Moodle in English: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Nishant Pandya - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 6:09 PM

Hi guys !!

I am using moodle 2.9 version. I need to get the information that which type of video formats moodle support.

I am working on a site. I need to create some courses in the format of videos. I have some videos in the format of .VOB. I think moodle doesn't support .VOB format videos. I have try to upload videos but getting errors i.e. File filetype cannot be accepted. Please provide the list of video formats.

Also provide the information that what is the limit of uploading videos on moodle. Actually my client want the courses in the format of videos & they provide him lots of videos for creating lessons.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Nishant Pandya - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 6:43 PM

I have convert the video from .VOB to .MP4 but videos work only on Chrome browser not in Firefox. Please provide the list of video formats for which it run on atleast Chrome, Firefox & IE browser.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 6:50 PM

Some may disagree, but I find the video playing ability of Moodle to be so inconsistent that I cannot in all conscience recommend it to you. Playing video on multiple platforms is non-trivial. If you can, you'd be much better uploading your videos into the likes of YouTube of Vimeo and then linking to them for Moodle.

If anybody has a more reliable solution for playing videos on all (well most) browsers and platforms I'd be interested to hear it myself.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Nishant Pandya - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 6:58 PM

Thanks for quick reply.

No can't upload videos on youtube. Actually my client don't want to share there videos. He will provide there videos for uploading.

Please help me how can I do this. Or please suggest to convert videos in other formats so those videos supported by Chrome, Firefox & IE.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 7:42 PM

Again I'm prepared to be overruled but you might want to encode them as flash-video which is (still) moderately reliable on desktops.

These won't work on iOS devices, so I would provide a second version encoded H.264 if you need to support that.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Nishant Pandya - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 7:53 PM

Can I need to use any player so videos can play on them with different browsers as well as IOS.

Please give me your suggestion.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 11:21 PM

Erm... I just did

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Marcus Green - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 9:57 PM

All video playing is inconsistent everywhere

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Ken Task - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 9:07 PM

Not familiar with .vob videos so did a little Googling ...

http://www.wikihow.com/Play-VOB-Files

I might be wrong, but VOB appears to be a video type used on DVD's thus have to ask ... how large are the video files themselves? Don't think VOB files are streaming/progressive (from the description given in the above link) so how long would a user have to wait to download the complete VOB file before whatever is found can play the video? In the 'instant gratification' world we seem to live in today, waiting beyond 'acceptable limits' is growing shorter and shorter. So you might be able to satisfy the clients un-reasonable requirements, somewhat, but users will tell you up front what's wrong or won't use at all.

Besides that, there is a movement away from what has been known as "Netscape Plugable Modules" (NPM's) in ALL browsers ... FireFox, Chrome, Safari. And, finding a single video file type that plays across ALL platforms (smartphone/tablets) and OS's is becoming more difficult ... if not impossible.

So Howard's suggestion about using a video service is sounding better and better.

My 2 cents of course ...

'spirit of sharing', Ken

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Wednesday, 5 August 2015, 11:20 PM

vob files are indeed the native DVD format. What you get if you 'rip' a DVD. You definitely don't want to be using those.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Nishant Pandya - Thursday, 6 August 2015, 1:30 PM

Please help me guys. I want that Courses display in the format of videos without using youtube videos.

I have some videos. I need that videos run on both Desktop Browsers as well as IOS browsers. Is there any solution.

Ipad /Iphone - .MP4 working on all browsers but .FLV not working.

Desktop - In Chrome .MP4 working but full screen not woking, Firefox .MP4 not working & .FLV work on all Desktop browsers but not working on Ipad/Iphone

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Thursday, 6 August 2015, 1:32 PM

You can ask as many times as you like but it doesn't change the answers you already have...

It's not possible in Moodle. Not as far as any of us here know anyway.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Nishant Pandya - Thursday, 6 August 2015, 2:06 PM

Ok. Means to use videos as course first I need to upload videos on Youtube & then access using Youtube.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Visvanath Ratnaweera - Thursday, 6 August 2015, 4:47 PM

Did you check the documentation, https://docs.moodle.org/en/Video for example?

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Thursday, 6 August 2015, 5:24 PM

To be fair that page doesn't actually address the OP's question which was (basically) how to encode the video so it works everywhere.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Visvanath Ratnaweera - Thursday, 6 August 2015, 5:30 PM

Oops, I didn't read the whole thing, its rather long!

