Playback Technology ("Tech")

Playback Technology refers to the specific browser or plugin technology used to play the video or audio. When using HTML5, the playback technology is the video or audio element. When using Flash, the playback technology is the specific Flash player used, e.g. Flowplayer, YouTube Player, video-js.swf, etc. (not just "Flash"). This could also include Silverlight, Quicktime, or any other plugin that will play back video in the browser, as long as there is an API wrapper written for it.

Essentially we're using HTML5 and plugins only as video decoders, and using HTML and JavaScript to create a consistent API and skinning experience across all of them.

Building an API Wrapper

We'll write a more complete guide on writing a wrapper soon, but for now the best resource is the Video.js source where you can see how both the HTML5 and video-js.swf API wrappers were created.

Required Methods

canPlayType play pause currentTime volume duration buffered supportsFullScreen

Required Events

loadstart play pause playing ended volumechange durationchange error

Optional Events (include if supported)

timeupdate progress enterFullScreen exitFullScreen

Adding Playback Technology

When adding additional Tech to a video player, make sure to add the supported tech to the video object.

Tag Method:

<video data-setup='{"techOrder": ["html5", "flash", "other supported tech"]}'

Object Method:

videojs("videoID", {
  techOrder: ["html5", "flash", "other supported tech"]
});

Youtube Technology

To add a youtube source to your video tag, use the following source:

<source src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=[ytVideoId]" type="video/youtube"

Important Note:

You can simply copy and paste the url of the youtube page from the browser and the Youtube Tech will be able to find the video id by itself. This is just the minimum needed to get the video working. (Useful for data storage)

Youtube Technology - Extra Options

In Addition to the natively supported options, the Youtube API supports the following added options:

ytcontrols

Type: Boolean (T/F) Default: False

Determines whether to show Youtube's basic Red/Black default play bar skin or to hide it and use the native video-js play bar.

hd