Instant blu-ray playback in plex with makemkv

Dev Community Dev/API Corner
1

Hi, I speak for developers of MakeMKV software that is apparently discussed on this forum. MakeMKV is the only software for Mac that can convert protected blu-ray discs, including ones with BD+, into MKV files suitable for playback with plex. In recent versions we added a new functionality - instant streaming. Instead of converting disc to mkv files on a hard drive the program would load disc, decrypt it on the fly and start a mini web server serving mpeg ts files. I believe that plex can play these files right now without any changes. In addition to serving video files MakeMKV web server will serve html pages with disc metadata such as disc and title name and information about tracks and languages. My understanding is that it should be very easy to write a plex plugin that will parse these web pages and expose blu-ray disc content to plex. Unfortunately none of us has any experience with plex plugins or access to powerful mac machine for testing. Is anybody interested in writing plugin that will enable instant blu-ray playback with plex? I can provide any necessary information and help from our side.

2

Would it be possible for such a plugin to serve up a disc from a cross platform networked source? My current problem is that I’m using a BD ROM drive and makemkv can’t see it. My current plan for a work around is using vitualbox (which also can’t naivety see it) with a SATA to USB converter effectively bypassing OS X altogether and then sharing the drive as a network source. (Still waiting for my cable to arrive in the post so it hasn’t been tested) So if i was using makemkv on this virtual windows machine, could a plugin theoretically pick that up too? Or is it local source only?



Many thanks,



Marc

3


Thanks much for posting here. This is a great feature that would be a fantastic add to Plex. I've been using MakeMKV for a couple months to successfully rip my BD collection and it's worked perfectly thus far!

I know there is interest in this feature, hopefully somebody with the right know-how will take a stab at this!
4

Speaking as someone who has written a few plugins I would say based on your description that this is very possible. What is basically needed for a plugin is a URL to the video stream and a source for meta-data (html, xml, rss, etc will all work). Personally, my barrier to doing this would be not owning the required hardware. But, the possibility of having direct BlueRay support on the Mac via Plex makes it tempting to look into getting some.



Jonny


5

yeah, this should be a really really easy thing to do with a plugin, though if it works as you described, the plugin could quite easily just be a stopgap to future seamless bluray disc support directly from the main menu in plex (like dvd discs are supposed to work). one question though, can the makemkv instant streaming strip hd audio tracks down to plain dts/ac3? plex cant play either of the bluray hd audio codecs (and the mac cant output multichannel lossless audio).



unfortunately i too lack the bluray hardware (and physical media) to be of too much help on this.

6

Hi Mike,



Could you grab some sample web pages, zip them up and post them here? We’ll also need the port number and address of the server.

With those we could get started on the plug-in without having to wait for the drives to be shipped.



Thanks

7

I think this might be a relevant link for server info?



http://www.makemkv.com/forum2/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=703&p=2009&hilit=streaming#p2009



I don’t see the “Experimental 1” feature from the file menu.

8

Well, I got it to open Star Trek Blu-ray disc m2ts with VLC and it plays just fine. But it’s a rather complicated process. Hopefully, the Plex plug-in will make it seamless.

9

Just checked your link cave man. The fact it has network support is great! Seems like there’s hope for users with ROM only drives too!

10

Could you navigate to http://localhost:51000/ in a web browser, save the page and post it here?
If you'd like something that plays the first title I can have it done in about 5 minutes, if you'd like to be able to choose between titles I'll need to see what that page looks like.
11

I’m not sure I follow what you’re asking (I’m a great user, but not developer!). Here’s my process. I insert a Blu-ray disc, then after it mounts in the Finder I launch Make MKV 1.4.10 beta. It reads the disc, then I click on the Open Disc icon and it starts decrypting the disc. This takes about 30 seconds to complete. I’m then presented with a list of 5 titles and the third one (title2) is the main title (14 chapters, 38.6 gb). I then click on the Make MKV server icon to launch the server, then am presented with a link: http://10.0.0.2:51000. When I click on that link Firefox opens and I get this:



This page is designed to be read by robots, not humans. For this it is a valid xhtml text document with a simple structure. Each page contains exactly one table that in turn contains name-value pairs which may point to other tables (web pages) or files to stream.

This feature is experimental - discs that use seamless branching will likely not work.

name value

version MakeMKV v1.4.10 beta darwin(x86-release)

address 10.0.0.2:51000

titles /web/titles



And when I click on ‘/web/titles’ I get this in a new Firefox tab:



name value

type Blu-ray disc

name Star Trek Disc 1

titlecount 5

title0 /web/title0

title1 /web/title1

title2 /web/title2

title3 /web/title3

title4 /web/title4



In the case of Star Trek, title2 is the main feature. I click on the title2 link and then get this in a new Firefox tab:



name value

id 2

duration 2:06:50

chaptercount 14

formatcount 2

format0 m2ts

file0 /stream/title2.m2ts

format1 ts

file1 /stream/title2.ts



I click on the link /stream/title2.m2ts and a new tab opens in Firefox with the Quicktime icon. I copy the url in the box, http://10.0.0.2:51000/stream/title2.m2ts, and then open VLC, choose File > Open Network and paste http://10.0.0.2:51000/stream/title2.m2ts into the box, hit return and the movie starts playing.

12

Hi Cave Man,



Thanks for all your help. I don’t have a Blu-ray drive or I’d run through the process myself.

Firefox removes the formatting instructions I need when it shows you the page. If you could run through these steps I should be able to write a plug-in for you



Open http://10.0.0.2:51000 in Firefox and press command-s.

In the Save As drop-down menu select Web Page, XHTML only

Save it to a location you’ll be able to find easily.

Repeat those steps with the two other pages you mentioned.



Select all three files in the Finder and right (or control) click them.

Select Compress 3 items. You should now have a file in the same folder name Archive.zip



Click add reply on the Plex forum and then the Click to Attach Files button.

Select the zip file you just created.

Click Add to Post.

Click Add Reply.



That should give the plug-in devs everything we need to get started.

Thanks again.

13

OK, they’re numbered in the order of the three screens.

14

Any progress on the plugin? I’m ready to try it out!

15

I haven’t added artwork yet but this should work. If you could have a look and let me know

BluRay.bundle.zip (2.84 KB)

16

OK, I’ve unzipped it (BluRay.bundle) but where does it go?



Thanks

17

Alright - I localized it to the proper place. However, after I start the streaming server in Make MKV and then open Blu-ray in Plex, I get the 5 titles from the Star Trek BD, but when I try to open any of them I get “Error: Could not determine input format”.



What next?

18

Thanks for testing. I was worried that might happen. I know a workaround but it’s getting late here. I’ll post an update tomorrow.

19

i have a general question about the instant streaming service in makeMKV - will the streamed video file quality be the same as the original blu-ray?

20

Yes, video is the same. The audio becomes AC3 or DTS.