Can we play videos during download?

[J Steve]

Some other apps like Streamlink, YTDL, FFmpeg etc.. save videos as .mp4 so we can start playing/watching it while its still downloading the video/stream.

But VDHelper saves files as ".part" file and it cannot be played until the video/stream finishes downloading. Are there any workaround for that?

[Wild Willy]

In my experience, this seems to be a function of how the web site presents the content,
not the downloader you use. I have found that on some sites, you can play the MP4 as it
is being downloaded & on others you can't. Contrary to what you say, I have found that
sometimes using ffmpeg I can play what I'm downloading before it's finished, and
sometimes I can't. Same is true for VDH. I have found some MP3 (audio only) streams
that I can play while they are still being downloaded, with both VDH & ffmpeg. I don't
know what the significant property is that makes one stream playable during download &
another not. But I believe this ability is not related to the download tool but rather
to the web site. Have you tried your various download tools on things you can't play
while downloading? By that I mean when you find something that won't play during
download via one tool, try the other tools on the same item. Does it change whether you
can play it back during download? Please post at least one link that you can play while
downloading & at least one link that you cannot. I'd like to compare results.

[Wild Willy]

As an experiment, I picked something at random off P o r n h u b. I'm writing it like
that to avoid possible censorship. The particular item is probably irrelevant but I'll
give it anyway, again slightly damaged to avoid censorship:

https://www.p o r n h u b.com/view_video.php?viewkey=ph6257dd2f3678a

I successfully downloaded this via VDH. While that was in progress, I tried to play
the .part file in VLC. You can try to play .part files in VLC. Sometimes they'll play.
In this case, it would not.

I then used my alternative technique discussed over here:

https://groups.google.com/g/video-downloadhelper-q-and-a/c/BzPLK2YyL-s

Do a string search on "cannot download" in there, then click the link you'll find to find
the discussion. Essentially, I downloaded the same item using ffmpeg. Same as with VDH,
VLC would not play the .mp4 file while ffmpeg was downloading it. However, after the
download completed, it played fine, same as the VDH download.

All of this is as expected. It shows that ffmpeg is not capable of letting you play
in-progress downloads any more than VDH is.

One curiosity. While VLC was attempting (and failing) to play VDH's .part file, VDH
completed its download. Unfortunately, it got an error saying the item was locked & the
download failed. This is not all that surprising. It was on a second attempt that I
successfully completed the download of the entire video. On that second attempt, I made
sure VLC was not trying to play the file when VDH was getting close to completing the
download. I imagine ffmpeg would have suffered a similar error if I had been trying to
play the file when that download completed. I didn't test that. If you can supply a URL
of something that you are able to "chase play" during a download, I'd like to test out
whether both VDH & ffmpeg manage to complete their downloads while VLC is playing the
file. I suspect that with VDH, when it comes time to rename the .part file, you'll get a
similar error. Or VLC might just suddenly stop playing because the file's name will no
longer be valid. With ffmpeg, since there is no renaming, maybe the error won't occur
but I'm not totally convinced. I'd like to try all of this to verify these guesses. It
would be nice if you can find an example that is relatively short, like under 15 minutes
duration.

Another curiosity. The file I downloaded with ffmpeg did not have any of the video &
audio properties you usually see in the Windows Properties dialog. The details tab
showed both video & audio properties that were completely blank. I ran ffprobe on the
file I downloaded with ffmpeg & it reported all the same video & audio properties Windows
reported for the file I downloaded with VDH. Very weird. I used to have a problem with
these properties on ffmpeg downloads but I fixed that over a year ago. I downloaded
something else earlier today with ffmpeg & all the video & audio properties were there so
I don't know what the deal is with this test file. I do note that this content has
timed_ID3 data. I've posted about that a few times on here, posts you can find via a
search in this forum. I used -map on my ffmpeg download so I omited the timed_ID3 data
streams. Maybe that has some impact on the file properties, but that's a total wildass
guess. The absence of the properties in no way affected the file. It played fine in
VLC.

Just to be complete, I'll say that I'm doing all of this on Windows 7 64-bit, Firefox
100.0 64-bit, licensed VDH 7.6.3a1 beta, CoApp 1.6.3, VLC 3.0.16 Vetinari, ffmpeg/ffprobe
version 2022-03-17-git-242c07982a-full_build-www.gyan.dev built with gcc 11.2.0 (Rev7,
Built by MSYS2 project).

[Maximillium]

Doesn't the site the OP is downloading from also allow playing on the site?

I start the download with VDH, & if I just can't wait, I play it from the site

while the downloading is going on in the background.  Works just fine.

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[Wild Willy]

That's quite true, Max. There are a couple of considerations there, though. First, if
you do as you suggest, then the download & the playback compete for your bandwidth. That
would generally not be a problem for me . . . now. But I still remember the bad old days
(a bit over a year ago & stretching back several years) when my connection couldn't have
handled such a thing. Second, I prefer VLC over any web site. VLC gives me much
stronger controls over playback, like starting, stopping, skipping forward or backward,
synching audio with video, etc. I would much rather play something in a player on my
system than stream it off a web site. Still, as you suggest, if your only option is to
stream it off the web site while it downloads, you ought to suck it up & not complain.

It would be really nice if the original poster would come back & respond to the questions
we've put to him here.

[J Steve]

ive recently installed VDH and didnt do much testing.

i tried to download a twitch live-stream.

with VDH, stream is being saved to disk as ".part" file so you cannot play it using third party softwares like MPV / Windows Media Player etc.

if you use streamlink/ytdl, twitch stream is being downloaded as ".mp4" file. you can start watching it immediately from disk while its still downloading/loading in the background.

to be exact :

i used this command for YTDL

yt-dlp.exe %link% -o "D:\%%(title)s.%%(ext)s" --hls-prefer-ffmpeg --no-part --add-metadata --add-header "Cookie:cb_legacy=1"

and this command for streamlink

streamlink --output "D:\%streamname%.mp4" https://www.twitch.tv/%streamname% best

7 Mayıs 2022 Cumartesi tarihinde saat 18:34:22 UTC+3 itibarıyla Wild Willy şunları yazdı:

[Wild Willy]

As just another user, not an employee of VDH, I get to make certain choices.  I choose not to be a member of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitch, etc.  I also choose not to get involved with this discussion any further.  I will say that as much of a booster of VDH as I am, I still choose when to use VDH & when to use ffmpeg.  I use them both regularly as the situation suits me.  I think you need to take the same approach.  Apparently, you have not 1 but 2 tools that do exactly what you want.  So use them instead of VDH.  Nobody is forcing you to use VDH.  VDH doesn't claim to work on all sites.  I don't think it's right for me in all situations.  You need to reach the same conclusion.

[J Steve]

yes i am using other tools which does the job for now. sucks that its not possible with vdh.

thanks for replies.

8 Mayıs 2022 Pazar tarihinde saat 11:05:04 UTC+3 itibarıyla Wild Willy şunları yazdı: