How do I run cvlc without audio on Jessie ?

[NewtownGuy]

How do I run cvlc so it streams video WITHOUT invoking audio on Jessie ? It ran fine on Wheezy but always gives this error with Jessie:

PulseAudio output error: PulseAudio connection failure: Connection refused

VLC uses 95% of my cpu, apparently waiting endlessly to open an audio connection that never comes.

I've read and followed many posts on the subject, but I don't want PulseAudio or any other audio program running. I tried purging PulseAudio and re-installing it, but it doesn't help. Those procedures try to fix or change the audio program, but I want to tell vlc not to use audio in the first place.

Here's my command line:

cvlc </home/vout1 stream:///dev/stdin --sout '#standard{access=http,mux=ts,dst=:8081}' --h264-fps=5.0 :demux=h264 &

I need to run it from root, so I invoke it with su -c and run as user pi.

Thank you in advance for your help.

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

vlc --no-audio --no-sout-audio

[NewtownGuy]

Thank you but I still get the same errors as before.

I changed the command to this:

cvlc --no-audio --no-sout-audio < /home/vout1 stream:///dev/stdin --sout '#standard{access=http,mux=ts,dst=:8081}' --h264-fps=5.0 :demux=h264 &

It's in a script, stream_8081.sh, with the usual /bin/bash. I invoke it like this from user root:

nice -5 su -c ./stream_8081.sh pi &

I get this:

root@Z:~/B# VLC media player 2.2.1 Terry Pratchett (Weatherwax) (revision 2.2.1-0-ga425c42)
Failed to create secure directory (/run/user/0/pulse): Permission denied
[01268828] pulse audio output error: PulseAudio server connection failure: Connection refused
Failed to create secure directory (/run/user/0/pulse): Permission denied
Failed to create secure directory (/run/user/0/pulse): Permission denied
[01267678] core interface error: no suitable interface module
[011d08f8] core libvlc error: interface "globalhotkeys,none" initialization failed
[01267678] dbus interface error: Failed to connect to the D-Bus session daemon: Unable to autolaunch a dbus-daemon without a $DISPLAY for X11
[01267678] core interface error: no suitable interface module
[011d08f8] core libvlc error: interface "dbus,none" initialization failed
[01267678] dummy interface: using the dummy interface module...
[011e4070] core access out error: socket bind error: Permission denied
[011e4070] core access out error: socket bind error: Permission denied
[011e4070] core access out error: cannot create socket(s) for HTTP host
[011e4070] access_output_http access out error: cannot start HTTP server
[011f8270] stream_out_standard stream out error: no suitable sout access module for `http/ts://:8081'
[011e4b90] core stream output error: stream chain failed for `standard{access=http,mux=ts,dst=:8081}'
[b4200508] core input error: cannot start stream output instance, aborting

How do I fix this ?

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

That's a local firewall or security framework problem. Check your OS configuraiton.

[NewtownGuy]

I see that PulseAudio is trying to use the same port, 8081, that I am trying to use, even though I told it not to run. I see several configuration files in /etc/pulse. What should I edit to tell PulseAudio to use a different port, or better yet, not to run at all ?

Thank you.

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

No. If PulseAudio were using it, you'd get error "Address already in use". "Permission denied" is what I said already.

[NewtownGuy]

What should I check in the local firewall or security framework ? Ubuntu firewall (ufw) is not installed. When I install everything in Wheezy, it works. But now, when I install everything in Jessie, and use the same commands as before, it does not work any more. Something changed. I do not have the PulseAudio error in Wheezy.

[NewtownGuy]

Could there be a problem with the video processing in vlc ? My earlier posts above assumed the problem was with pulseaudio because I've seen posts that pulseaudio can use most of the cpu. But in fact, it's vlc that's using 95+% of the cpu, and pulseaudio is not running.

Here, again, is the console text when I run vlc:

root@Z-2:~/B# VLC media player 2.2.1 Terry Pratchett (Weatherwax) (revision 2.2.1-0-ga425c42)
Failed to create secure directory (/run/user/0/pulse): Permission denied
[0159fab8] pulse audio output error: PulseAudio server connection failure: Connection refused
Failed to create secure directory (/run/user/0/pulse): Permission denied
Failed to create secure directory (/run/user/0/pulse): Permission denied
[01525290] core interface error: no suitable interface module
[015148f8] core libvlc error: interface "globalhotkeys,none" initialization failed
[01525290] dbus interface error: Failed to connect to the D-Bus session daemon: Unable to autolaunch a dbus-daemon without a $DISPLAY for X11
[01525290] core interface error: no suitable interface module
[015148f8] core libvlc error: interface "dbus,none" initialization failed
[01525290] dummy interface: using the dummy interface module...
[b3d00508] core input error: Invalid PCR value in ES_OUT_SET_(GROUP_)PCR !
[b3d00508] core input error: ES_OUT_SET_(GROUP_)PCR is called too late (pts_delay increased to 300 ms)
[b3d00508] core input error: ES_OUT_RESET_PCR called

With the exception of the pulseaudio errors, I have seen these errors in Wheezy, so I did not think they were important because it worked.

[Ilya]

I had the same problem with Pulse, but I solved it using --noaudio --no-sout-audio.
ubuntu@petrov:~$ vlc -I dummy video.mp4
--sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,avcodec=m
pga,vb=800,scale=1,ab=128}:rtp{dst=local
host, port=554,sdp=rtsp://localhost:8083
/test.sdp}' --noaudio --no-sout-audio
VLC media player 2.2.2 Weatherwax (revis
ion 2.2.2-0-g6259d80)
[00000000019ac1c8] core interface error:
no suitable interface module
[0000000001898148] core libvlc error: in
terface "globalhotkeys,none" initializat
ion failed
[00000000019ac1c8] dbus interface error:
Failed to connect to the D-Bus session
daemon: Unable to autolaunch a dbus-daem
on without a $DISPLAY for X11
[00000000019ac1c8] core interface error:
no suitable interface module
[0000000001898148] core libvlc error: in
terface "dbus,none" initialization faile
d
[00000000019ac1c8] dummy interface: usin
g the dummy interface module...
[00007f15340012a8] stream_out_rtp stream
out: Consider passing --rtsp-host=IP on
the command line instead.
[00007f1534002798] stream_out_transcode
stream out: input interval 55555 (base 1
)
[00007f1534002798] stream_out_transcode
stream out: output interval 55555 (base
1)

[mafjmafj]

Probably you need
--aout=adummy --vout=dummy --no-dbus
This lets me run cvlc on WSL2 with no X, no pulseaudio and no dbus