Tvheadend

Some additional info: I tried to figure out why there are 30 minutes in the m3u8 - actually that's because the TV stations offer 30 minutes time-shift in their Web-based viewer - so user may hit "Pause" and may do so for up to 30 minutes.

Reading further, it seems that the "rotating playlists" are exactly how HTS works...

My next step will be to bring a proxy inbetween and establish a rewrite rule that strips all but a few lines from m3u8-files - let's see if I am clever enough to accomplish this... If I succeed, will post the solution here.

OK, I already hit a wall at the very first step: How do I configure tvheadend to actually use a proxy? Searched the internet for an hour and only found tutorials to proxy tvheadend, but not vice versa..

Anyone can give me a hint? Thanks!

OK, solved the problem. In short, I created two PHP pages that modify the involved playlists as desired and use the PHP as tvheadend URLs for the network.

A little bit more detailed:¶

I have:

• A m3u8 playlist that I use as network, which contains the services the TV station offers. I'll call it the network playlist below.
• A m3u8 playlist that contains a sequence of transport streams, in my case 180 of them, which I will call the MUX playlist below.

The network playlist URL is like this:

http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/master.m3u8

and its content is (shortened):

#EXTM3U
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:PROGRAM-ID=1,BANDWIDTH=184000,RESOLUTION=320x180,CODECS="avc1.66.30, mp4a.40.2"
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/index_184_av-p.m3u8?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:PROGRAM-ID=1,BANDWIDTH=184000,RESOLUTION=320x180,CODECS="avc1.66.30, mp4a.40.2"
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/index_184_av-b.m3u8?sd=10&rebase=on
[...]

My first PHP script, m3u8redirect.php, now changes each line of this playlist like this:

#EXTM3U
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:PROGRAM-ID=1,BANDWIDTH=184000,RESOLUTION=320x180,CODECS="avc1.66.30, mp4a.40.2"
http://127.0.0.1:8000/m3u8shorten.php?Keep=5&TargetURL=http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/index_184_av-p.m3u8?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:PROGRAM-ID=1,BANDWIDTH=184000,RESOLUTION=320x180,CODECS="avc1.66.30, mp4a.40.2"
http://127.0.0.1:8000/m3u8shorten.php?Keep=5&TargetURL=http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/index_184_av-b.m3u8?sd=10&rebase=on
[...]

So, basically the part http://127.0.0.1:8000/m3u8shorten.php?Keep=5&TargetURL= was added in front of each URL, which causes TVheadend, when it collects the MUXes to enter these new URLs into the MUX URL, and when it checks the services, the MUX playlists will each be run through my second php script, m3u8shorten.php.

This second script then strips the unwanted sequences from the MUX playlist, et voilá, Live-TV is suddenly live. The original MUX playlist looks like this (again - shortened):

#EXTM3U
#EXT-X-TARGETDURATION:10
#EXT-X-ALLOW-CACHE:YES
#EXT-X-VERSION:3
#EXT-X-MEDIA-SEQUENCE:148753965
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148753965_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148753966_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148753967_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on
[...]
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148754141_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148754142_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on


And after m3u8shorten.php (this time complete file):

#EXTM3U
#EXT-X-TARGETDURATION:10
#EXT-X-ALLOW-CACHE:YES
#EXT-X-VERSION:3
#EXT-X-MEDIA-SEQUENCE:148754138
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148754138_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148754139_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148754140_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148754141_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on
#EXTINF:10.000,
http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/segment148754142_184_av-b.ts?sd=10&rebase=on


Notice also the updated line #EXT-X-MEDIA-SEQUENCE:148754138.

And here in detail everything to get it up and running¶

My description for XBian 20170203-0. All steps done as root/sudo:

First, install webserver and php:

apt-get install lighttpd php5-cgi

Next: Configure lighttp - edit /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf:

server.port = 8000

This is to keep port 80 open for web interfaces. Now add the following lines to /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf:

fastcgi.server += ( ".php" => ((
"bin-path" => "/usr/bin/php-cgi",
"socket" => "/var/run/php.sock"
)))

Activates PHP. Now put the following two PHP scripts into /var/www/html:

m3u8redirect.php:

<?php

        /*

        This script adds to each URL in a m3u8-playlist a redirect-URL to the PHP-script that
        shortens the transport stream playlist to a given number of sequences.
        Hand over two GET variables:

        Keep            Number of sequences to keep in the rolling playlists
        TargetURL       URL of the MUX playlist that contains the rolling playlists for the services

        Written by Hauke Feb 2017
        */

        // Set correct content type
        header('Content-Type: application/x-mpegURL');

