What is rtmpsuck and rtmpsrv? When to use rtmpsuck and when rtmpsrv/rtmpdump?

[hyc]

You can use rtmpsuck on Windows if you have a TCP/IP filter that handles connection redirects. I'm not aware of any free drivers for Windows that will do this. I have one for Windows XP that my company sells. If you want it, feel free to email sales@symas.com for a "TCPX For Windows" license.

Personally I detest Windows and have no desire to help its spread. That also means I don't help Windows users unless they pay for my time. There are plenty of companies out there writing and selling software for Windows, go use their stuff. I'm only interested in talking to people who actually do their homework, and demonstrate that they've carefully read all the documentation already. By and large, that excludes 99% of Windows users; it seems they're all allergic to reading...

[placebo]

Originally Posted by hyc

You can use rtmpsuck on Windows if you have a TCP/IP filter that handles connection redirects. I'm not aware of any free drivers for Windows that will do this.

hyc, you are one of the folks behind rtmpdump or know rtmpdump extremely well? [...] You are mentioning "paying" (money), "time" and "work" in your posting (and dont give any practical help/info other than "write me an email if you want to buy"). Interesting that you're mentioning these aspects (of life). Maybe that's exactly what the original coder (author/creator) of the rtmpdump-package was thinking, too (who, too, doesnt want to address or deal with Windows users).

So well, okay then. And here is my response (representing some larger part of the Windows users, namely the "99%" ):

From what is written on SRF (this website!) we can conclude that rtmpsuck could be used on Windows machines but, in practice, no single Windows user actually ever uses rtmpsuck. In fact, on SRF, i havent come across any boardie who uses rtmpsuck on a Windows system.

i (a forum moderator on SRF. and a hardcore Windows user. only willing to read the chapter headlines of manuals/documentation.) dont even use rtmpdump nor rtmpsrv other than for testing it for the sake of testing. in RL-practice, when i need to download a stream (audio/video), many Ch*nese software tools (freeware or shareware e.g. the ones designed by Terry Backer) for Windows are available which, by their GUI, do the download more comfortably and even though they lack noteworthy documentation too. so why would i want to waste my time with rtmpdump (or rtmpsrv or rtmpsuck or the documentation of rtmpdump or the documentation of rtmpsrv or the documentation of rtmpsuck)?? so there are three tools (rtmpdump+rtmpsrv+rtmpsuck) with their respective documentation and my sole aim is to download a single video? oh please. no thanks.

if i want to download a (protected) streaming video, i do this instead, which is the opposite of wasting time:
i launch GetFLV, surf to the video webpage, download the video with getflv's GUI, and done! No need to read any documentation!!

Let's summarize (and correct me if i am wrong):

• rtmpdump.exe is for Windows. and it works.
• rtmpsrv.exe is for Windows and works too. it facilitates the secure use of rtmpdump.exe.
• rtmpsuck could be used on Windows but no Windows user uses it (because they dont need it or because they dont want to buy your software. like me. i am not going to buy your software, no thanks.). it primarily aims at Linux users.
• the documentation of the rtmpdump-package s*cks (otherwise there wouldnt be any need to dedicate a whole forum section to the use of rtmpdump!). it is not a manual per se and does not compare at all to commercially written documentation (or manuals!) of successful commercial software. but this is quite natural or common: documentation of freeware usually lacks or s*cks. and it is even truer for freeware/documentation produced by non-English native speakers.

I am willing to pay for (little) software tools which come along with outstanding(!) practical manuals which make the usage of the tool a clear, secure, easy, concise, reproducible thing (experience, successful), including comprehensive FAQ's and helpful trouble shooting tips and tricks.

again. *imo*

the rtmpdump documentation really sucks.
(dont take this statement personally. unless you want to. in any case hopefully you enjoyed reading my response)

Originally Posted by hyc

You can use rtmpsuck on Windows if you have a TCP/IP filter that handles connection redirects. I'm not aware of any free drivers for Windows that will do this. I have one for Windows XP that my company sells. If you want it, feel free to email sales@symas.com for a "TCPX For Windows" license.

What kind of traffic needs to be redirected to rtmpsuck? TCP/IP coming to port 1935? Should this traffic be redirected to localhost:1935?

And what about RTMPE protocol? Do you think a TCP/IP filter that handles connection redirects for RTMPE streams can be DMCA compliant?

What about rtmpsuck.exe on Windows? Can it be just launched or any tweaks are needed?

symas driver works in Windows XP only?

[hyc]

Originally Posted by placebo

hyc, you are one of the folks behind rtmpdump or know rtmpdump extremely well?

I have written all of the rtmpdump releases from 1.8 to 2.3.

[...] You are mentioning "paying" (money), "time" and "work" in your posting (and dont give any practical help/info other than "write me an email if you want to buy"). Interesting that you're mentioning these aspects (of life). Maybe that's exactly what the original coder (author/creator) of the rtmpdump-package was thinking, too (who, too, doesnt want to address or deal with Windows users).

