Support mp3 and h264 in video and audio tag

For licensing issues our pre-built binary doesn't ship with codec for patented media formats, but for commercial cases where it's necessary to support patented media formats, we have solutions below.

Please consult experts if you want to use patented media formats on your apps.

Overview

In the pre-built libffmpegsumo.dll, the following codecs are supported:

theora,vorbis,vp8,pcm_u8,pcm_s16le,pcm_s24le,pcm_f32le,pcm_s16be,pcm_s24be

The following demuxers are supported:

ogg,matroska,wav

Since node-webkit is based on Chromium, their media parts are basically the same. In order to open MP3 and H.264, you need to compile ffmpeg with corresponding features open. And be careful, MP3 and H.264 codecs are GPL licensed in ffmpeg.

There is also a simpler way, you can try to use the media codec files from Chrome. It had been reported to work, but we don't test this and it may not work for you in latest version.

Notice: linking with GPL code will make your codes GPL too.

Windows

You need files from the matching Chrome version. (0.6.x is based on Chromium 28)

1. Locate Chrome\Application folder (e.g. C:\Program Files\Google)

2. Copy ffmpegsumo.dll to your node-webkit distribution.

Linux

The folder location may vary according to the linux distro you are using. Its located in the /opt/google/chrome on Ubuntu. Copy libffmpegsumo.so and paste it in the node-webkit folder.

Mac

Head to your Applications folder and right-click Google Chrome. Choose show package contents and drill down to Versions > Most recent # > Framework > Libraries. Copy ffmpegsumo.so.

Then open node-webkit.app/Contents/Frameworks/node-webkit Framework.framework/Libraries/ and paste the ffmpegsumo.so file.

build your own

Alternatively, if you are building node-webkit, open src/third_party/ffmpeg/chromium/scripts/build_ffmpeg.sh, go to (approximately, might change) line 379 and change

# Google Chrome & ChromeOS specific configuration.
add_flag_chrome --enable-decoder=aac,h264,mp3
add_flag_chrome --enable-demuxer=mp3,mov
add_flag_chrome --enable-parser=aac,h264,mpegaudio

To

add_flag_common --enable-decoder=aac,h264,mp3
add_flag_common --enable-demuxer=mp3,mov
add_flag_common --enable-parser=aac,h264,mpegaudio

Then follow the short directions here: http://src.chromium.org/svn/trunk/deps/third_party/ffmpeg/README.chromium

You'll also need to patch the ffmpeg repo (or define the branding gyp variable to Chrome, didn't try it)

diff --git a/ffmpeg.gyp b/ffmpeg.gyp
index ac059f0..1b0424c 100644
--- a/ffmpeg.gyp
+++ b/ffmpeg.gyp
@@ -54,7 +54,7 @@
       ['chromeos == 1', {
         'ffmpeg_branding%': '<(branding)OS',
       }, {  # otherwise, assume Chrome/Chromium.
-        'ffmpeg_branding%': '<(branding)',
+        'ffmpeg_branding%': 'Chrome',
       }],
     ],

see https://github.com/rogerwang/node-webkit/issues/1461#issuecomment-32009915

Please also at least turn on the resource loader's support in Chromium's code, or your format will be treated as non supported MIME type and won't be loaded. See src/net/base/mime_util.cc. You might want to look into code in other files guarded by 'USE_PROPRIETARY_CODECS' macro.