WMS & Internet Explorer Cache

[S@gittarius]

Hi there,
Watching Youtube HDs (720p & 1080p) I sometimes experience a “Playback not available” on my Bravia Z5500. The Internet connection is not a problem at all - this was double checked. I tracked the problem down to the fact WMS does use Internet Explorer to actually download the video clip. The clips themselves appear in “Temporary Internet Files” folder as files named videoplayback[X], where X is an index number. The problem arises when for some reason a cached partial copy of the clip was left from a previous session. These particles are always the same in size - exactly 1 MB. I disabled IE cache but they kept on appearing. I managed to find a workaround by manually deleting the content of “Temporary Internet Files”. This is impossible while WMS is running because some files are locked so I have to restart WMS for this to take place.

My questions are:
Does WMS implicitly or explicitly depend on IE for downloading internet content?
What would happen if I completely uninstall IE? Will WMS continue working as before?
Regards!

[Eugene]

Hi there,
Watching Youtube HDs (720p & 1080p) I sometimes experience a “Playback not available” on my Bravia Z5500. The Internet connection is not a problem at all - this was double checked. I tracked the problem down to the fact WMS does use Internet Explorer to actually download the video clip. The clips themselves appear in “Temporary Internet Files” folder as files named videoplayback[X], where X is an index number. The problem arises when for some reason a cached partial copy of the clip was left from a previous session. These particles are always the same in size - exactly 1 MB. I disabled IE cache but they kept on appearing. I managed to find a workaround by manually deleting the content of “Temporary Internet Files”. This is impossible while WMS is running because some files are locked so I have to restart WMS for this to take place.

My questions are:
Does WMS implicitly or explicitly depend on IE for downloading internet content?
What would happen if I completely uninstall IE? Will WMS continue working as before?

WMS uses WinInet.dll, I think this is part of Windows

[S@gittarius]

Hi there,
Watching Youtube HDs (720p & 1080p) I sometimes experience a “Playback not available” on my Bravia Z5500. The Internet connection is not a problem at all - this was double checked. I tracked the problem down to the fact WMS does use Internet Explorer to actually download the video clip. The clips themselves appear in “Temporary Internet Files” folder as files named videoplayback[X], where X is an index number. The problem arises when for some reason a cached partial copy of the clip was left from a previous session. These particles are always the same in size - exactly 1 MB. I disabled IE cache but they kept on appearing. I managed to find a workaround by manually deleting the content of “Temporary Internet Files”. This is impossible while WMS is running because some files are locked so I have to restart WMS for this to take place.

My questions are:
Does WMS implicitly or explicitly depend on IE for downloading internet content?
What would happen if I completely uninstall IE? Will WMS continue working as before?

WMS uses WinInet.dll, I think this is part of Windows

It is well known fact that IE and Windows itself are tightly connected and it happens very often when an IE patch does modify system files and vice versa . So I presume removing IE won't make any difference to WMS. I'll give it a try on a virtual machine environment and post the results.
One more thing.
All Youtube HDs have h.264 for video and AAC for audio tracks. So for Sony TV sets you don't need to transcode the video stream. Only audio has to be transcoded into AC3 or MP3. For this purpose the tsMuxer profile is ideal and actually works great achieving up to 100 fps while using less than 5% CPU power but ... (:o) there are always some buts) ... but it takes too long for the playback to start. I went through the tsMuxer profile's script and I think I know why it is so.
Is it possible to make tsMuxer profile (or another one) to start faster knowing the clip comes from Youtube, the video format is h.264 and that only the audio has to be transcoded from AAC to AC3?
Regards!

[Eugene]

Hi there,
Watching Youtube HDs (720p & 1080p) I sometimes experience a “Playback not available” on my Bravia Z5500. The Internet connection is not a problem at all - this was double checked. I tracked the problem down to the fact WMS does use Internet Explorer to actually download the video clip. The clips themselves appear in “Temporary Internet Files” folder as files named videoplayback[X], where X is an index number. The problem arises when for some reason a cached partial copy of the clip was left from a previous session. These particles are always the same in size - exactly 1 MB. I disabled IE cache but they kept on appearing. I managed to find a workaround by manually deleting the content of “Temporary Internet Files”. This is impossible while WMS is running because some files are locked so I have to restart WMS for this to take place.

My questions are:
Does WMS implicitly or explicitly depend on IE for downloading internet content?
What would happen if I completely uninstall IE? Will WMS continue working as before?

WMS uses WinInet.dll, I think this is part of Windows

It is well known fact that IE and Windows itself are tightly connected and it happens very often when an IE patch does modify system files and vice versa . So I presume removing IE won't make any difference to WMS. I'll give it a try on a virtual machine environment and post the results.
One more thing.
All Youtube HDs have h.264 for video and AAC for audio tracks. So for Sony TV sets you don't need to transcode the video stream. Only audio has to be transcoded into AC3 or MP3. For this purpose the tsMuxer profile is ideal and actually works great achieving up to 100 fps while using less than 5% CPU power but ... (:o) there are always some buts) ... but it takes too long for the playback to start. I went through the tsMuxer profile's script and I think I know why it is so.
Is it possible to make tsMuxer profile (or another one) to start faster knowing the clip comes from Youtube, the video format is h.264 and that only the audio has to be transcoded from AAC to AC3?