So well, okay then. And here is my response (representing some larger part of the Windows users, namely the "99%" ):

From what is written on SRF (this website!) we can conclude that rtmpsuck could be used on Windows machines but, in practice, no single Windows user actually ever uses rtmpsuck. In fact, on SRF, i havent come across any boardie who uses rtmpsuck on a Windows system.

i (a forum moderator on SRF. and a hardcore Windows user. only willing to read the chapter headlines of manuals/documentation.) dont even use rtmpdump nor rtmpsrv other than for testing it for the sake of testing. in RL-practice, when i need to download a stream (audio/video), many Ch*nese software tools (freeware or shareware e.g. the ones designed by Terry Backer) for Windows are available which, by their GUI, do the download more comfortably and even though they lack noteworthy documentation too. so why would i want to waste my time with rtmpdump (or rtmpsrv or rtmpsuck or the documentation of rtmpdump or the documentation of rtmpsrv or the documentation of rtmpsuck)?? so there are three tools (rtmpdump+rtmpsrv+rtmpsuck) with their respective documentation and my sole aim is to download a single video? oh please. no thanks.

if i want to download a (protected) streaming video, i do this instead, which is the opposite of wasting time:
i launch GetFLV, surf to the video webpage, download the video with getflv's GUI, and done! No need to read any documentation!!

Let's summarize (and correct me if i am wrong):

• rtmpdump.exe is for Windows. and it works.
• rtmpsrv.exe is for Windows and works too. it facilitates the secure use of rtmpdump.exe.
• rtmpsuck could be used on Windows but no Windows user uses it (because they dont need it or because they dont want to buy your software. like me. i am not going to buy your software, no thanks.). it primarily aims at Linux users.
• the documentation of the rtmpdump-package s*cks (otherwise there wouldnt be any need to dedicate a whole forum section to the use of rtmpdump!). it is not a manual per se and does not compare at all to commercially written documentation (or manuals!) of successful commercial software. but this is quite natural or common: documentation of freeware usually lacks or s*cks. and it is even truer for freeware/documentation produced by non-English native speakers.

I am willing to pay for (little) software tools which come along with outstanding(!) practical manuals which make the usage of the tool a clear, secure, easy, concise, reproducible thing (experience, successful), including comprehensive FAQ's and helpful trouble shooting tips and tricks.

again. *imo*

the rtmpdump documentation really sucks.
(dont take this statement personally. unless you want to. in any case hopefully you enjoyed reading my response)

I adopted rtmpdump after it was abandoned by its original author so that *I* could use it for the things I needed. Since you are a Windows user, you are NOT the target audience for this package. I already know there are umpteen-zillion downloaders available for Windows and I heartily encourage all Windows users to go and use their favorite.

The only reason we provide builds of rtmpdump for Windows is because some people whined loudly enough that they wanted to use it but it was too hard for them to compile it on their own. I don't have any more Windows boxes in my place but I can still fire up a VM when I need to compile and test this code.

I provide builds of rtmpdump for Android because I use it on my Android phone. I don't provide builds of rtmpdump for MacOS because I don't use MacOS and don't have a VM that I can install it in and build under, and I have no interest in getting one set up.

So anyway - no, not taking this personally. But the simple fact is, if you read the provided documentation and it didn't make sense to you, then NO, this package isn't for you. You have tons of other options available, please go use one of them instead.

RTMPdump is important to me because there are NO other options on Linux. It is open source, to make it possible for other Linux programmers to extend it and enhance it with pretty push-button GUIs if they feel so inclined. It has only ever been intended as a vehicle for other programmers to build their own projects around. (In fact its functionality has now been integrated into what I see as the important projects on Linux - VLC, XBMC, mplayer, and ffmpeg - so its reason for existence as a standalone command line tool is greatly diminished.)

If you as a user are unhappy with what you got for free, that's not my problem. i gave this code to the world, what have you given?

[hyc]

Originally Posted by Stream Recorder

What kind of traffic needs to be redirected to rtmpsuck? TCP/IP coming to port 1935? Should this traffic be redirected to localhost:1935?

Almost. You need to redirect traffic *going out to* port 1935, not "coming to". And of course, port 1935 is only a default; any particular server could be configured to use any other port arbitrarily. Moreover, you need the redirect to be done at the kernel level, so that the original destination address is preserved inside the kernel, and can be retrieved by the rtmpsuck program. When you edit the hosts.txt file, you can redirect a hostname to localhost, but the original destination address is lost. And of course, editing hosts.txt doesn't help you if the original RTMP destination was specified as a numeric IP address.

And what about RTMPE protocol? Do you think a TCP/IP filter that handles connection redirects for RTMPE streams can be DMCA compliant?

The TCP/IP filter doesn't know (or care) what the data streams carry. It simply takes traffic bound for one destination and swaps in an alternate destination instead. DMCA is irrelevant.

