Viddler

The Viddler team is using CodeIgniter more and more for our internal PHP projects. Obviously we need to use CodeIgniter with the Viddler API quite a bit so we figured we’d share with you how easy it is to include PHPViddler, the open source PHP API wrapper class for the Viddler API, in your CodeIgniter application.

Here are the steps to follow:

1. Download the latest copy of PHPViddler.
2. Extract PHPViddler into system/libraries/phpviddler/ in your CodeIgniter installation.
3. Load the PHPViddler library (as needed) like this:

   // Load PHP Viddler and setup
   $this->load->library('phpviddler/php5viddler');
   $viddler = $this->php5viddler;
   $viddler->apiKey = 'your_api_key_here';

4. Use $viddler->function_name() after that.

I’ve just set up a local CodeIgniter installation and had multi-file uploading working within about 30 minutes using PHP Viddler with PHPViddlerUploadify (an extension of both PHPViddler and the JavaScript framework jQuery) for easy file uploading.

We hope that you enjoy using PHPViddler with CodeIgniter as much as we do.

Just recently we added a small tweak to the Recorder, to make it try connecting to our recording facilities over more than just one port and protocol pair.

As of next push, those of you, who are hopelessly firewalled, will be able to record not only using the default port 1935, but also over ports 80 or 443, too. No user action is needed, Recorder does the magic automatically.

Drupal is a robust content management platform built to make it easy to power everything from a blog to a full community Web site. – And it just got a little bit easier to use your Viddler videos on your Drupal-powered Web sites.

The Viddler Drupal module, which we’ve just added to our Project Directory, makes it easy to record video with your Web cam, upload videos directly to Viddler, and use your video’s metadata throughout the site.

Thanks to the talented people at OmniTechPro for getting this project off the ground. The module is open source, so feel free to use it and make it better!

The Viddler Wordpress plugin, or as some like to call it the video commenting plugin, has now been added to the official Wordpress.org plugins directory.  We feel all official about it.

What does this mean for you? It means that now you’re able to install the plugin from within your blog’s Wordpress admin. It also means that anytime we release an update to the plugin, like we just have with version 1.2.3 which is now available, you will be notified of this update from within the plugin panel in Wordpress.

Wordpress 2.7 has made it as easy as ever to find, install, and update plugins that will enhance your blog’s features. We hope the Viddler Wordpress plugin is one of them.

As we’re slowly putting together our new developers site we are continously updating the documentation, articles, and projects that are on the site. 

Today we’ve just launched a new article How to: Encode High Quality Video for Viddler. We’ve had this article requested from us several times and we’re happy to finally offer it. Nothing too special in the article itself, really, no rocket science – however it is nice to have an easy to read reference on how to get the best out of your Viddler videos.

If you have any questions or would like to have something appended to the article, or would like to request a new article, please feel free to leave a comment.

Watch for falling rocks!  We’re sort of live updating the Viddler’s Developer site.

We’ve got a new template designed by Viddler’s Lead Designer Andrew Smith which will facilitate our needs not only for the Developer site but also for a few other sub-level domains we’ll be launching in the next few weeks.  Andrew provided me with a style guide of sorts and so now I’m put to the task of getting both Wordpress and MediaWiki, the two applications we use to pull off this site, to bend to my will.

Everything should work ok, but will look a little wonky while I’m updating. If you have any concerns, let me know.

The response from the first version of the bookmarklet has been pretty strong. It has now been updated a little, based on the comments we’ve received, and hopefully you’ll find it even more useful.

Changes in beta 0.2

• Sharing via Twitter now works, even when logged out of Twitter.com.
• Window is now resizable.

We still need to fix the Firefox 3 RC1 issue that Evan Sims pointed out, as well as figure out how to make the bookmarklet work on pages where a Viddler video is embedded, and not just on Viddler.com.
Thanks for all of your feedback so far!

To upgrade or install

To update your bookmarklet, just delete the old one, and use this new one: ViddlerPop!

As always, if you have any questions, just ask.

I like watching video in Viddler’s player.  All of my favorite podcasts are now using Viddler including WineLibrary TV, DiggNation, Two Guys on Beer, just to name a few.  But sometimes I don’t like keeping a browser tab open to watch these longer videos while I’m doing other things like surfing the Web, writing code, or replying to the endless amounts of email I seem to get.

This is where ViddlerPop!, a new bookmarklet we’re playing with, comes in and saves the day.  Now instead of keeping a browser tab open dedicated to a Viddler video, I can watch this video in its own window.

Here is a quick video demonstration of how this first version works.

Please leave us some feedback to let us know what you think of the bookmarklet, how you’d like it to improve, and if you find any bugs.  Thanks in advance!

Installation

To install ViddlerPop! just drag the ViddlerPop! link to your browser’s bookmarks bar – or, right-click and “Add to bookmarks”. I believe in Firefox it is right-click and “Bookmark this Link”.

Questions?  Fire away!

In an effort to make developing on Viddler’s platform as easy as possible, we’ve moved the lab from lab.viddler.com to developers.viddler.com.  Everything should be forwarded now and we’ll be now setting up shop here.  The wiki is still available, but we’re going to be adding a whole new interface to our Developers area over the next few weeks.

Please stay tuned!

One of the great aspects of Viddler’s API is the ability to embed our webcam recorder right into your site. With only a few lines of code, your users will be able to record video using any camera attached to their computer, and it’s automatically uploaded to Viddler and encoded. Let’s dive right in!

First off, if you haven’t checked out part one and part two of the phpViddler series, you’ll want to do that first, as some of that code will be necessary for recording.
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