1. Try to upgrade to 1.01 (http://www.wildmediaserver.com/forum/vi ... ?f=3&t=393)
2.

By default, Internet resources do not allow use a pause, you can change the positioning of Internet resources, Settings-"File-types", m2ts - Edit, turn on "Positioning media resources (stream)" - turn on "By position in file ", same for mpg if used Movies (primary). I have a slow connection to Youtube, on "Youtube - Movies" use a pause.

If you enable these settings, the problem may be associated with this. The device asks for an end transcoded file - this extra time.

[S@gittarius]

Hi there,
Watching Youtube HDs (720p & 1080p) I sometimes experience a “Playback not available” on my Bravia Z5500. The Internet connection is not a problem at all - this was double checked. I tracked the problem down to the fact WMS does use Internet Explorer to actually download the video clip. The clips themselves appear in “Temporary Internet Files” folder as files named videoplayback[X], where X is an index number. The problem arises when for some reason a cached partial copy of the clip was left from a previous session. These particles are always the same in size - exactly 1 MB. I disabled IE cache but they kept on appearing. I managed to find a workaround by manually deleting the content of “Temporary Internet Files”. This is impossible while WMS is running because some files are locked so I have to restart WMS for this to take place.

My questions are:
Does WMS implicitly or explicitly depend on IE for downloading internet content?
What would happen if I completely uninstall IE? Will WMS continue working as before?

WMS uses WinInet.dll, I think this is part of Windows

It is well known fact that IE and Windows itself are tightly connected and it happens very often when an IE patch does modify system files and vice versa . So I presume removing IE won't make any difference to WMS. I'll give it a try on a virtual machine environment and post the results.
One more thing.
All Youtube HDs have h.264 for video and AAC for audio tracks. So for Sony TV sets you don't need to transcode the video stream. Only audio has to be transcoded into AC3 or MP3. For this purpose the tsMuxer profile is ideal and actually works great achieving up to 100 fps while using less than 5% CPU power but ... (:o) there are always some buts) ... but it takes too long for the playback to start. I went through the tsMuxer profile's script and I think I know why it is so.
Is it possible to make tsMuxer profile (or another one) to start faster knowing the clip comes from Youtube, the video format is h.264 and that only the audio has to be transcoded from AAC to AC3?

1. Try to upgrade to 1.01 (http://www.wildmediaserver.com/forum/vi ... ?f=3&t=393)

I'll give it a try

2.

By default, Internet resources do not allow use a pause, you can change the positioning of Internet resources, Settings-"File-types", m2ts - Edit, turn on "Positioning media resources (stream)" - turn on "By position in file ", same for mpg if used Movies (primary). I have a slow connection to Youtube, on "Youtube - Movies" use a pause.

If you enable these settings, the problem may be associated with this. The device asks for an end transcoded file - this extra time.

Actually I have enabled this options in the device's settings section but probably the result is the same in both cases.
But why does the playback start faster when using "Movies (primary)" compared to "Movies - tsMuxer" profile? All other conditions are equal. And the test transcoding with "Movies - tsMuxer" starts instantly! What makes the difference? Is it the way the device asks for playback or what?

[Eugene]

Hi there,
Watching Youtube HDs (720p & 1080p) I sometimes experience a “Playback not available” on my Bravia Z5500. The Internet connection is not a problem at all - this was double checked. I tracked the problem down to the fact WMS does use Internet Explorer to actually download the video clip. The clips themselves appear in “Temporary Internet Files” folder as files named videoplayback[X], where X is an index number. The problem arises when for some reason a cached partial copy of the clip was left from a previous session. These particles are always the same in size - exactly 1 MB. I disabled IE cache but they kept on appearing. I managed to find a workaround by manually deleting the content of “Temporary Internet Files”. This is impossible while WMS is running because some files are locked so I have to restart WMS for this to take place.

My questions are:
Does WMS implicitly or explicitly depend on IE for downloading internet content?
What would happen if I completely uninstall IE? Will WMS continue working as before?

WMS uses WinInet.dll, I think this is part of Windows

It is well known fact that IE and Windows itself are tightly connected and it happens very often when an IE patch does modify system files and vice versa . So I presume removing IE won't make any difference to WMS. I'll give it a try on a virtual machine environment and post the results.
One more thing.
All Youtube HDs have h.264 for video and AAC for audio tracks. So for Sony TV sets you don't need to transcode the video stream. Only audio has to be transcoded into AC3 or MP3. For this purpose the tsMuxer profile is ideal and actually works great achieving up to 100 fps while using less than 5% CPU power but ... (:o) there are always some buts) ... but it takes too long for the playback to start. I went through the tsMuxer profile's script and I think I know why it is so.
Is it possible to make tsMuxer profile (or another one) to start faster knowing the clip comes from Youtube, the video format is h.264 and that only the audio has to be transcoded from AAC to AC3?