But from the name https://docs.moodle.org/en/Video I expected the page to dicuss Video completely. Or, is it answered in the https://docs.moodle.org/en/Media_FAQ ?

If that one too is negative, may be something for the "Video" forum yet to be born: "Wasn't there a dedicated forum for videos?" https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=313462 ?

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Thursday, 6 August 2015, 5:47 PM

That would require somebody who knows something about it who can answer the questions....

The FAQ says about MP4s... "It seems that the media filter is hard coded to NOT use Flowplayer for MP4.". At that point a reasonable person should know that they are in a lot of trouble....

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Rick Jerz - Friday, 7 August 2015, 12:22 AM

I think (in general) .FLV files require Flash. Get away from this format by moving to .mp4 (h.264).

Do your browsers contain video player plugins, such as Quicktime? I use .mp4's and they work across most environments (much better than any other format.)

I just presented a topic at MoodleMoot that demonstrates some of my techniques. Visit: https://mootus15.moodlemoot.org/course/view.php?id=29

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Friday, 7 August 2015, 2:12 AM

How do you encode your mp4s and how is your Moodle configured for video (if not default)?

My experience with mp4 has been very disappointing.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Rick Jerz - Friday, 7 August 2015, 2:20 AM

In Adobe Premiere, I select h264, and then I tweak some of the settings. I have attached a screenshot (dark grey) showing my choice.

In Camtasion, I select "mp4", and then adjust some of the options (lower the quality to increase streaming probability.) I have attached a screenshot (white/light grey) showing this.

Out of curiosity, which format do you have success using? .wmv? .mov?

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Usman Asar - Friday, 7 August 2015, 3:40 AM

Rick, is this the full version of Premiere (also called Premiere Pro) or Premiere Elements?

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Rick Jerz - Friday, 7 August 2015, 6:16 AM

Yes Usman, Premiere Pro (currently CC2015). Sorry about that.

Premiere Pro is part of my Adobe Creative Cloud subscription.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Rick Jerz - Monday, 10 August 2015, 11:34 PM

Usman, I thought about adding a few more video settings that I use when producing via Premiere pro and Camtasia.

Camtasia lets me control the "quality" with a slider which I slide to about 60%-70%. "Encoding mode"=Quality, Keyframe=5, Frame rate = 15fps, Audio bit rate = 32kbps.

For Premiere Pro, Frame Rate = 15, Field Order = Progressive, NTSC, Profile = Baseline, Level = 4.1, Render at Maximum Depth=On, Bitrate Encoding VBR 2 pass, Target Bitrate = 2, Maximum Bitrate = 2, Key Frame Distance = 75, Audio Format = ACC, Channels = Mono, Audio Quality = High, Audio Sample Rate = 32000 Hz, Audio Precedence = Bitrate, Audio Bitrate (kbps) = 32.

As you can see, Premiere Pro offers a lot of fine tuning, which is helpful as one deals with the quality/size issues.

I came across these settings by experimenting a lot (a real lot). However, I am always open to suggestions.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Rick Jerz - Friday, 7 August 2015, 6:27 AM

Howard, I forgot to answer your second question about my Moodle's configuration. I'll attach a screenshot. Quite honestly, I do not recall changing any of these from the default settings, but maybe so. Since I distribute my videos via RSS, maybe I don't need to rely on moodle by rather the browser to play my videos. If you go to my "course" (search for RSS) on the MoodleMoot2015 site, try playing the various versions of my videos on your variety of devices and see how they work. The videos all seem to work, yet I don't know if the folks managing the MoodleMoot2015 site did anything special. Keep in mind that none of my videos were "uploaded" into the moodle, they are all external. Yet, the students would never know this, nor should they care as long as the videos play.

Let me know if you are interested in any of my other settings.

You are also welcome to grab any of the URLs that I used in this "course", and put them into your own moodle to see what happens.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Alejandro Lengua - Friday, 7 October 2016, 8:38 PM

Where is this options screen available?

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Bret Miller - Friday, 7 August 2015, 4:53 AM

H.264-encoded MP4 is a good format selection. It's generally well-tolerated cross-platform.

While I don't have any experience with media playback in Moodle, I have dealt with it for years on our own website (custom HTML, now Drupal). For a long time, we used JWPlayer, which still has a stellar reputation and last switched to MediaElement.js about the time WordPress included it. MediaElement.js provided a solid cross-platform, mobile-friendly solution to video playback. We still use it for archives, though all our new video runs from YouTube.

