How to record BBC iPlayer without signing-in

[Ed999]

As of July 1st, 2017, any attempt to listen to the BBC Radio iPlayer is met with a refusal, unless you are signed-in to a BBC account.

The schedules for iPlayer are at (for example) here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4extra/programmes/schedules

To listen without signing in, there are various options.


Listen to the live stream, using Winamp (or any media player of your choice), with one of these URLs -

http://bbcmedia.ic.llnwd.net/stream/...dio4extra_mf_p

http://bbcmedia.ic.llnwd.net/stream/...dio4extra_mf_q

http://www.radiofeeds.co.uk/bbcradio4extra.pls

Listen to the live stream (the 320 kbps version), using VLC Media Player, with this URL -

http://as-hls-uk-live.akamaized.net/...%3d320000.m3u8

The VLC media player is here: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/




Download one of the live streams, using the program FFMPEG.EXE, with one of these commands (at a command prompt, or in a batch file) -

ffmpeg -v 16 -stats -i "http://bbcmedia.ic.llnwd.net/stream/bbcmedia_radio4extra_mf_p" Out.mp2

ffmpeg -v 16 -stats -i "http://bbcmedia.ic.llnwd.net/stream/bbcmedia_radio4extra_mf_q" Out.mp2

Listen to an on-demand Listen Again programme (but not the live stream), using Internet Explorer 8.

Because IE8 uses an old version of javascript, it does not recognise the newer forms of javascript used in iPlayer. It in effect ignores them, and so the audio stream plays normally.

Just turning off javascript won't work. The iPlayer refuses to stream any audio if the browser has no javascript support at all.



Here's how to download an on-demand programme from the Listen Again service -


FFMPEG command line from Greasemonkey script

These instructions are for use in Windows XP / Vista / 7 / 8 / 10. There are links below to obtain the software mentioned.


To obtain the command line -

1. Open the Firefox browser (must have the Greasemonkey extension installed, and the iPlayer greasemonkey script installed).

2. Open the iPlayer page which plays the radio show, using Firefox. After a few moments, an FFMPEG command line will be displayed immediately below the area where the radio show plays.


To run the command line -

3. Create a batch file (a plain-text file with the extension .bat or .cmd).
4. FFMPEG.exe must be copied into the same directory/folder as the batch file.
5. Copy-and-paste the command line into the batch file.
6. Modify the file extension specified on the command line: change it from .mp3 to whatever you want (see below).
7. Run the batch file.


Software required -

FFMPEG.exe (Static build recommended)
https://ffmpeg.zeranoe.com/builds/

Firefox 39
https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/...tup%2039.0.exe

Greasemonkey extension for Firefox 39
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/fir.../greasemonkey/

Greasemonkey script 'BBC iPlayer video download', for Firefox 39
https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/81...ideo-download/

Addendum : You might need to replace the .js file installed by the current version of the installer with an older version of that file (version 3.6.3) to get the script to work in Windows. Here's a link to v3.6.3:

BBC iPlayer video download v 3.6.3 -
https://www.mediafire.com/?awx3o4v2l49yceg

In Windows 7, the .js file is in this folder -

C:\Users\%Username%\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefo x\Profiles\<ProfileName>\gm_scripts\BBC_iPlayer_vi deo_download


Notes -

The above procedure can download a file in various formats, including (for radio): .mp3, .mp2, .m4a, .ts

For instance, .MP2 files have a 384 kbps stream, of better audio quality than the MP3 stream.


M4A : Variable KBPS rate, up to 200 kbps; 48 kHz; Stereo; MPEG-4 AAC LC
MP3 : Fixed 128 KBPS rate; 48 kHz; Stereo; MPEG-1 layer 3
MP2 : Fixed 384 KBPS rate; 48 kHz; Stereo; MPEG-1 layer 2
TS : Fixed 384 KBPS rate; 48 kHz; Stereo; 16 bit per sample
WAV : Fixed 1536 KBPS rate; 48 kHz; Stereo; Signed 16 bit PCM


M4A is downloaded if the command line specifies an output file with the extension .M4A
MP3 is downloaded if the command line specifies an output file with the extension .MP3
MP2 is downloaded if the command line specifies an output file with the extension .MP2
TS is downloaded if the command line specifies an output file with the extension .TS
WAV is downloaded if the command line specifies an output file with the extension .WAV


By default, the Greasemonkey script adds .mp3 to the command line; but you can replace that with any of the above alternatives (or some other). I recommend replacing it with .mp2 instead, because of its superior bitrate.


I developed this solution on my laptop, which happens to be running the Firefox v39 browser. The solution will probably work in other versions of Firefox; but if it doesn't (some add-ons only work on particular Firefox versions), be aware that you can always force it to work - by installing Firefox 39.

If you are running Internet Explorer, don't uninstall IE. On Windows 7, there are no problems arising if you also install Firefox. The most that might happen is all urls start opening in Firefox (which is easy to fix): both browsers co-exist happily on my laptop, and have done for years.



Read this article (by Andrea Lazzarotto) for further information -

https://andrealazzarotto.com/2015/02...player-videos/

I only understand Windows! But Andrea develops this software in the Linux operating system. So Andrea's webpage has information for anyone wishing to download from iPlayer using a computer running on Linux.