mpv.js

All format embeddable player for Electron/NW.js applications.
Powered by marvelous mpv.

Get libmpv

In order to try mpv.js you need to install mpv library first.

• Windows: download mpv-dev, unpack, put corresponding mpv-1.dll to C:\Windows\system32
• macOS: brew install mpv
• Linux: apt-get install libmpv1 libavformat-dev

Example

Simple Electron application yet capable of handling pretty much any available video thanks to mpv. Run:

git clone https://github.com/Kagami/mpv.js.git && cd mpv.js
npm install
# Only on Linux: npm run use-system-ffmpeg
npm run example

Usage

Add npm package

npm install mpv.js --save

Package includes prebuilt binaries for all major platforms so no need to setup compilers.

Load plugin in main process (Electron example)

const path = require("path");
const {app} = require("electron");
const {getPluginEntry} = require("mpv.js");

// Absolute path to the plugin directory.
const pluginDir = path.join(path.dirname(require.resolve("mpv.js")), "build", "Release");
// See pitfalls section for details.
if (process.platform !== "linux") {process.chdir(pluginDir);}
// Fix for latest Electron.
app.commandLine.appendSwitch("no-sandbox");
// To support a broader number of systems.
app.commandLine.appendSwitch("ignore-gpu-blacklist");
app.commandLine.appendSwitch("register-pepper-plugins", getPluginEntry(pluginDir));

Don't forget to enable plugins feature when creating BrowserWindow:

const win = new BrowserWindow({
  // ...
  webPreferences: {plugins: true},
  // ...
});

Use MPV component (React example)

const React = require("react");
const {ReactMPV} = require("mpv.js");

class Player extends React.PureComponent {
  constructor(props) {
    super(props);
    this.mpv = null;
    this.state = {pause: true, "time-pos": 0};
  }
  handleMPVReady(mpv) {
    this.mpv = mpv;
    this.mpv.observe("pause");
    this.mpv.observe("time-pos");
    this.mpv.command("loadfile", "/path/to/video.mkv");
  }
  handlePropertyChange(name, value) {
    this.setState({[name]: value});
  }
  togglePause() {
    this.mpv.property("pause", !this.state.pause);
  }
  render() {
    return (
      <ReactMPV
        className="player"
        onReady={this.handleMPVReady.bind(this)}
        onPropertyChange={this.handlePropertyChange.bind(this)}
        onMouseDown={this.togglePause.bind(this)}
      />
    );
  }
}

Currently only React component is provided.

See also

• mpv properties documentation
• mpv commands documentation
• ReactMPV source with JSDoc API comments
• example player source for a more advanced usage

Packaging

Basically all you need to ship is mpvjs.node and mpv library. Make sure they both and also Electron/NW.js distribution have the same bitness!

Windows

You may use lachs0r builds. Copy mpv-1.dll to the directory with mpvjs.node and you are done.

macOS

Homebrew can compile libmpv.1.dylib and all its dependencies. To find dylibs that need to be packaged and fix install names you may use collect-dylib-deps script.

Linux

Two options are normally acceptable:

1. Ask your users to install libmpv1 with package manager or simply depend on it if you build package.
2. Compile static libmpv.so with e.g. mpv-build.

Pitfalls

Path to plugin can't contain non-ASCII symbols

This is unfortunate Chromium's pepper_plugin_list.cc restriction. To workaround this relative path might be used.

On Windows and Mac it can be done by changing working directory to the path where mpvjs.node is stored. You can't change CWD of renderer process on Linux inside main process because of zygote architecture so another fix is just cd to the plugin directory in wrapper script.

getPluginEntry helper will give you plugin entry string with that fix applied.

libmpv is being linked with Electron's libffmpeg on Linux

On Linux plugins loaded with register-pepper-plugins inherit symbols from electron binary so it leads to unfortunate effect: libmpv will use Electron's libraries which is not supported.

To workaround it you need to either replace libffmpeg.so with empty wrapper linked to libav*:

gcc -Wl,--no-as-needed -shared -lavformat -o /path/to/libffmpeg.so

Or use libmpv with statically linked libav*.

Build on x86

To build mpvjs.node by yourself you need to setup dev environment.

Step 1: setup node-gyp

See installation section.

• Windows: Visual Studio 2013 is required

Step 2: setup NaCl SDK

See download page.

• Windows: unpack nacl_sdk.zip to C:\
• macOS & Linux: add export NACL_SDK_ROOT=/path/to/pepper_49 to ~/.bash_profile

Step 2.1: compile 64-bit NaCl host binaries on Windows

1. Open C:\nacl_sdk\pepper_49\tools\host_vc.mk and replace 32_host with 64_host
2. Open cmd, run "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat" amd64
3. Run cd C:\nacl_sdk\pepper_49\src and make TOOLCHAIN=win PROJECTS="ppapi_cpp ppapi_gles2"

Step 3: setup mpv development files

• Windows: download mpv-dev, unpack to C:\mpv-dev
• macOS: brew install mpv
• Linux: apt-get install libmpv-dev

Step 4: build plugin

• Run node-gyp rebuild in project directory
• Run node-gyp rebuild --arch=ia32 to build 32-bit version of plugin on 64-bit Windows

Build on ARM

Important: Electron 1.8.x ARM releases are broken so use 2.x or 1.7.x instead.

Note: instructions below have been tested on Raspberry Pi 3, see more.

Step 0: enable hardware graphics acceleration

• Run sudo raspi-config
• Select Advanced Options, then select GL Driver and then GL (Full KMS) OpenGL desktop driver with full KMS. When configuration is finished you will see following message: "Full KMS GL driver is enabled"
• Select <Ok> and then <Finish> and raspi-config tool will ask you if you would like to reboot
• Select <Yes> to reboot the system and apply configuration changes

Step 1: setup node-gyp

See installation section.

Step 2: setup NaCl SDK

The NaCl SDK itself is only built to run on x86, so you can't use ./naclsdk. Instead you have to download pepper's archive directly and unpack it to some directory. Then add export NACL_SDK_ROOT=/path/to/pepper_49 to ~/.bash_profile.

Step 3: setup mpv development files

apt-get install libmpv-dev

Step 4: compile ARM host binaries

Run cd /path/to/pepper_49/src and make TOOLCHAIN=linux PROJECTS="ppapi_cpp ppapi_gles2" CFLAGS="-D_GLIBCXX_USE_CXX11_ABI=0".

Step 5: build plugin

After the process is done, head back to mpv.js directory and run node-gyp rebuild.

Applications using mpv.js

• boram
• Arclight
• BeyondPlayer
• Torrent Player

Feel free to PR your own.

License

mpv.js is licensed under CC0 itself. However if you use GPL build of libmpv (e.g. lachs0r builds) your application might violate GPL dynamic linking restrictions. LGPL build should be safe, see mpv copyright for details. (This is not a legal advice.)

Example video is part of Tears of Steel movie (CC) Blender Foundation | mango.blender.org.

Logo is by @SteveJobzniak.