Netflix on Linux with Chrome

https://plus.google.com/104912707432334684242/posts/1gnbmo63xVa

by callumjones • 12 years ago

131 59 12 years ago

plus.google.com

aroman• 12 years ago

i don't think the explanation as to why this works is correct. the poster says it's because Google and Microsoft "have been working closely with Netflix to get the needed DRM code required for HTML5 streaming", yet:

1. the user-agent switch involves adding a Safari identifier (rather than IE or a new Chrome one)

2. at WWDC 2014, Apple announced that it had been working closely with Netflix along those lines, and that the upcoming version of Safari would be able to play Netflix without Silverlight. (And indeed Safari on Yosemite can do just that in the developer previews)

mappu• 12 years ago

That is a chrome UA, it has Chrome/X in it. Safari/X is a compatibility shim.

nacs• 12 years ago

That is the Chrome user agent. It mentions Safari and AppleWebkit for compatibility reasons but it's Chrome.

Windows Chrome user-agent for reference:

  Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/36.0.1985.125 Safari/537.36

emergentcypher• 12 years ago

Ah, yes, another reminder of the hilariously bad user-agent situation in today's web...

compedit• 12 years ago

(And indeed Safari on Yosemite can do just that in the developer previews)

Yep, it's definitely a bit buggy and stops occasionally but it's usable!

voyou• 12 years ago

"the user-agent switch involves adding a Safari identifier"

Well, the default user agent string for Chrome already has a Safari identifier in it, but I don't think Safari user agents have a Chrome identifier. The change being made in the post doesn't add a Safari identifier, because there was one there already, but it does change the OS string to Windows. So I think the explanation in the post is probably right.

azernik• 12 years ago

For a humorous history of why exactly the Chrome UA string claims to be Safari, see this:

http://webaim.org/blog/user-agent-string-history/

TazeTSchnitzel• 12 years ago

It's not complete without the new Windows Phone user agent, though:

https://mobile.twitter.com/0xabad1dea/status/497122542885556...

higherpurpose• 12 years ago

I thought the whole point of "HTML5 DRM" was to be backed by hardware DRM. So are they giving up on that idea for Linux? And if they are, maybe hardware DRM isn't necessary on other platforms either.

jiggy20114• 12 years ago

HTML5 DRM (EME) only defines an interface between the DRM system and the browser, it doesn't specify the mechanism for the DRM itself, the CDM is a black box . You could have a DRM scheme based on ROT13 and it would be entirely valid.

https://dvcs.w3.org/hg/html-media/raw-file/tip/encrypted-med...

fafner6• 12 years ago

What they mean is that the "Digital Restriction Management in HTML5" proposal is pushed by Google, Microsoft, and Netflix into the W3C spec. Apple has simply followed the proposal and implemented it as well. AFAIK Chrome, IE, Safari ship with it. Firefox will follow suite by adding a Restriction Module from Adobe (given Adobe's track record it will certainly be an amazingly fast, flexible, beautiful, efficient, and nice way of viewing videos...).

So Web-Restrictions is kinda unstoppable now. Instead of having a plugin-free future with HTML5 we have an even worse situation.

Karunamon• 12 years ago

"No DRM" was never an option. The option was between 1 DRM standard and 50 (so silverlight and widevine and....).

The W3C made the most pragmatic choice, here. I think DRM is still crap, but one system is unambiguously better than >1.

josteink5• 12 years ago

Instead of having a plugin-free future with HTML5 we have an even worse situation.

Indeed. Now we need to have one plugin, per browser, per operating system supported.

Guess which next emerging OS wont be able to fully access "standard-compliant" HTML5? Yeah. All of them.

W3C should be thrown to the sharks for this.

nmjohn• 12 years ago

Firefox + pipelight + UA switcher has been working flawlessly* for me for the last six months or so.

It doesn't work on chrome anymore unfortunately after the update where they disabled NPAPI plugins.

Native support still can't come soon enough.

pit• 12 years ago

I can confirm this works on Chrome on OpenSuSE 13.1:

    Version 37.0.2062.68 beta (64-bit)

RexRollman• 12 years ago

Really, it's more like accidently supported on Linux.

fractalsea• 12 years ago

But I thought that Netflix required Silverlight on the client to work. What is this using then?

pilif• 12 years ago

The HTML5 encrypted media extensions. Chrome has support for that

batram• 12 years ago

If you use Ubuntu 14.04 (like me) you have to install a newer version of libnss3 (at least 3.16.2) and than it works.

