FCast: Casting Made Open Source

https://fcast.org/

by icar • 2 years ago

263 65 2 years ago

fcast.org

dblitt• 2 years ago

Could this end up on an embedded smart tv device, like a Roku?

hiatus• 2 years ago

They have an android receiver package available: https://gitlab.futo.org/videostreaming/fcast/-/tree/master/r...

koen3114• 2 years ago

FCast engineer here. Yes it will come to Roku.

nsteel9• 2 years ago

NymphCast has been around for years but it's still basically unheard of. This has more polished marketing (and a less weird name) but other than that I don't see what makes it any more likely to succeed.

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22457351

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27482699

oezi2• 2 years ago

I wonder what is their ecosystem play? Why would Netflix implement this in their app? Why would any TV manufacturer?

koen3114• 2 years ago

I am not counting on anybody to implement this on their TV. We don't have big budgets to pay TV manufacturers to put FCast receivers inside.

Instead, I hope to have receivers that the user can install if they wish.

riedel2• 2 years ago

Why not use straight UPnP (DLNA). Tons of open source there. The only problem was standardising codecs (also related to the Chromecast spinoff)

IshKebab• 2 years ago

UPnP/DLNA seems to be a bit of a disaster protocol wise. As you say the codec support is "eh whatever" which means whether it works or not depends on too many random factors. It's also a massively over-complicated design-by-committee relic.

There also isn't a good open source DLNA server (presumably because of the above issues).

nsteel9• 2 years ago

Yes, 100% this is what I've ended up doing. There's existing support on a lot of platforms for DLNA and if you're really lucky, it works. I'd be interested in hearing what the advantages of something like this is.

Edit: And then there's stuff like Plex and Kodi too with existing servers and clients for numerous platforms. I'm fairly sure I can "share" a URI to the Kodi app on my phone and the Kodi server will stream it. I remember that working well but it's been a while.

brnt3• 2 years ago

I don't know that you can 'cast' using DLNA. Live streams and such.

paulryanrogers• 2 years ago

DLNA is okay if the receiver supported the codecs well enough to avoid playback stalling. Though it lacks search and dashboard features.

I prefer having an app that can save progress and remember what I've already watched. (As a younger person I could recognize a show or movie from a glimpse while surfing. Nowadays I find myself rewatching for several minutes before recognizing the program.)

_volatile• 2 years ago

Is it currently usable in anything other than GrayJay?

I wish I could use this with local videos.

qmarchi• 2 years ago

Thus far, nope.

pihug12• 2 years ago

Cloudstream uses it too: https://github.com/recloudstream/cloudstream/blob/master/app...

For local videos with GNOME Nautilus, there is https://gitlab.com/futo-org/fcast/-/tree/master/clients/naut...

nsteel9• 2 years ago

There's a terminal client at https://gitlab.com/futo-org/fcast/-/tree/master/clients/term... which supports local videos.

koen3114• 2 years ago

Someone also made it possible to stream anything that yt-dlp can download https://git.sr.ht/~shironeko/fcast/tree/yt-dlp/item/clients/...

justinclift3• 2 years ago

Seems to use confusing terminology?

  In FCast, a "client" is a device or software application that discovers and
  communicates with a "receiver".

  The client, which can be a terminal client or an Android application, uses
  the FCast protocol to send media content to the receiver, such as a TV or
  media top box. The client initiates the media streaming by connecting to the
  receiver, launching the media, and then the receiver begins playing the media.

  Once the media is launched, the client can control the playback, allowing
  operations like pause, resume, seek, and volume adjustment.

Seems like basically a client-server relationship, but with the "client" acting as a server and a "receiver" acting as a er... client?

But with the "client" being the thing to control the start/stop/etc of the media, which is a weird thing for a server to do.

nsteel9• 2 years ago

What in the above makes you think that? The receiver is the "server". Playback happens on the "server" (just like mpd, if that helps).

justinclift3• 2 years ago

In a more normal client-server architecture, initial requests are sent to a server, which then responds with the requesting data.

ie: give me file XYZ

With the FCast project, it seems like the bulk of the transmitted data is from the "client" to the "receiver"?

At least, that's what it sounds like from this description?

  The client [...] uses the FCast protocol to send media content
  to the receiver, such as a TV or media top box.

Is my reading of this wonky? :)

riedel2• 2 years ago

Speaking of terminology. I open the discussion because I thought the title was about the manufacturing process (casting with a mold).

zigzag3123• 2 years ago

Media provider and controller might be less confusing terms.

justinclift3• 2 years ago

Thanks, that is helpful. :)

ravenstine• 2 years ago

Now we're talking! The experience of casting has recently become a bigger headache for me than ever. Last month, I made a comment on HN about how the original Chromecast was great and that I'm disappointed in the state of the current Chromecast devices; a lot of people seem to agree with this. I've also had trouble with Airplay since streaming from Quicktime seems to only support h264, and even that hasn't really worked for me even though my 1st gen Chromecast worked great before my TCL television fried it.

Casting video should be simple, straight forward, and open. Glad to see there's projects like this trying to solve this problem rather than leaving it up to advertising firms.

ilrwbwrkhv• 2 years ago

I swear like all of these things used to be so much better and if given a chance large companies will make it worse.

