Live from Switzerland.
Michel Burnand (HB9DUG) approached me a few months ago indicating that he had live video running on the project. This page provides information about his setup, along with a single, detailed configuration PDF and associated configuration files.
Michel has written a rather comprehensive, single document about how he configured his system from a clean Ubuntu 12.04 install. This is avaiable as a PDF here, and the associated config files are available here. He can be contacted by email at this address.
Note 1: This package now includes "pesdemux" which is a small application that can replace FFMPEG in situations where the audio does not need to converted from 192 to 128kbs. While the Transport Stream payload is 64kbs higher with audio, the realtime burden on the CPU is considerably reduced. This can save on the electricity-bill in cases of 24/7 operation.
Note 2: Even with FFMPEG running, it appears that it is possible to create valid video using a 1GHz thin client with 1GB RAM; a solution that consumes less than 18 watts total. pesdemux may allow for an even lower power solution.
Note 3: Ubuntu 12.04 server appears to use a different time-slice mechanism than 12.04 desktop. I have been unable to get the server version to reliably generate valid video.
The solution described, builds heavily on the prior art of Christian F1FAU, Rob M0DTS and Charles G4GUO, to name but a few. Thank you to all who contributed.
I would also like to thank Lorenzo from Avalpa Digital Engineering who helped provide pesdemux. Avalpa also provided the version of the OpenCaster package use in this project.
Comments and corrections always welcome.
Regards,
15 Aug 2012, New Zealand
