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Ffmpeg Watch-Folder PDF

This document describes using iwatch and bash scripts to automatically convert video files uploaded via FTP to a watched folder. Iwatch monitors the folder recursively for new .mp4 files and executes a bash script to convert each using FFmpeg. The script creates three versions of each uploaded file with different bitrates, placing them in destination folders. This allows automatic transcoding of uploaded videos without user intervention.

Uploaded by

ravi
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© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
278 views

Ffmpeg Watch-Folder PDF

This document describes using iwatch and bash scripts to automatically convert video files uploaded via FTP to a watched folder. Iwatch monitors the folder recursively for new .mp4 files and executes a bash script to convert each using FFmpeg. The script creates three versions of each uploaded file with different bitrates, placing them in destination folders. This allows automatic transcoding of uploaded videos without user intervention.

Uploaded by

ravi
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Watch a folder for new files and convert them

with bash script


For a recent web app project I needed a solution to automatically convert uploaded files with ffmpeg.
This post describes my solution so Ill still know what I did 4 weeks from now.
The client uploads folders, subfolders and files to a specific folder via FTP. Lets say this folder sits at
/data/upload/. Every *.mp4 file inside these folders and subfolders needs to be encoded with
ffmpeg. This will result in three different files per uploaded file, each with a different bit rate. This
should happen automatically and only for new uploaded files.

Watch a folder for uploaded files


I watch a folder with the app iwatch. Install iwatch via sudo apt-get install iwatch.
During install it may ask you to specify your configuration for Postfix. This is outside the scope of this
post. You can run iwatch as a daemon and specify a configuration file:
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iwatch -d -f /etc/iwatch/iwatch_encoder.xml

The xml file looks like this:


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<?xml version="1.0" ?>


<!DOCTYPE config SYSTEM "/etc/iwatch/iwatch.dtd" >

<config>
<guard email="root@localhost" name="IWatch"/>
<watchlist>
<title>Neue Video-Daten erhalten. Encoding starten.</title>
<contactpoint email="[email protected]" name="Administrator"/>
<path type="recursive" alert="off" exec="find %f -iname '*.mp4' -execdir /data/upload/
</watchlist>
</config>

Line 9 is the crucial part.


Lets dissect it:
type="recursive" - This makes sure to watch the folder recursively. So you dont miss
files inside subfolders.
alert="off" - You can get emails every time something happens in /data/uploads. I chose
not to.
exec="find %f -iname '*.mp4' -execdir
/data/upload/encode_files.sh {} \;" - The part inside the quotation marks is the
command I want to execute once a file is uploaded. It will be executed for every file uploaded.
events="close_write" - I watch only this event. It means to fire the command once a
file is closed after write. This is essential for large (video) files. Otherwise the command
triggers while the file is still uploaded.
<path>/data/upload</path> - This is simply the path you want to watch.

Trigger a command for uploaded files


find %f -iname '*.mp4' -execdir /data/upload/encode_files.sh
{} \; This is bash magic happening. Took me quite some time to find out.
%f is the full path of the filename that gets an event. (via iwatch documentation).
What the command does:
Find every mp4-file (*.mp4) inside directory %f and execute a certain command with this file.
execdir - run the command inside the directory where you found the mp4-file.
/data/upload/encode_files.sh {} \; - run the bash script encode_files.sh
and pass the mp4-file as first parameter so I can access the filename inside the script.

The encoding script


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f=$(basename "$1")
if ! [ -f "/data/streamfiles/$f" ]; then
ffmpeg -i "$1" -vcodec libx264 -b:v 1000k -ab 96k -ar 48k -f mp4 -strict experimental "/
fi

if ! [ -f "/data/streamfiles/128_$f" ]; then
ffmpeg -i "$1" -vcodec libx264 -b:v 250k -ab 96k -ar 48k -f mp4 -strict experimental "/d
fi
if ! [ -f "/data/streamfiles/250_$f" ]; then
ffmpeg -i "$1" -vcodec libx264 -b:v 500k -ab 96k -ar 48k -f mp4 -strict experimental "/d
fi

f=$(basename "$1") - Take the first parameter and strip it of its path. This gets you the
bare filename (my_uploaded_file.mp4 instead of
/data/uploaded/subfolder/my_uploaded_file.mp4)
if ! [ -f "/data/streamfiles/$f" ]; then - If the file doesnt exist at the
target destination run the following command
ffmpeg -i "$1" -vcodec libx264 -b:v 1000k -ab 96k -ar 48k -f mp4
-strict experimental "/data/streamfiles/$f" - This is a bunch of ffmpeg
gibberish, also outside of the scope of this post. Ffmpeg seems overwhelming at first but is quite
well documented.

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