Runs smoother than pipelight + firefox at least for me.

revasm• 12 years ago

Full instructions for reference. Run:

  wget http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/n/nss/libnss3{_3.16.3-1ubuntu1_amd64,-1d_3.16.3-1ubuntu1_amd64,-nssdb_3.16.3-1ubuntu1_all}.deb
  sudo dpkg -i libnss3*.deb

Create a new Tampermonkey script:

  // ==UserScript==
  // @name         Netflix HTML5 for Linux
  // @namespace    0d0a3443-cc79-4f86-bf62-2dac581d2b3a
  // @version      0.1
  // @description  Enables HTML5 video support for the Linux host platform
  // @match        *://www.netflix.com/WiPlayer?*
  // @user-agent   Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/37.0.2062.68 Safari/537.36
  // ==/UserScript==

Retr0spectrum• 12 years ago

I tried this, but I just get prompted to install the silverlight plugin. I am using Lubuntu 14.04.

frabbit• 12 years ago

CentOS-6.5 and later with Pipelight and Firefox 24.7.0 ESR works flawlessly. God knows what it's installing and what security holes I opened up by downloading it though.

Looking forward to any native solutions.

captaincrunch• 12 years ago

If anyone gets it working, my start-up is doing some interesting things with Netfix: turboflix.com

jaredsohn• 12 years ago

Your website seems confusing a few ways:

* You only list TV shows in the examples, despite the service offering both movies and shows

* I actually do have all of those shows (or at least most) on my Netflix. Although I see on your Facebook page that the service is perhaps targeted to people in other countries.)

* I am wondering if what your service offers will be legal, especially if you are charging for it (my best guess is that it is some kind of proxy that lets you access international Netflixes, perhaps a little more convenient than existing Chrome extensions in that it might list movies allowed in different countries together.)

finnn• 12 years ago

In other news, bittorrent continues to work on all platforms, without placing any restrictions on what viewers can do.

themartorana• 12 years ago

Including participating in massive copyright infringement.

I struggle with the sentiment that if offered no other way to legally consume media, BitTorrent will show them! I can't find "The Money Pit" anywhere but BT. Does that make it ok to download?

I don't know. Morally, legally, etc., I've never been quite so torn for quite so long.

DrJokepu• 12 years ago

I think OP's point was that DRM pushes people to pirate content, regardless of whether this is morally acceptable or not.

gcr• 12 years ago

It's a toughie because there are two evils at work here:

- DRM is its own kind of evil, but only implicitly because it erodes the rights and privacy of the users;

- Copyright infringement is another kind of evil, which is important because the law explicitly says so;

- Just not watching TV shows seems like the easiest option here, but it's boring and doesn't support starving artists.

Which kind of evil is worse?

Slix• 12 years ago

Does this work with only Chrome and not Chromium?

TD-Linux2• 12 years ago

Yes. Only chrome includes the Widevine binary blob and supporting source code in the browser.

azakai2• 12 years ago

Chromium is open source doesn't ship with the proprietary, closed bits of Chrome, like the EME DRM module which is used here. So this is Chrome-only.

josteink5• 12 years ago

Open-source software can obviously never properly support DRM.

Which is why Mozilla/Firefox was so much against this whole HTML5 DRM bullshit in the first place, and so should you have been to.

rakoo2• 12 years ago

Fantastic.

What do you use to watch movies and series on-demand ?

Why, a web browser !

focus• 12 years ago

Doesn't work for me. Error Code: M7063-1913

lsb_release -d: Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS

uname -a: Linux x230 3.13.0-32-generic #57-Ubuntu SMP Tue Jul 15 03:51:08 UTC 2014 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

chrome://version: 38.0.2114.2 (Official Build 287444) dev

marcelocamanho• 12 years ago

Anyone tried it on a Raspberry Pi?

yeowMeng• 12 years ago

google-chrome not supported on arm

lutusp• 12 years ago

Say what? The majority of Android devices have ARM processors, and Chrome is available for Android:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.android.ch...

Hengjie• 12 years ago

It works perfectly on v37 on my Mac OSX machine (running Mavericks)

Netflix on Linux with Chrome

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