How to add support for our campus streaming video service [Kaltura]?

[SteelWagstaff]

We're working with several users on our campus who'd like to be able to make interactive video H5P activities with videos they've uploaded to our campus streaming media service [Kaltura] rather than to Youtube. As far as I know, Kaltura doesn't expose an .mp4 link directly, but it does support oEmbed (like YouTube and Vimeo). Do you have any advice or pointers for how we might be able to use a Kaltura-hosted video with this activity type?

[icc]

First, please note that I have no experience with Kaltura or their services.

Unfortunately, many video streaming services usually bind you to only using their video player as it's part of their product and branding. The first thing you'll have to check is if they offer any player API, if they do then the second part is writing your own version of youtube.js or html5.js that controls the underlying player from your provider.

You should note that there may be a bit of work involved getting the second part to function smoothly with all the features of Interactive Video. It may be an easier route to get your provider to offer some sort of way for you to use the standardized way of streaming video on the web.

[SteelWagstaff]

Thanks @icc. Kaltura does have a player API: http://player.kaltura.com/docs/api and we'll explore how to work with that to see how we might produce something comparable to the .js files you referenced in relation to our player. If/when we build a workable prototype, would you be open to a pull request adding support for it as a player to the interactive video library? If so, do you have any guidelines other than what you provide here: https://h5p.org/contributing and here: https://h5p.org/documentation/contributing/contribute-pull-requests we should be mindful of in how we approach this?

[icc]

Of course, I don't see any drawbacks of supporting this platform as long as it's generic enough so that it can be reused and have value to other people.

[nadavkav]

Just saw this issue, so hope it still can help anyone...
This is how we added VideoJS + MPEG-DASH support to H5P.Video (to play Kaltura streamer videos and Wowza too) at the Tel Aviv university.
https://github.com/nadavkav/h5p-video/tree/videojs/scripts

And another implementation of the TheoPlayer (by the Israeli Open University)
https://github.com/nadavkav/h5p-video/tree/open-uni-il_theoplayer/scripts

[SteelWagstaff]

Thanks @nadavkav!

[SanatSharma]

@nadavkav I was looking at your video.js branch. Is it possible to update the Readme with instructions or add a usage example to the repo? I am new to the H5P codebase and was curious if H5P videos could be played using VideoJS. Thanks a lot!!

[nadavkav]

@SanatSharma , You will have to use video URI with proper MPEG-DASH syntax so the VideoJS player could pick it up, as seen here:
https://github.com/nadavkav/h5p-video/blob/videojs/scripts/videojs.js#L597
Example:
https://your-vod-server/folder/video.mp4/manifest.mpd

Our video streamer is Kaltura open source streamer for NGINX:
https://github.com/kaltura/nginx-vod-module

[SanatSharma]

@nadavkav understood thanks! :) I was more curious about how to use this in VideoJS. Do I download the videojs.js file and import the package as a plugin in an html page to allow the VideoJS player to play H5P content? Or is the code provided in the above repo a standalone player that uses VideoJS under the hood?

[SteelWagstaff]

I found two references on the H5P forum that appear to document methods that allows users to derive/create a usable link from a Kaltura video that will work with H5P: https://h5p.org/comment/15531#comment-15531 and https://h5p.org/node/135919. I will test and offer details if either prove successful.

[SteelWagstaff]

Neither of the previous links worked for me, but I did have success using these instructions: https://kb.wisc.edu/page.php?id=72075 (though I am working with content at the University of Wisconsin-Madison specifically, so not use how replicable these instructions will be for others with different flavors of Kaltura).

[mikehubert4012]

@nadavkav How can I upload your code for using in moodle h5p plugins?

[reinhilde-1982]

@nadavkav, do you plan to update your code to be able to use it with the current version of H5P?

[nadavkav]

I am no longer involved and responsible for this code. so I am internally checking to see who is and what is the status of the code, and I will let you all know, soon.
Sorry for not responding to the earlier information and status requests.

[reinhilde-1982]

Hello Nadav,

thank you very much for this response.