Drupal 6 media streaming with Dash Media Player

Several weeks ago I took a fairly in-depth look at the current video streaming options available for Drupal 6. Shortly after I published the article, a new product entered the market - Dash Media Player. Dash Player is the creation of Travis Tidwell from TMT Digital, also the developer of the FlashVideo module for Drupal.

From the project's home page...

The Dash Media Player for Drupal CMS is a revolutionary, first of its kind, media player built specifically to tap into the power of Drupal CMS! Just imagine… a media player whose content is driven by the power and flexibility of Drupal. With this player, you can truly take advantage of the best of two worlds... the incredible user interface of Flash, and the unparalleled content management of Drupal. Using these two systems together, you can quite literally have your very own Media CMS system! As you will soon see, the Dash Media Player is a truly remarkable player geared up for the rise of Web 3.0

Features

• Remote Playlist Support: Allows you to have the playlist separate from the player on the page but it act as ONE player!
• Compatible with ALL Drupal Media modules!
• Completely Skinable (using external SWF files) and Themeable!
• Create and Manage your Media Playlists using the Views module!
• Add custom fields to the player using the CCK (Content Construction Kit) module
• RSS, XML Playlist, and Single File compatible
• High Definition Video Support ( H-264 )
• Media Free Tagging Support
• Complete Audio Support including MP3's ( Make sure that you check out the How-to article!)
• Works great as just an Image Viewer.
• Written using latest Object Oriented Techniques in Actionscript 3
• Lightweight: All these features packed into only 75kB!
• 100% Resizable
• Secure: Using Drupal's Services Module
• Built in 5 star voting mechanism.
• Full Screen Support

Installation and setup

Much like FlashVideo, Dash Player has some very good and complete documentation available on the TMT Digital website. They cover installation and setup in great detail, as well as providing a developers' guide which covers more advanced topics such as reskinning and theming the media player.

Installation and setup consists of the following 6 steps and took me no longer than 15 minutes from start to finish:

• Install the required Drupal Modules
• Download and install the Dash Player in Drupal
• Configure the Services Module and the Dash Player
• Create a Content Type for the Dash Player
• Setup the Dash Player playlist using the Views Module
• Embed the Dash Player in a page

Once installed and configured, the Dash player can be embedded into Drupal anywhere where PHP code can be executed, such as a node or block:

This will insert a player whose dimensions are 652 x 432, and whose playlist is driven by the view named 'videos'. Simple, right!

Using Views for your Playlists

With Dash Player, you create a new custom content type for the videos, and then use the Views module to generate playlists for them. The great thing about Dash is that all of the media player's content is driven by the Views module, so many options can be made to control how your playlist is viewed and filtered to your viewers.

Adding custom fields to the Dash Media Player using CCK

The Dash Player was written to be completely customized. One great feature is the ability to add your very own custom fields to the player using CCK. This allows you to add your own data to the player and show that information anytime someone clicks on a teaser in the playlist.

Remote playlists

The remote playlist feature gives you the ability to separate the playlist from the player and even have multiple playlists controlling one player. For example, you might want to have the player in the main section of the page, and then have a 'latest videos' playlist in a Block in your sidebar as well as a 'related videos' playlist directly underneath the player. Implementing this remote playlist feature is very simple and complete instructions are provided in the online documentation.

Dynamic playlists

Having Dynamic Playlists basically means that your users can select how they wish to filter the playlist content by simply clicking on links in your player. This adds a whole new dimension of interactivity to the player.

Reskinning the player

Whilst the Dash Player looks great straight out of the box, probably its coolest feature is the ability to load an external skin (SWF) to completely change the look and feel of the player. This allows you to truly have a remarkable looking player while at the same time retaining all the solid functionality that the Dash Player has to offer.

Licensing

The Dash Player has been released under the Creative Commons License. Although, you are more than welcome to use the code and source as you see fit, it is required that you purchase a commercial license if you wish to use this player on a commercial site.

A two year license costs $160.00. Each license is valid for a single domain (and subdomains) only. Any additional domains will need another license.

Conclusion

Dash Media Player boasts an impressive feature list and is surely set to change the Drupal media streaming landscape. It is easy to install and use, is highly configurable and completely customizable.

Whilst it it is still in beta stages, I have found the player to be fully functional and bug free and would recommend all Drupallers to have a look for themselves.

Useful resources

• Project homepage
  Download the software from the project homepage.
• Documentation
  Full Documentation including setup and installation right through to reskinning the player.
• Dash Media Player showcase
  The TMT Digital website hosts several fully functional examples showing off some of its best features.