What about rtmpsuck.exe on Windows? Can it be just launched or any tweaks are needed?

Once the TCP/IP redirector is running, rtmpsuck needs no special tweaks.

symas driver works in Windows XP only?

WinNT, Win2K, WinXP. I haven't tried it on Vista or Win7 but from what I've read in the developer's documentation, it probably will not work.

[hyc]

Originally Posted by placebo

Let's summarize (and correct me if i am wrong):

• rtmpdump.exe is for Windows. and it works.
• rtmpsrv.exe is for Windows and works too. it facilitates the secure use of rtmpdump.exe.

The purpose of the rtmpsrv program is to intercept a connection from an RTMP client and extract its connection parameters so that they can be passed to rtmpdump. The intent is to provide an automated way to discover the parameters, which would otherwise have to be tediously extracted from various HTML, XML, or SWF files scattered across a web site. There's nothing that makes it any more or less secure.

• rtmpsuck could be used on Windows but no Windows user uses it (because they dont need it or because they dont want to buy your software. like me. i am not going to buy your software, no thanks.). it primarily aims at Linux users.

rtmpsuck was written for Linux, which has a complete TCP/IP networking stack that isn't brain-damaged by design. It relies on networking features that are generally present by default on any Linux machine. Its purpose is similar to rtmpsrv's - it intercepts an outgoing RTMP session. But instead of just collecting parameters that can later be used with rtmpdump, it runs in a passthru mode so that it can just save the data while the client is running. The main reason rtmpsuck is useful is because it should work regardless of whatever silly security token methods might be in use on a client or server. Since it just operates in passthru mode, it doesn't need to understand what those security methods are, it just has to pass them thru faithfully.

rtmpsuck can be made to work on Windows, if you add some 3rd party software to extend the TCP/IP stack to support connection redirection. There are many 3rd party products that can add this feature. I only commented that I am not aware of any free ones. I never implied that my company's was the only option.

And as already noted - NO, IF YOU'RE ON WINDOWS YOU REALLY DON'T NEED ANY OF THIS. Please go and use GetFLV or StreamTransport or Jaksta or whatever else.

• the documentation of the rtmpdump-package s*cks (otherwise there wouldnt be any need to dedicate a whole forum section to the use of rtmpdump!). it is not a manual per se and does not compare at all to commercially written documentation (or manuals!) of successful commercial software. but this is quite natural or common: documentation of freeware usually lacks or s*cks. and it is even truer for freeware/documentation produced by non-English native speakers.

Well, professionally written documentation comes from professional documentation writers. This is an open source project, anyone is welcome to participate. I am a professional software engineer and I donate my coding skills. Any professional doc writer who wishes to donate their doc writing skills is welcome to participate in the project.

Originally Posted by hyc

Almost. You need to redirect traffic *going out to* port 1935, not "coming to". And of course, port 1935 is only a default; any particular server could be configured to use any other port arbitrarily. Moreover, you need the redirect to be done at the kernel level, so that the original destination address is preserved inside the kernel, and can be retrieved by the rtmpsuck program. When you edit the hosts.txt file, you can redirect a hostname to localhost, but the original destination address is lost. And of course, editing hosts.txt doesn't help you if the original RTMP destination was specified as a numeric IP address.

Sorry, I don't understand what "going out to port 1935 means".
Does it mean that the server uses port 1935 and a PC can use any other port?

Also the developer of rtmpexplorer says that RTMPE and RTMPT don't use port 1935, so his program works with RTMP only
http://stream-recorder.com/forum/sho...84&postcount=6
So he doesn't know how to handle RTMPE and RTMPT streams. Other developers will probably face the same problem.

[hyc]

Originally Posted by Stream Recorder

Sorry, I don't understand what "going out to port 1935 means".
Does it mean that the server uses port 1935 and a PC can use any other port?

Yes.

Also the developer of rtmpexplorer says that RTMPE and RTMPT don't use port 1935, so his program works with RTMP only
http://stream-recorder.com/forum/sho...84&postcount=6
So he doesn't know how to handle RTMPE and RTMPT streams. Other developers will probably face the same problem.

If he was writing open source I could easily help him. Since he's not, too bad.

[chap]

rtmpsuck FOR WINDOWS?... hopefully

Now, it already is.

[sam4037]

I think it would be a great idea to somehow persuade the RTMPexplorer dev to open his code so that Howard can help him with rtmpe support for all the windows users.

How can this be done? Perhaps with a financial initiative or plain logic and reason?

Having had a good look at the mailing list as well as Howards CV I am sure not only the dev of rtmpexplorer but all of the rtmpdump users on Windows would greatly benefit.

That said, I have just started using Ubuntu Desktop and oh wow.. Thanks to rtmpdump I have finally made the move, well at least I am trying things out with rtmpsrv on Ubuntu now. This is so damn exciting!

Having come back to this thread month later I also now understand this pass through advantage of Linux compared to the Windows OS and the complicated way the traffic is handled there. Howard FTW!