        // Get GET-Variables
        $SequencesToKeep = $_GET['Keep'];
        $M3u8URL = $_GET['TargetURL'];

        // Download original M3U8
        $M3u8 = file_get_contents($M3u8URL);

        // Add redirect-URL to each URL in playlist and send it out
        echo str_replace("http", "http://127.0.0.1:8000/m3u8shorten.php?Keep=" . $SequencesToKeep . "&TargetURL=http", $M3u8);

?>

And m3u8shorten.php:

<?php

        /*

        This script takes a m3u8 playlist that contains a sequence of transport streams. It
        drops all sequence URLs but the last ones - how many can be configured via GET variable.
        It adjusts the starting sequence number accordingly.

        Input GET variables:
        Keep            Number of sequences to keep
        TargetURL       URL of the original playlist

        Written by Hauke Feb 2017

        */

        // Set correct content type
        header('Content-Type: application/x-mpegURL');

        // Read GET variables
        $M3u8URL = $_GET['TargetURL'];
        $SequencesToKeep = $_GET['Keep'];

        // Download original playlist
        $M3u8 = file_get_contents($M3u8URL);

        // Split playlist into individual lines
        $M3u8Lines = explode("\n", $M3u8);

        // Arrays that will contain the individual transport stream URLs and the m3u8 EXTINF information
        $EXTINFs = [];
        $URLs = [];

        // Count sequences processed
        $Sequences = 0;

        // Loop through all lines
        foreach($M3u8Lines as $line) {
                if (strtoupper(substr($line, 0, 8)) == "#EXTINF:") {
                        // EXTINF found --> Add to array
                        $EXTINFs[] = $line;
                } else if (strtoupper(substr($line, 0, 4)) == "HTTP") {
                        // URL found --> Add to array and count sequences +1
                        $URLs[] = $line;
                        $Sequences++;
                } else if (strtoupper(substr($line, 0, 22)) == "#EXT-X-MEDIA-SEQUENCE:") {
                        // Filter out current sequence start number - needs to be updated later
                        $MediaSequenceStart = substr($line, 22);
                } else if (strlen(trim($line)) > 0) {
                        // Each other non-empty line is just echoed (assume it's a header line)
                        echo $line . "\n";
                }
        }

        // Adjust the starting sequence number and send it out
        echo "#EXT-X-MEDIA-SEQUENCE:" . ($MediaSequenceStart + $Sequences - $SequencesToKeep) . "\n";

        // now send out the desired number of sequence URLs from the end of the list
        for ($SequenceCounter = $Sequences - $SequencesToKeep; $SequenceCounter < $Sequences; $SequenceCounter++) {
                echo $EXTINFs[$SequenceCounter] . "\n";
                echo $URLs[$SequenceCounter] . "\n";
        }

?>

Thats all to install.

In order to configure tvheadend, if you create the network, the URL needs to be changed. Assume the original URL is:

http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/master.m3u8

You have to change this to:

http://127.0.0.1:8000/m3u8redirect.php?Keep=5&TargetURL=http://daserste_live-lh.akamaihd.net/i/daserste_de@91204/master.m3u8

So you just add http://127.0.0.1:8000/m3u8redirect.php?Keep=5&TargetURL= to the original URL.

Everything else goes like usual, and you're done!

Adjust the value Keep=5 to your liking - the number says, how many sequences should in the end be in the MUX playlist. 5 I found working really well with the German TV stations.

/me is happy now :-)

Edit: Additional information regarding the HTS-protocol i found here: https://developer.apple.com/library/content/technotes/tn2288/_index.html

Dear all,

since I struggled with several problems, I decided to publish a tutorial in my blog. Find it here:

http://projects.webvoss.de/2017/04/02/building-a-media-center-for-german-iptv/

Hope it's helpful.

Hi Hauke,
I just had the same problem with the NDR livestream, which is also provided by Akamai.

Found their HLS URL specs here:
https://learn.akamai.com/en-us/webhelp/media-services-live/media-services-live-stream-packaging-rtmp-ingest-hds-and-hls-outputs-user-guide/GUID-EB91F1A0-75EF-4604-9F57-61B66BB7B6C0.html

So the solution is simply to append a "dw" parameter with the desired playback in seconds to the m3u8 query string, e.g.:
http://ndrfs-lh.akamaihd.net/i/ndrfs_nds@430233/master.m3u8?dw=60

By the way, I am getting the HLS playlists from MediathekView(Web): https://mediathekviewweb.de/#query=live%20ndr

Cheers!