[GTALUG] Youtube hints

[Walter Dnes]

  Given that Flash is being minimally maintained for linux, it's nice
that Youtube has gon over to HTML5, but there are still a few hiccups
that I ran into.  I'll detail how I got around them, and also mention
random access to videos.  For the purposes of this example, I'll use the
"Ancient Aliens Debunked" video, because it's over 3 hours long, which
allows for examples of time offset.  Warning... some URL-tweaking
follows.


Item 1)  Youtube is now "officially" viewable in html5 without Flash,
but I do run into a few instances of...

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  Here's a video that "doesn't play on HTML5".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&hd=1

  Let's break it up into sections.  For URLs, the first parameter is
preceeded by "?", and additional parameters are preceeded by "&".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&hd=1 breaks up into

https:// www.youtube.com          domain
/watch                            "watch" parameter
?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ                    video ID
&hd=1                             HD mode selection

  If you get rid of the "&hd1", the URL becomes...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ

...and it plays perfectly in HTML5, without Flash.  Note that this is
"the basic Youtube video URL".


Item 2)  OK, you've got a long video, and you want to jump a certain
point in the video, without having to wait an hour plus to get to that
point.  This is done by appending a "&t=" parameter.  It can contain
"h", "m", and "s" subparameters.  E.g. 1 hour, 20 minutes, and 15
seconds is signified by "&t=1h20m15s".  You can include any or all of
h/m/s.  A few examples follow.

"Pumapunku" (begins at 3 minutes 34 seconds into the video).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&t=3m34s


"The Pyramids" (begins at 22 minutes 40 seconds into the video).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&t=22m40s


"Easter Island" (begins at 1 hour 1 minute 35 seconds into the video).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&t=1h1m35s


"Pacal's Rocket" (begins at 1 hour 5 minutes 43 seconds into the video).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9w-i5oZqaQ&t=1h5m43s

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes at waltdnes.org>