network shared video

[Lt_Horn]

I appologise for my previous thread. I wasn't quite sure on the money thing. but here it goes again albiet slightly modified:

I'm at my wits end with this. I have tried FC6, fedora 7 and Ubuntu all with no success. what i want to be able to do is view a video file on a windows machine networked with my linux box. what i have is a file server running windows 2k3 and a laptop running Ubuntu. smb://artemis/ allows me to connect to my server, i can navigate to where the video is. i can see the files. i just cant play them over the network. if i copy them to my laptop then i can view them so i know that the drivers have been installed properly. I have tried everything i can think of. im unsure how to use chmod on smb. please help

LT

PS again sorry mods

[Shelnutt2]

What video player are you using? Try VLC

And Second (I think this might be it), check the permission's. Do you have execute permission? If not no way you can play the video. Simply do chmod +x videofile.


(I didn't care about the money, I just want you to stay with Linux/GNU!)

Right click on the video file, and go to properties and then permissions and tell me what it says..mainly looking for execute permission for everyone.

[TalRW]

what happens when you right click on the file and hit play or try to open it in a media player? Do you get an error?

[Lt_Horn]

i get a variaty of different things. mostly errors though. with vlc nothing happens. once i get back to my laptop ill check on the permissions for Shelnutt2

[Lt_Horn]

i right clicked on the file, and it appears to have the box next to "allow executing the file as a program" checked.

LT

[TalRW]

could you post a screenshot of that because I haven't heard of that but if I could actually see what was happening that might help. Thanks.

[MRD]

What exactly does it say when you try to browse to the file and play it with vlc, mplayer, etc.?

If you can copy it, you have read access, so that's a non-issue.

[Lt_Horn]

with vlc it does nothing, it looks just like it would if you just open the vlc app directly. with kaffeine it says...

05:06:19 PM: xine: cannot find input plugin for MRL [smb://artemis/Anime%20A-Ma/Ah!%20Megami%20Sama/Ah!%20Megami%20Sama%20-%2004.avi]
05:06:19 PM: xine: input plugin cannot open MRL [smb://artemis/Anime%20A-Ma/Ah!%20Megami%20Sama/Ah!%20Megami%20Sama%20-%2004.avi]
05:06:19 PM: xine: found input plugin : CIFS/SMB input plugin based on libsmbclient

[MRD]

Are you mounting the samba share to a directory? or trying to access it with //servername/sharename/etc.

[Lt_Horn]

Are you mounting the samba share to a directory? or trying to access it with //servername/sharename/etc.

i have tried both

[Lt_Horn]

have i possibly stumped everyone?!? i can't be the only one who has somthing like this setup. does anyone else watch video on a linux box where the file is stored on a windows share?

LT

[MRD]

I watch videos over a samba share all the time, without issues. I also have a mythtv system, which essentially streams video over a samba share to all the other computers in the house.

I've never had any problems at all with this. If I can access the file (i.e. copy it, read it, etc.), then I can play it.

I always do it via a mount. I have a mount line in my fstab that mounts the share to a directory in the filesystem, and I access it off /samba/servername/share/directory/file.

There is something peculiar about your setup... it's not a general issue with samba.

[Zerix01]

Are you able to play the video if it is copied to your laptop? If not then you need a codec or a library that can play that codec for that file. If it plays fine then it is a network issue.

[troutbum]

have i possibly stumped everyone?!? i can't be the only one who has somthing like this setup. does anyone else watch video on a linux box where the file is stored on a windows share?

LT
I have my entire media library on a WHS server and I stream to multiple devices including a ubuntu 7.10 machine. I use XBMC (linux port) and things work great, the UI is still a little buggy because it is an alpha release, but streaming works great.

If you can download the files and play them locally, it sounds like it is not a player/codec issue. Could it be a network bandwidth issue? I am running all my machines on a gigabit network, but you may have streaming problems on wireless.

I would also make sure you are mounting the network share...I modified fstab to auto mount my server media library to /media/videos

[MRD]

I have no trouble streaming full quality DVD video over 100 mbit. Haven't tried anything higher def than that.

If it's wireless, that'll cause lagging and skipping, but I don't think Lt_Horn is getting even that far.

[Jolly-Swagman]

Yeah sounds like a codec problem have a look here
http://www.yolinux.com/TUTORIALS/LinuxTutorialVideo.html
http://sol4.net/downloads/vid1.shtml
http://www.codec-download.com/modules.php?name=Downloads

[Lt_Horn]

Are you able to play the video if it is copied to your laptop? If not then you need a codec or a library that can play that codec for that file. If it plays fine then it is a network issue.
I can play videos locally so it cant be a codec issue

I have my entire media library on a WHS server and I stream to multiple devices including a ubuntu 7.10 machine. I use XBMC (linux port) and things work great, the UI is still a little buggy because it is an alpha release, but streaming works great.

If you can download the files and play them locally, it sounds like it is not a player/codec issue. Could it be a network bandwidth issue? I am running all my machines on a gigabit network, but you may have streaming problems on wireless.

I would also make sure you are mounting the network share...I modified fstab to auto mount my server media library to /media/videos
My network is gigabit so bandwidth isn't an issue

I watch videos over a samba share all the time, without issues. I also have a mythtv system, which essentially streams video over a samba share to all the other computers in the house.

I've never had any problems at all with this. If I can access the file (i.e. copy it, read it, etc.), then I can play it.

I always do it via a mount. I have a mount line in my fstab that mounts the share to a directory in the filesystem, and I access it off /samba/servername/share/directory/file.

There is something peculiar about your setup... it's not a general issue with samba.
i dont have it mounted. ill try working with fstab when i get home from work tonight and see what happens

LT

[Lt_Horn]

having some problems with fstab, i think its because of my password. here is what i have

//artemis/Secure /mnt/Secure smb defaults 0 0

[MRD]

Ok, couple things. I'm assuming that "artemis" is in /etc/hosts, /mnt/Secure exists (case sensitive) and is chmod 777 (both /mnt and /mnt/Secure). Also, my samba mounts look quite different. I believe the mount type is smbfs, not smb. After you correctly configure it, you should be able to type "mount /mnt/Secure" and it should mount based on the contents of your fstab.

Are the files very large? That's another issue... samba doesn't support large file xfers unless you enable large file support (mount with option lfs).

[TimP]

Ok, couple things. I'm assuming that "artemis" is in /etc/hosts

As long as you can reach it with nmblookup, it doesn't need to be in /etc/hosts. I refer to other Windows machines by hostname which aren't in my hosts file.

[Lt_Horn]

Its working!!! :) fstab fixed the problem thanks everyone!!

the problem i was having was that i wasn't putting my server name in all caps. I changed it and boom streaming video! again thanks :)

LT