• http://github.com/NPO/codem-transcode

Codem-transcode is an offline video transcoder written in node.js. It

1. Uses ffmpeg for transcoding
2. Has a simple HTTP API
3. Is mostly asynchronous

Codem-transcode can be used in conjunction with Codem-schedule (https://github.com/NPO/codem-schedule) for robust job scheduling and notifications or it can be used stand-alone, with or without a custom scheduler.

• ffmpeg (compiled/configured to your own taste)
• sqlite3
• node.js version >= 0.4.x, with packages (if you use npm they will be installed automatically):
  • sqlite3 (http://github.com/developmentseed/node-sqlite3)
  • connect (http://github.com/senchalabs/Connect)
  • argsparser (http://github.com/kof/node-argsparser)
  • mkdirp (https://github.com/substack/node-mkdirp)

The recommended installation procedure is to just use npm (http://npmjs.org/):

# npm install codem-transcode

Install it to your preferred location, or use the -g option to install it globally.

When you install codem-transcode a script will be installed that allows you to start the transcoder. If you install it globally it should be in your PATH, otherwise, you can start the transcoder using:

# /PATH/TO/TRANSCODER/bin/codem-transcode

Please check for yourself where npm installs your packages and script.

Configuration is done by specifying a CLI option (-c) and pointing to a file containing a valid JSON object (http://www.json.org/). Note that node.js' JSON parser is fairly strict so make sure you get the syntax right. An example config is:

{
    "port":        8080,
    "access_log":  "/var/log/access_log",
    "database":    "/var/db/jobs.db",
    "slots":       8,
    "interface":   "127.0.0.1",
    "encoder":     "ffmpeg",
    "scratch_dir": "/tmp"
}

Configuration options:

• port; port to start server on, default 8080
• interface; which network interface to listen on, default 127.0.0.1 (only localhost)
• access_log; location to store HTTP access log, default /var/log/access_log
• database; location to store sqlite jobs DB, default /var/db/jobs.db
• slots; number of transcoding slots to use (i.e. the maximum number of ffmpeg child processes), defaults to the number of CPUs/cores in your machine
• encoder; path to the ffmpeg binary, if it is in your path specifying only ffmpeg is sufficient, defaults to ffmpeg
• scratch_dir; temporary files are written here and moved into the destination directory after transcoding, defaults to /tmp

Note that the default config will put the access_log and job database in /var/log and var/db/ respectively. If you wish to put these in a different location please supply your own config. You can start the transcoder with your custom config using:

# /PATH/TO/TRANSCODER/bin/codem-transcode -c /PATH/TO/CONFIG/config.json

After starting the server you can control it using most HTTP CLI tools, such as curl or wget. The HTTP API is as follows:

Request: POST /jobs

Parameters (HTTP POST data, should be valid JSON object):

{
    "source_file": "/PATH/TO/INPUT/FILE.wmv",
    "destination_file":"/PATH/TO/OUTPUT/FILE.mp4",
    "encoder_options": "-acodec libfaac -ab 96k -ar 44100 -vcodec libx264 -vb 416k -vpre slow -vpre baseline -s 320x180 -y -threads 0",
    "callback_urls": ["http://example.com/notifications"]
}

Responses:

• 202 Accepted - Job accepted
• 400 Bad Request - Invalid request (format)
• 503 Service Unavailable - Transcoder not accepting jobs at the moment (all encoding slots are in use)

The callback_urls array is optional and is a list (array) of HTTP endpoints that should be notified once encoding finishes (due to the job being complete or some error condition). All other options are required (source_file, destination_file and encoder_options). Input and output files should be absolute paths.

Request: GET /jobs

Responses:

• 200 OK - Returns status of all active jobs

Request: GET /jobs/$JOB_ID

Responses:

• 200 OK - Returns status of job
• 404 Not Found - Job not found

Request: DELETE /jobs/$JOB_ID

Cancels the job (if it is running) and deletes it from the database.

Responses:

• 200 OK - Returns last known status of the job that is being deleted
• 404 Not Found - Job not found

Create a new job, transcode "video.wmv" to "video.mp4" using the specified ffmpeg options (96kbit/s audio, 416kbit/s video, 320x180, use as much threads as possible). Requires libx264 support in your ffmpeg.

# curl -d '{"source_file": "/tmp/video.wmv","destination_file":"/tmp/video.mp4","encoder_options": "-acodec libfaac -ab 96k -ar 44100 -vcodec libx264 -vb 416k -vpre slow -vpre baseline -s 320x180 -y -threads 0"}' http://localhost:8080/jobs

Output: {"message":"The transcoder accepted your job.","job_id":"d4b1dfebe6860839b2c21b70f35938d870011682"}

Create a new job, transcode "video.mpg" to "video.webm" using the specified ffmpeg options (total bitrate 512kbit/s, 320x180, use as much threads as possible). Requires libvpx support in your ffmpeg.

# curl -d '{"source_file": "/tmp/video.mpg","destination_file":"/tmp/video.webm","encoder_options": "-vcodec libvpx -b 512000 -s 320x180 -acodec libvorbis -y -threads 0"}' http://localhost:8080/jobs

Output: {"message":"The transcoder accepted your job.","job_id":"c26769be0955339db8f98580c212b7611cacf4dd"}

Get status of all available encoder slots.

# curl http://localhost:8080/jobs

Output: {"max_slots":8,"free_slots":8,"jobs":[]}

or

Output: {"max_slots":8, "free_slots":7, "jobs":[{"id":"da56da6012bda2ce775fa028f056873bcb29cb3b", "status":"processing", "progress":0.12480252764612954, "duration":633, "filesize":39191346, "message":null}]}

Get full status of one job with id "da56da6012bda2ce775fa028f056873bcb29cb3b".

# curl http://localhost:8080/jobs/da56da6012bda2ce775fa028f056873bcb29cb3b

Output: {"id":"da56da6012bda2ce775fa028f056873bcb29cb3b", "status":"processing", "progress":0.21800947867298578, "duration":633, "filesize":39191346, "opts":"{\"source_file\":\"/shared/videos/asf/video.asf\", \"destination_file\":\"/shared/videos/mp4/journaal.mp4\", \"encoder_options\":\"-acodec libfaac -ab 96k -ar 44100 -vcodec libx264 -vb 416k -vpre slow -vpre baseline -s 320x180 -y -threads 0\"}", "message":null, "created_at":1304338160, "updated_at":1304338173}

All tests are written using jasmine (via jasmine-node). Running them is as easy as:

# jasmine-node test

More specs coming soon.

Codem-transcode is released under the MIT license, see LICENSE.txt.