The VideoLAN Forums

Please can someone tell me how to create this BBC News24 stream as a shortcut which opens directly and specifically in VLC (as opposed to WMP, Real Player etc.)
To be clear, I'll paint a picture:
I am looking at my Windows desktop and I fancy watching BBC News24. So I click on my little shortcut which I made earlier and it opens VideoLAN, Which immediately starts the stream.

I already have my URL and my .ICO(just for fun ) so all I need now is the extra info which will tell my PC to open it ONLY with VideoLAN


BTW, here is the stream URL: http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/tvseq ... s24_bb.asx

Create a new shortcut which would initially just open VLC, then right click it, hit Properties then add "http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/tvseq ... s24_bb.asx" (including quotes) to the end of the 'Target' parameter.
So, if VLC was installed to the default path on an x64 machine, the final shortcut would look something similar to:
Should do the trick.

Create a new shortcut which would initially just open VLC, then right click it, hit Properties then add "http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/tvseq ... s24_bb.asx" (including quotes) to the end of the 'Target' parameter.
So, if VLC was installed to the default path on an x64 machine, the final shortcut would look something similar to:

Code: Select all

"C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\vlc.exe" "http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/tvseq/n24/bb/wm/video/news24_bb.asx"

Should do the trick.

Excellent!!! Thanks very much!!! That's what I thought I should do but I didnt know about the "quote" marks. Now, do you know how to get the shortcut to open VLC with specific preferences just for this particular stream? For example, I might want it to open in half size with the volume on mute... and so on.

Mute, half size.

For more details, see this Wiki entry on Command Line help

Code: Select all

"C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\vlc.exe" "http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/tvseq/n24/bb/wm/video/news24_bb.asx" --volume=0 --zoom=0.5

Mute, half size.

For more details, see this Wiki entry on Command Line help

Thanks very much. I'll check it out now! Just out of interest, can most of the stuff i've been talking about be created just by tweaking the target? Sorry for being so trivial but I'm a highly skilled "everyday PC user" and now just want to try and push myself to the next level. I cannot even tell you how much help these two snippets of advice I got here are!! Thanks again!!

Of course, just add the desired command effects to the end of the "Target" attribute of the shortcut (after the address of the video).
If, for example, you wanted full volume instead of no volume, you could add: to the end of the target. In the above example, the entire target attribute would end up looking like this: Hope that helps.