ActiveX/HTML

Embedding Activex using Javascript

You can insert the ActiveX control in your HTML pages like this :

 <OBJECT classid="clsid:E23FE9C6-778E-49D4-B537-38FCDE4887D8"
    codebase="http://downloads.videolan.org/pub/videolan/vlc/latest/win32/axvlc.cab"
       width="640" height="480" id="vlc" events="True">
 <param name="Src" value="" />
 <param name="ShowDisplay" value="True" />
 <param name="AutoLoop" value="False" />
 <param name="AutoPlay" value="False" />
 </OBJECT>

Then, using Javascript, you can select another source, or change the audio track :

 document.vlc.playlistClear();
 var options=[":audio-track=5"]; // select audio track 5 (=6th, 1st is 0)
 document.vlc.addTarget("...",options,2,0); // replace entry 0
 document.vlc.play();

Embedding ActiveX using m3u Playlists

Maybe a better to show VLC in an HTML Website is to use m3u Playlists. It has got the advantage that users with turned-off Javascript can also use this plugin, since document.vlc.addTarget won't work with javascript turned off.

• Step 1: Create the HTML website with the VLC-Object linked to the m3u playlist
• Step 2: Create your m3u playlist with all options, save and upload it to your webspace.
• Step 3 (optional): Create buttons and other objects to control VLC (like document.vlc.play();)

Step 1: Creating the website to embed ActiveX Control

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Frameset//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/frameset.dtd">

   
     
   
 

You should modify the values of width, height and volume (0-100) fitting to your desires. If you don't know them, simply delete them (e.g. remove width="640" from the code).

Step 2: Creating the m3u playlist

Open Notepad, create your playlist and save it as 'myplaylist.m3u' for this example.

#EXTM3U                                     // Required to identify this file as m3u file
#EXTVLCOPT--input-repeat=-1                 // repeat the following file/playlist
#EXTVLCOPT--http-reconnect=true             // required for a streaming-client to enable repeat
#EXTVLCOPT--any further parameter goes here // see also VLC command-line help
#EXTINF:0, Test Description                 // set the title for the following file shown in your playlist
video.mpg                                // the actual file to be displayed

Annotations:

• For actual looping of the entire playlist, the user has to have check 'Repeat all' under Preferences --> Playlist --> General
• Mind that options have different names if you play a file locally or if you want to stream it (--sub-filter --> --s-filter)

Mind the different Options-styles:

 --option  A global option that is set for the duration of the program.
  -option  A single letter version of a global --option.
  :option  An option that only applies to the playlistitem directly before it
           and that overrides previous settings.

See also

• Delphi Implementation

• ActiveX Description