OK, so you don’t necessarily call rtsp on Ubuntu QuickTime Streaming Server. Instead, you call it Darwin Streaming Server (DSS). But the end result is basically what you have exposed in Mac OS X Server, but running on Linux. You don’t have the same functionality in Server Admin, but it does work. And the key to what it does is use the rtsp protocol to stream supported files from the server to clients. It is a little tougher than just clicking on the start button, but too much tougher provided you follow these directions (thanks to the good folks of the DSS list that I’ve been a member of for a few years for taking such good notes, making this much simpler to write when I just have to move from Ubuntu 7 to 10.04).
To get started (most all of this is going to need sudo or su), let’s use wget to download all the files that we’re going to need (except 1):
wget http://static.macosforge.org/dss/downloads/DarwinStreamingSrvr6.0.3-Source.tar
wget http://dss.macosforge.org/trac/raw-attachment/ticket/6/dss-6.0.3.patch
wget http://dss.macosforge.org/trac/raw-attachment/ticket/6/dss-hh-20080728-1.patch
Now let’s extract the tar file:
tar -xvf DarwinStreamingSrvr6.0.3-Source.tar
Now let’s create our qtss user and group:
addgroup –system qtss
adduser –system –no-create-home –ingroup qtss qtss
We’re going to need the build-essential package from apt-get, so let’s install that before moving on:
apt-get install build-essential
The base 6.0.3 installer was only built for Mac OS X, so let’s apply the patches we used wget to pull down:
patch -p0 < dss-6.0.3.patch
patch -p0 < dss-hh-20080728-1.patch
Now let’s cd into the actual dss installer directory and then grab a patched installer file, get rid of the old Install script and then grab a new one:
cd DarwinStreamingSrvr6.0.3-Source
mv Install Install.old
wget http://dss.macosforge.org/trac/raw-attachment/ticket/6/Install
Then we’ll make the Install script executable and run the Buildit (no, not Configure) then Install scripts:
chmod +x Install
./Buildit
./Install
Finally, fire up the DSS:
/usr/local/sbin/DarwinStreamingServer
Now you should be able to go to a standard Mac OS X client and run a port scan of the rtsp port, 554 using stroke (swap the 192.168.210.254 IP here with whatever IP or hostname that you’re using):
/Applications/Utilities/Network Utility.app/Contents/Resources/stroke 192.168.210.254 554 554
DSS installs some sample movies into /usr/local/movies. Provided that the port is open, let’s open Safari and provide the following link to see if one of the stock sample movies will open:
rtsp://192.168.210.254/sample_h264_300kbit.mp4
Provided that you see the sample movie from Apple then you can move the sample movies elsewhere and drop your own in here. You’ve now got a fully functional DSS. The DSS will stream .mov, .mp4 and .3gp files. If you enable the QTSSHttpFileModule you can also stream mp3 files. If you go into the /etc/streaming folder you will see a number of files that look similar to what you have been working with on Mac OS X Server (assuming you’ve been working with Mac OS X Server). In here, you’ll find the qtusers and qtgroups files for managing users and groups in rtsp as well as the streamingserver.xml file, which is where the modules are loaded and unloaded. In /var/streaming you’ll also find a directory called logs, which is interestingly enough where the logs reside and another directory called playlists, which is where you will drop playlists in the event that you decide to make your own radio station. My music tastes are bad enough where I’ve never really considered this, but feel free to get all WKRP in Cincinnati if you so choose, I promise not to judge (or maybe just a little)…
You’ll also end up likely looking to embed these rtsp streams (that seems to be what everyone does). If so, get to know the XML structure:
<?xml version=”1.0″?>
<?quicktime type=”application/x-quicktime-media-link”?>
<embed src=”rtsp://192.168.210.254/sample_h264_300kbit.mp4″ autoplay=”true” />
Ultimately, building and using QuickTime Streaming on Mac OS X Server is far superior in a number of ways to doing so in Linux. For starters, the steps here are all done by clicking on a Start button in Mac OS X Server. But even further than that, updates are even more rare to DSS. If you’re in the rack density game, a number of Mac mini servers in the right sized rack might just get you more bang for your square inch!
