Streaming Video over TCP and WebSockets with node.js

This is experimental streaming server in node.js. Ingest stream is sent over TCP to server then it is redistributed to all clients over WebSockets.

Ingest stream

FFMPEG can be used to ingest stream. In this example I use v4l2 to caputre camera on linux.

-f v4l2 -framerate 25 -video_size 640x480 -i /dev/video0

VP8 (using libvpx)

ffmpeg -f v4l2 -framerate 25 -video_size 640x480 -i /dev/video0  -vcodec libvpx -b:v 3500k -r 25 -crf 10 -quality realtime -speed 16 -threads 8 -an -g 25 -f webm tcp://localhost:9090

H.264 (using libx264)

To stream MP4 it needs to be ISO BMFF compatible, so -movflags is set to empty_moov+default_base_moof.

ffmpeg -f v4l2 -framerate 25 -video_size 640x480 -i /dev/video0  -vcodec libx264 -profile:v main -g 25 -r 25 -b:v 500k -keyint_min 250 -strict experimental -pix_fmt yuv420p -movflags empty_moov+default_base_moof -an -preset ultrafast -f mp4 tcp://localhost:9090

Stream flow

FFMPEG ---TCP---> NODE.JS Server -- WebSockets --> [client 0] MediaSource Video
                                |-- WebSockets --> [client 1] MediaSource Video
                                |-- WebSockets --> [client 2] MediaSource Video

Ingest stream is sent over TCP to node.js server. Every packet of stream is sent to clients using WebSockets.

MediaSource is used to retrive video stream.

How to use

Install

npm install

Start application

gulp 

In browser go to localhost:8080

Stream video to tcp://localhost:9090

ffmpeg (...) tcp://localhost:9090

According to video codec set codecString in client/js/app.js line 9 to right value.

You can customize ports in server\app.js lines 12 and 13.

'First packet' hack :)

There is little hack in lines 41-44 and 68-76. Server stores beginning of stream in array which is sent to every new client. Every client will receive couple of start frames.

Without that hack video won't start for users who start watching in the middle of stream. Perhaps there is solution in better ffmpeg setting.