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Casting local media on a Google ChromeCast

Synposis

This project allows one to watch local media by streaming it to a Google ChromeCast present on the local network. The video is streamed at approximately 650 kbps at which speed the video quality is excellent. One can mute audio, pause and resume and use a seekbar to move playback to different parts of the video.

NOTE: This does NOT require any hacking of the ChromeCast or registration with the Google backend. Simply set this project up on an Ubuntu computer which has Chrome and the Google Cast Chrome Extension installed and it will work.

Genesis

The project is basically a modification of the "HelloVideos" project provided by the Google team to aid Developers. I have used their code to create a python application which is served via uwsgi and nginx which reads and displays files from a specific "media" folder (the /media sub-folder of the project) and allows one to cast a selected file to a ChromeCast operating on the same WiFi network.

Supported Media formats

I have ONLY had success with mp3 and mp4 files. In particular I was unable to play avi files using this technique probably because HTML5 (which is what the ChromeCast uses) has no avi support in any browser.

Requirements

  • Chromecast device
  • Chrome browser
  • "Google Cast" extension on the Chrome browser
  • Ubuntu (the Makefile uses apt-get). A little work will make this function on any Linux variant.

Installation

The project comes with a Makefile which can be used to install and run it. Simply navigate to the project root folder and issue:

sudo make install       # Sets up the project. Installs uwsgi, nginx and jinja2 (pip) if absent.
sudo make start         # (re)starts the uwsgi and nginx services
make run                # Launches the Controller page in Chrome

Usage

Copy or better yet create symlinks for the Media files you wish to play in the /media subfolder of this project. Then launch the project website by either running make run or navigating to http://localhost:3435 in Chrome.

Click the Launch App button. A pop-up will appear in the browser window asking you to choose the ChromeCast device to cast to. Make your selection.

Select the Media file you want to play and click on Load Media. Wait for the log window to show the Media selected ... message.

Click Play and off you go.

License

Copyright 2014 Abid Hasan Mujtaba

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
You may obtain a copy of the License at

    http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
limitations under the License.