For using that in Moodle, you might try VideoEasy, though it isn't officially supported in 2.9, it still might work: https://moodle.org/plugins/view/filter_videoeasy

HTH,
Bret

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Jeff White - Saturday, 8 August 2015, 1:00 AM

I use html wrapped videos when the videos need to be stored in Moodle and not on a media streaming server. It gives me a nice consistency between the 4 major browsers (Safari, Chrome, IE, Firefox).

I highly recommend giving Camtasia a shot with producing video content you want to make very professional looking.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Justin Hunt - Friday, 7 August 2015, 1:48 PM

There are two issues here, i) how to format the video , and ii) how to get Moodle to play it.

For video format you might check this post here:

https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=313378

In it I propose an MP4 format that will work on everything. Enough people tested and reported success that I think its the best way to go. Only old IE versions seemed to have troubles.

The format is: AVC (H.264) profile baseline 3.1

If you were to make such a video using FFMPEG the command to convert mycool.flv to mycool.mp4 would look like this:

ffmpeg -i mycool.flv -c:v libx264 -preset ultrafast -profile:v baseline -level 3.1 -crf 28 -f mp4 mycool.mp4

If you are using a GUI tool to do this, usually the preset that will produce a video suitable for an old iphone (2 or 3) produces one of these.

For how to get it on Moodle.

Raw HTML5 Video tags don't give you much control or consistency across platforms, but they are the simplest way. Moodle will produce them out of the box if you leave the html5 video checkbox on, as in Rick's screenshot.

The VideoEasy filter gives you more control, consistency and a choice of players. Though I should note that with all the extra power, there is extra complexity too. You can see it an action and play with it at: http://demo.poodll.com/course/view.php?id=3 (As noted by Bret, the 2.9 version is not on Moodle.org yet, but its done. I will post it early next week.)

Another option is the jwplayer filter : https://moodle.org/plugins/view/filter_jwplayer

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Howard Miller - Friday, 7 August 2015, 4:02 PM

I imagine that re-encoding, if required, can be done with something like Handbrake (https://handbrake.fr/) if you don't have expensive Adobe options and similar.

I'm going to need to have a proper look at those plugins.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Gareth J Barnard - Monday, 10 August 2015, 6:16 PM

I'd forgotten about Handbrake! Which reminds me, there is 'Avidemux' too: http://avidemux.sourceforge.net/

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Justin Hunt - Monday, 10 August 2015, 7:46 PM

+1 for Handbrake. It is actually really good. I used to use that a lot.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by AL Rachels - Monday, 10 August 2015, 1:17 AM

Thank you Justin!!!

The ffmpeg settings you list work great for me. For the first time in a long time, I am able to create ONE video file that every device I have access to has been able to play.

When I first ran it, ffmpeg quit and spit out this message: [aac @ 0xf40ca0] The encoder 'aac' is experimental but experimental codecs are not enabled, add '-strict -2' if you want to use it.

Once I added -strict -2, right after ultrafast, every video has been playable on all my tablets, phones, and computers.

Just need to figure out how to enable experimental codecs now.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Gareth J Barnard - Monday, 10 August 2015, 5:33 AM

Cross connection with a similar post, perhaps webm is a better format: https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=318029#p1275177

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Justin Hunt - Monday, 10 August 2015, 10:54 AM

Thats a good win!

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Colin Fraser - Monday, 10 August 2015, 12:35 PM

mmm is there a single player that will play on all platforms? Or can a single plugin for video be created that uses HTML5, and all videos play MP4? Not necessarily a good solution, but I understand MP4 will play on all devices, I think it is likely that now it is just a matter of creating the environment for it, a native video plugin.

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Re: Video Format supported by moodle & uploading limitation of videos

by Mathieu Pelletier - Tuesday, 11 August 2015, 2:32 PM

I may be late to the discussion, but if YouTube is not an option and one does not wish to use a CDN, I have found Alfresco to be very useful for this sort of thing. It is able to do format conversions based on a workflow, so you should not have to spend time doing conversions manually. Alfresco is open-source and has a free community version, so if you have constrained budgets, it is a very attractive solution. We will also be using it to manage course readers and such. It is well worth exploring.

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