1. Try to upgrade to 1.01 (http://www.wildmediaserver.com/forum/vi ... ?f=3&t=393)

I'll give it a try

2.

By default, Internet resources do not allow use a pause, you can change the positioning of Internet resources, Settings-"File-types", m2ts - Edit, turn on "Positioning media resources (stream)" - turn on "By position in file ", same for mpg if used Movies (primary). I have a slow connection to Youtube, on "Youtube - Movies" use a pause.

If you enable these settings, the problem may be associated with this. The device asks for an end transcoded file - this extra time.

Actually I have enabled this options in the device's settings section but probably the result is the same in both cases.
But why does the playback start faster when using "Movies (primary)" compared to "Movies - tsMuxer" profile? All other conditions are equal. And the test transcoding with "Movies - tsMuxer" starts instantly! What makes the difference? Is it the way the device asks for playback or what?

If the device buffers playing, then for MPEG2 requires less time for filling the buffer. Also, if not read stream properties, the profile transcoding "Movies-TsMuxer" first reads the properties (possible 1MB).

[S@gittarius]

My thoughts were heading into the same direction so thank you for the clarification.
I presume that if stream properties were read in advance than playback would start faster. Right?

May be the following questions is of topic and I should commence a new thread but I'll ask it anyway

How does WMS decide which transcoding profile to use when there is no profile selected?
I made a simple test by inserting a show message instruction in the beginning of "Movies (primary)" profile and did a test transcoding. That message appeared several times before the transcoding actually took place. This makes me think WMS evaluates more than one profile against the currently selected media source. Right? Also there are conditions which may control whether or not to use particular profile. What would happen if those conditions are true for more than one profile?

To be more specific my efforts are towards improving the quality of watching online podcasts and especially these from Youtube. I wrote some podcast's scripts which are still not in the state to be shared but the results are very encouraging. The major problems I'm facing is the caching by the IE modules (you mentioned wininet.dll early on) and choosing the right transcoding strategy.

Nevertheless I managed to construct a complicated playlists which start playing successfully in may be 80% of the time. The rest of them start after manually deleting the temporary internet files. It would be really nice if you manage to overcome this dependency. May be some free open source downloader like WGET would be a nice addition to already superb DLNA server such as is WMS.
Regards!

[Eugene]

My thoughts were heading into the same direction so thank you for the clarification.
I presume that if stream properties were read in advance than playback would start faster. Right?

Yes, of course, if properties are read, playback starts faster.

How does WMS decide which transcoding profile to use when there is no profile selected?

1. Transcoding profile selected for podcast
2. Transcoding profile selected for folder of podcast.
3. Transcoding profile selected in settings of device (common or individual) - Transcoding file params - Movies
4. Transcoding profile in list of profiles by field Priority.

I made a simple test by inserting a show message instruction in the beginning of "Movies (primary)" profile and did a test transcoding. That message appeared several times before the transcoding actually took place. This makes me think WMS evaluates more than one profile against the currently selected media source. Right?

No, the device can request various parts of content - transcoding runs several times. More in the debug log (Settings-Additional)

Also there are conditions which may control whether or not to use particular profile. What would happen if those conditions are true for more than one profile?

By field Priority.

To be more specific my efforts are towards improving the quality of watching online podcasts and especially these from Youtube. I wrote some podcast's scripts which are still not in the state to be shared but the results are very encouraging. The major problems I'm facing is the caching by the IE modules (you mentioned wininet.dll early on) and choosing the right transcoding strategy.
Nevertheless I managed to construct a complicated playlists which start playing successfully in may be 80% of the time. The rest of them start after manually deleting the temporary internet files. It would be really nice if you manage to overcome this dependency. May be some free open source downloader like WGET would be a nice addition to already superb DLNA server such as is WMS.

If you provide an example of problematic links, then I can test the program. You can use any program that supports the command line, you can use system or your own OLE-objects (CreateOleObject) for transcoding.

[S@gittarius]

If you provide an example of problematic links, then I can test the program. You can use any program that supports the command line, you can use system or your own OLE-objects (CreateOleObject) for transcoding.

Here it is a HD playlist with high quality 1080p videos.

http://gdata.youtube.com/feeds/api/play ... 0D1C31B747

Episodes 1/5, Part 1/3 through 5 make some trouble. But as I said before everything goes OK after manually deleting the IE cache directory.

[Eugene]

If you provide an example of problematic links, then I can test the program. You can use any program that supports the command line, you can use system or your own OLE-objects (CreateOleObject) for transcoding.

Here it is a HD playlist with high quality 1080p videos.

http://gdata.youtube.com/feeds/api/play ... 0D1C31B747

Episodes 1/5, Part 1/3 through 5 make some trouble. But as I said before everything goes OK after manually deleting the IE cache directory.

1. I repeated the problem, test transcoding stopped for about 90 seconds
2. I deleted cache files.
3. Now I can not repeat the problem in various combinations.

You known of any sequence of actions which leads to the problem ?