Protecting and playing flv files

[billatts]

I saw a thread that indicate that s2member allowed you to protect flv files. I would like to know how to make that work.

I use an flv player (the situation described occurred with multiple players EXWeb Player Lite and Hana flv player). In the place where the player wants the url I placed the "?s2member-downloads=" and then the folder in s2member-files. This worked (I know it was intended as a download only) on my IE 7. However, when someone on a Mac tried to see the video it failed. In doing some de-bugging, it appears that the special s2member code causes the Mac to say it can't find the file.

So how can I show the videos on the web page and still have it securced by s2member.

Thanks

[Jason Caldwell]

Thanks for reporting your experience with s2Member.

This sounds it could be related to the way in which your video player is receiving the URL. Perhaps you need to urlencode() the full location of the FLV file. This way it is passed in to your video player without causing problems. This tool might come in handy: http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/dencoder/

Reference articles:
http://www.w3schools.com/tags/ref_urlencode.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percent-encoding ( aka: Percent Encoding )
http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.urlencode.php

If you continue to have trouble, please post a code sample for us. Show us how your video player is embedded, and how you're specifying the full location to your protected FLV file.

[billatts]

Thanks for the response Jason. I'm not sure I have explained the problem correctly. Below is the code for EZWebPlayer (but as i indicated previously I have used other players).

[EZWebPlayerLite VIDEOURL="http://www.stockoptionsprofits.com/?s2member_file_download=courses/Trade1.flv" THUMBNAILURL="http://stockoptionsprofits.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/vid_player_v2.jpg" SKINURL="NavyBlue.xml" PLAYARROW="TRUE" WIDTH="500" HEIGHT="397" /]

In the thread below, you indicated that the technique of using "download" was for download not playback. You then indicated that such a capabilty (playing protected flv files) was supported.
viewtopic.php?f=4&t=14&p=29&hilit=flv+player#p29

The code I have above works for all browsers using a PC, and fails for all browsers on the MAC. This is true regardless of which "player plugin" I use. I would not find any video which described how you support videos and keeping the files in the protected "s2member-files" area. I understand that I can protect the pages and use files outside of the "s2member-files" protected area (this will work on both PC and MAC - any browser), but the question is how do I protect the flv files and play them using s2member.

Hope that helps.

[Jason Caldwell]

Yes, thank you. Currently investigating.

[Jason Caldwell]

While I'm investigating this. Here are some things to go over in your configuration.

1. Are "Inline" files enabled for the FLV extension?
If not, you can pass it in explicitly using this parameter: &s2member_file_inline=yes

Code: Select all

http://www.stockoptionsprofits.com/?s2member_file_download=courses/Trade1.flv&s2member_file_inline=yes

There are two ways to serve files. Inline, or as an Attachment. By default, s2Member will serve all of your protected files, as downloadable attachments. Meaning, visitors will be given a file download prompt. Otherwise known as Content-Disposition: attachment. In some cases though, you may wish to serve files inline. For example, PDF files and images should usually be served inline. When you serve a file inline, it is displayed in your browser immediately, rather than your browser prompting you to download the file as an attachment.

Using the field in s2Member -> Download Options -> Inline Extensions, you can list all of the extensions that you want s2Member to serve inline ( ex: htm,html,pdf,jpg,jpeg,jpe,gif,png,mp3,mp4,flv ). Please understand, some files just cannot be displayed inline. For instance, there is no way to display an exe file inline. So only specify extensions that can, and should be displayed inline by a web browser. Alternatively, if you would rather handle this on a case-by-case basis, you can simply add the following to the end of your download links: &s2member_file_inline=yes.

2. When testing on your MAC, are you logged in with an adequate Membership Level?

[billatts]

1) I'll try that code.

2) Yes, signed in as member (admin actually)

[billatts]

1) that code does not resolve the problem. Still can't find the file on the MAC. Still works fine on the PC.

[Jason Caldwell]

1) that code does not resolve the problem. Still can't find the file on the MAC. Still works fine on the PC.

Thanks for reporting back.
Just to confirm, you're using s2Member v3.5.4?
Or what version? And what version of WordPress too?

[billatts]

Wordpress 3.1
S2member 3.5.2

[Cristián Lávaque]

Would you update s2Member to the latest version and see if helps?

[billatts]

Upgraded to 3.5.4. No change.

[cdils]

billatts, were you able to resolve your issue? I'm experiencing a similar problem.