I'm glad we are taking this into our own hands. The programming community is learning that we have to make the software ourselves and also fund it ourselves to have quality software in the future.

koen3114• 2 years ago

FCast engineer here. Look forward to FCast receivers on platforms like AppleTV, Roku, Tizen (Samsung), WebOS (LG).

grepexdev• 2 years ago

Will there be a receiver for Fire TV too?

koen3114• 2 years ago

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CLKVH8GZ/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=fca... personally only tested on a Fire TV Stick but I believe it should be equivalent?

teruakohatu• 2 years ago

Are any efforts being made to incorporate this into VLC? Both as a receiver and caster?

koen3114• 2 years ago

Not ongoing but certainly something I am open to.

zozbot234• 2 years ago

Not sure how useful that would be, since VideoLAN supports its own streaming solution https://www.videolan.org/vlc/streaming.html

junon• 2 years ago

Question, is it named after the sites?

akvadrako• 2 years ago

What about as a Kodi plugin?

koen3114• 2 years ago

I have seen several attempts at this https://github.com/c4valli/kodi-fcast-receiver being one of them. There is not one provided by FUTO (for now).

cobalt60• 2 years ago

Any road map for Bandcamp and SoundCloud (logged in) support.

Briefly looked at SoundCloud script js, for the moment it seems to be written to pull frontpage with basic API implementation, correct me if I'm wrong.

brnt3• 2 years ago

Thanks for taking this effort, I hope it takes off!

mintplant• 2 years ago

The site talks about setting up a receiver, but I can't figure out how I would cast something to an FCast receiver, or what is currently available to cast.

koen3114• 2 years ago

We will do a better job explaining this soon and also provide binaries. For now there are a few possibilities:

1. Grayjay can cast to an FCast receiver

2. There are some terminal clients and a nautilus plugin, but we don't provide binaries (yet). These can be used to cast local media and remote media https://gitlab.com/futo-org/fcast/-/tree/master/client

3. Someone made a yt-dlp client that can cast to FCast: https://git.sr.ht/~shironeko/fcast/tree/yt-dlp/item/clients/...

4. Cloudfstream supports it: https://github.com/recloudstream/cloudstream/blob/master/app...

viernullvier• 2 years ago

Would it be possible (in theory) to build a receiver on an embedded platform, for instance an audio-only ESP32 speaker, or is there something in the protocol that requires a more powerful device?

koen3114• 2 years ago

The protocol has been designed by taking the commonalities between all different casting protocols like AirPlay and Chromecast as a base. This is what has been used to make version 1.0. I tried making it as simple as possible and low effort to implement.

https://gitlab.com/futo-org/fcast/-/wikis/Protocol-version-1

As you can see the 1.0 protocol is very lean and fits on an A4.

If you want to have an audio-only ESP32 speaker I don't see why it wouldn't be possible with the FCast protocol.

r-w• 2 years ago

This project comes from FUTO, which is now making a name for itself by releasing and maintaining OSS alternatives like this, as well as sponsoring development of other OSS options. I personally first came across them when Louis Rossmann announced his affiliation. Very excited to see where this goes!

As an aside, I wonder what it will take to get the protocol integrated into browsers? I presume Chrome is a foregone conclusion, but maybe Firefox and/or Brave would be interested in an integration?

koen3114• 2 years ago

Very demo-y https://gitlab.com/futo-org/fcast/-/tree/master/clients/chro... but it works.

westurner2• 2 years ago

How does FCast differ from Matter Casting?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41171060&p=2#41172407

"What Is Matter Casting and How Is It Different From AirPlay or Chromecast?" (2024) https://www.howtogeek.com/what-is-matter-casting-and-how-is-... :

You can also potentially use the new casting standard to control some of your TV’s functions while casting media on it, a task at which both AirPlay and Chromecast are somewhat limited.

Feature ideas: PIP Picture-in-Picture, The ability to find additional videos and add to a [queue] playlist without stopping the playing video

koen3114• 2 years ago

Instead of waiting, hoping that big companies will implement the standard. Just make it as easy as possible to adopt by having receivers for all platforms and making client libraries that can cast to AirPlay, Chromecast, FCast and others seamlessly.

pzo2• 2 years ago

Doest current app support AirPlay and Chromecast as different receivers/backends? Websites doesn't mention anything about it. Is there any plan also for iOS app?

Some feedback: I would also add dedicated buttons for downloading MacOS and Windows binaries - for typical users gitlab button will be to scary. Website also not clear if there is and SDK for developers (the one that supports also airplay and chromecast) and what languages bindings it supports.

zigzag3123• 2 years ago

I'm not a native English speaker, but FreeCast would be better, more meaningful name in my opinion.

boomboomsubban• 2 years ago

Already taken https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FreeCast

zigzag3123• 2 years ago

Oh, that's unfortunate. Thanks for pointing that out.

throwaway81523• 2 years ago

I've used Icecast before. It worked great. Is Fcast better somehow?

koen3114• 2 years ago

Had not heard of Icecast before, but it doesn't look like they have the same aim of having receivers on every platform (AppleTV, Roku, TizenOS, Android, Linux, MacOS, Windows, ...)

FCast: Casting Made Open Source

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