View source for Old Python bindings

= Python binding documentation =

For a while, there has been a basic python binding for libvlc, that was used for streaming. A more complete (with a hopefully generic API that can be reused by other players) has been developped, based on the MediaControlAPI.

[http://trac.videolan.org/vlc/browser/trunk/bindings/python python binding] (see 
[http://liris.cnrs.fr/advene/download/] for a basic code sample)

= Basics =

The vlc python module provides 2 main classes : MediaControl and Object.

vlc.MediaControl is an

= Tips and tricks =

== Snapshot support ==

In order to get snapshot support, you have to activate the snapshot vout module through a clone video filter.  The following code gives a way to achieve this :

  mc=vlc.MediaControl([ "--vout-filter", "clone" ])
  o=VLC.Object(0)
  o.config_set("clone-vout-list", "default,snapshot")
  o.config_set("snapshot-width", 320)
  o.config_set("snapshot-height", 200)

Note that all config options could have been given on the command line, but this illustrates the use of the vlc.Object API.

== Win32 initialization ==

If the vlc module was not compiled with the exact same prefix as the VLC installation (e.g. c:\\Program Files\\Videolan), then it cannot find itself the installation directory (stored in the registry Software\VideoLAN\VLC\Path), and the MediaControl instanciation will fail with a message like "Cannot find interface plugins". 

The workaround consists in changing directory to the VLC installation directory before instanciating the MediaControl object. 

    def get_registry_value (self, subkey, name):
        import _winreg
        value = None
        for hkey in _winreg.HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, _winreg.HKEY_CURRENT_USER:
            try:
                reg = _winreg.OpenKey(hkey, subkey)
                value, type_id = _winreg.QueryValueEx(reg, name)
                _winreg.CloseKey(reg)
            except _winreg.error:
                pass
        return value

    vlcpath=get_registry_value('Software\\VideoLAN\\VLC','InstallDir')
    if vlcpath is None:
        print "Cannot locate VLC installation directory"
    else:
        os.chdir(vlcpath)
        mc=vlc.MediaControl()