

I was on a quest to put together a 3 channel streaming bridge from existing equipment -
a PC, Decklink cards, and free software NGINX, ffplay, and VLC but its not working out.
I can make it work (Windows 10) but its not reliable.
For instance, ffplay does not always launch from the command line, requiring ^c
restarts and neither can recover reliably from a pulled network cable.
I'm at wits end.

So I'm moving on. Considering 3x ATEM Streaming Bridge for 3 channels.
Can I expect the ATEM Streaming Bridge to recover from any and all glitches that might happen
in the stream without need for power cycle? Was it designed for 24/7continuous use or just
ad-hoc connections...

Thanks-
DC

No it wont. We have been able to let the bridge crash by as simple as sending a cutom RTMP stream to it's IP address.. Locks it up and only recovers by power cycle.

Uggg.
See my other post on Decklink support for VLC, ffmpeg... its all about trying to make
a streaming bridge.
Have any ideas on how else I might do this?
Its tough... I'm trying a roll your own with a raspberry pi using nginx and omxplayer.
It doesn't recover either, but I think it might fail dependably and I might be able to
work with that... auto reboot on a detectable failure.
But low and behold, even the linux system itself isn't reliable... after all this time...
it sometimes fails to establish its IP address on reconnecting the cable.
Looks like I have to detect and repair that too after a reboot.
Can one depend on NOTHING?
I'm at wits end, most everything I try just doesn't meet up with expections or reasonable
assumptions of how a device should behave.
Are we getting crushed by decades of software bloat and complexity?
It seems very pervasive.
Maybe.

Oh there are systems out there that will auto recover etc..
They depend on internal Watchdog.. Something that BMD does not have inside there hardware. I have never seen a lockup device from them auto reboot..


Anyway for products that do this you have to look at the expensive side of things.. There are solutions but expect to pay 20K or more..

We have a expensive range Netgear internet router that locks up at least once every 2 weeks.. We fixed it now by a simple arduino that checks every 2 minutes for NTP time. If it fails 3 times in a row to get NTP time it will power reset the modem. Works like a charm!!!

And the arduino has a Watchdog inside.. So the moment it "would" ever lockup it will reboot itself.

So you might look into a solution that will detect the decoder is still going.. ( Silence detection or something.. ) And if not power cycle device.

dmemphis : U do not need reboot RPI .. IF omxplayer freeze , u can restart it .. If network freeze , u can restart network .. etc .. just analyze your problem ..

Maybe.
Could be right on restarting the network processes. I'll research.
On the OMXplayer...
OMXplayer is exe launched within NGINX on a connection. That method of launching does
not recover when the network stream is cut and restored.
I'll experiment if I can relaunch the player from the user session... I don't think
it will work. Maybe. Or maybe I restart NGINX is the right thing.

(anyway, thanks for suggesting I try to restart things rather than reboot.)

Of course, if I change the way NGINX is setup and take out the exec of OMXPLayer,
and run it in an infinite loop like you said you were doing in my other thread.
I was prior not successful with getting OMXPLayer to connect from the command line,
but I try to figure it out.
Then yes, I am simply restarting and not rebooting.
Doing anything fancy in your infinite loop script? Care to post it?

I have different scenario than U .. Im not using ngnix .. im using WOWZA streaming server .. Its located in serverhouse .. Cammeraman have small encoder on camera (Im using TERADEK CUBE) and LTE modem on it .. And sending video feed from his location to my WOWZA .. And i have RPI with OMXplayer connecting to WOWZA and show feed from it .. Or we was used this 2 years ago in ELECTION .. There was one journalist in every policital central with Iphone and sending stream to WOWZA .. And i was switched to any stream and show video from there .. Works perfect

Very cool! You can't argue with "Works perfect!"

You mentioned running the player in an infinite loop- that is taking care of all network/stream failures or are you generally not seeing failures anyway?

Thanks!

Im using it in small time intervals .. On election it was maybe 8 hours .. And no issues .. Maybe in 24/7 can be any problems ..