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https://github.com/danielpetri1/bbb-recording-exporter

A client- and server side script to generate BigBlueButton MP4 recordings.
https://github.com/danielpetri1/bbb-recording-exporter

bbb-recorder bigbluebutton-addon bigbluebutton-downloader bigbluebutton-plugin bigbluebutton-record-export bigbluebutton-recorder

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A client- and server side script to generate BigBlueButton MP4 recordings.

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README 

        

  



  



# BigBlueButton Exporter



  



  



Server-side version of the script that enables users to download BigBlueButton recordings as a single video file.



  



  



## What's supported?



The script was developed for BigBlueButton versions ranging from 2.3 to 2.5.



  



✅ Annotations 



  



✅ Captions 



  



✅ Chapters 



  



✅ Chat (with an option to anonymize names) 



  



✅ Cursor 



  



✅ Integration with Greenlight 



  



✅ Polls 



  



✅ Screen shares 



  



✅ Slides



  



✅ Text 



  



✅ Webcams 



  



✅ Zooms 



  



  



![BigBlueButton recording exporter](/demo/export_example.png)



  



  



## Server-Side Usage



Install the prerequisites (the following packages and RubyGems need to be installed on a BBB v2.5.x server running Ubuntu 20.04):



```shell

sudo apt-get install libsystemd-dev ruby-dev

sudo gem install builder optimist loofah nokogiri redis journald-logger open4 absolute_time

```

  



Place the file `presentation.rb` in the `/usr/local/bigbluebutton/core/scripts/post_publish` directory with executable rights.



Do the same for the file `lib/interval_tree.rb`, moving it to `/usr/local/bigbluebutton/core/lib/recordandplayback`.



  



After a session is over and the presentation is processed, the script will begin to export the recording as a single video file. It can be accessed and downloaded at https://`your.bbb.hostname`/presentation/`meeting-id`/meeting.mp4 once rendering completes, or directly in the Greenlight interface.



  



The meeting's ID is the alphanumeric string following the 2.3 in the recording's URL.



  



Existing recordings can be re-rendered by running the exporting script on an individual basis:



  



    ./presentation.rb -m  -f presentation



  



Note that this will stop automatic exports unless executed with the `bigbluebutton` user! See the "Troubleshooting" section below.



  



Alternatively,



    bbb-record --rebuild 



  



will rebuild the entire recording (including the playback in the browser).



  



To re-render all existing recordings, run



  



    bbb-record --rebuildall



  



If you do not have access to a BBB server, check out the branch 'client-side'.



  



For caption support, recompile FFmpeg with the `movtext` encoder enabled and uncomment the `add_captions` method.



  



The chat component can be disabled by turning `HIDE_CHAT` on. If you want to keep the messages but anonymize the names, set `HIDE_CHAT_NAMES` to true.



  



### Requirements



  



Root access to a BBB 2.3 server.



  



### Rendering options



If your server supports animated strokes on the whiteboard, set the flag `REMOVE_REDUNDANT_SHAPES` to **true** in `presentation.rb`.



  



Less data can be written on the disk by turning `SVGZ_COMPRESSION` on.



  



To make rendering less resource-intensive, download FFMpeg's source code and replace the file `ffmpeg/libavcodec/librsvgdec.c` with the one in this directory. After compiling and installing FFMpeg, enable `FFMPEG_REFERENCE_SUPPORT` in `presentation.rb` . [Steps by @felcaetano](https://github.com/danielpetri1/bbb-recording-exporter/issues/44#issuecomment-904464887).



  



The video output quality can be controlled with `CONSTANT_RATE_FACTOR`.



  



### Troubleshooting



  



Exports don't start after the meeting ends: `/var/log/bigbluebutton/post_publish.log` and `/var/bigbluebutton/published/video/` must be chowned to `bigbluebutton:bigbluebutton`



  



### License



This script was developed for my [bachelor's thesis](https://mediatum.ub.tum.de/doc/1632305/1632305.pdf) at the Technical University of Munich and is licensed under MIT. Please cite as



```

@mastersthesis{bbb-recording-exporter,

	author = {Daniel Petri Rocha},

	title = {Development of a Sophisticated Session Recording Exporter for the BigBlueButton Web Conferencing System},

	year = {2021},

	school = {Technische Universität München},

	month = {},

	adress = {80805 Munich},

	pages = {65},

	language = {en},

	abstract = {BigBlueButton is an open-source web conferencing system designed for remote teaching.

              A longstanding feature request by community members has been to give users the

              ability to download the recording of a meeting as a video file, including the presentation,

              webcams, and chat messages. This thesis implemented that enhancement as a script

              executed automatically by the server once a recorded conference ends, performing

              significantly faster than previous solutions capturing the screen of the web player in realtime.

              Additionally, annotated slides can be output as PDF. Processing the presentation into both

              formats can also be done client-side if the user has no access to the server.

              Development of the converter did not introduce new dependencies into BigBlueButton

              and resulted in contributions to a Ruby library providing a data structure for efficient

              queries on intervals and FFmpeg, a command-line multimedia framework. The code

              offers a foundation for other improvements on BigBlueButton’s roadmap, such as giving

              instructors the option to import work done on documents in breakout rooms into the

              main session.},

	keywords = {open-source, web conferencing},

	note = {},

	url = {https://mediatum.ub.tum.de/doc/1632305/1632305.pdf},

}

```