Date: Fri, 23 Nov 2007 02:09:11 +0300 From: Andrew Pantyukhin <infofarmer@FreeBSD.org> To: Girish Venkatachalam <girishvenkatachalam@gmail.com> Cc: questions@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: efficient terminal/console screencasting Message-ID: <20071122230910.GF66812@amilo.cenkes.org> In-Reply-To: <20071122043048.GA21707@saraswathy.susmita.org> References: <20071121182639.GA66812@amilo.cenkes.org> <20071122043048.GA21707@saraswathy.susmita.org>
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On Thu, Nov 22, 2007 at 10:00:48AM +0530, Girish Venkatachalam wrote: > On 21:26:41 Nov 21, Andrew Pantyukhin wrote: > > A while ago I needed to screencast a terminal to a class of > > students in real-time. It turned out to be quite straightforward > > with screen(1) in multiuser mode. > > screen(1) is really cool. :) > > > Now I want to record screencasts and allow people to watch them > > later. I'm looking at recordmydesktop, but the innefficiency > > strikes me: I'm operating in text-only environment, there's no > > need to record every frame as a flat bitmap. Whatever codec I > > choose, the files will be huge and of low quality. > > How about ttyrec(1) and ttyplay(1) ? Oh, yes. I've tried ttyrec a few years ago but have completely forgotten about it since. Thanks, it helps a lot! > > What I need is something like script(1) on steroids: > > - accurately record the complete state of my terminal window at > > any given moment > > - store it as a succession of updates, each represented in a > > text-based format (as opposed to pixel-based) > > If you want pixel based output then there are quite a few options but > none to my taste. As you mention they all are bloated. > > > - record timings correctly > > - allow for a method to record speech in the background > > This you have to do manually with sox(1). Not a big deal. A simple shell > script can do what you want. > > > - allow for a method to play it all back in sync > > This is no big deal either. If you want to create a video, then you have > to go in for pixel based stuff. You can however do efficient compression > and use a good codec like x264 or something. > > > Has anyone heard about any tool which would help me achieve at > > least some of my requirements? > > Your idea seems good enough to create an open source tool that does > exactly what you want. I'm still hoping to get by with some hacks, but you might be right. It's a pity and almost a surprise there's no widely available text-based video codec. Maybe I just need to try my luck on mplayer-related mailing lists. P.S. Please don't post to questions@ and freebsd-questions@ at the same time. It's the same list and you're just sending double mails.
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