Bug! Bitrate selection is not enforced for series download

[pandlouk]

When selecting the resolution and video bitrate to download series StreamFab does not respect it (e.g. it happens on netflix and disney).
The video episode that was used to detect the bitrates downloads correctly, but all other episodes downloaded the maximum bitrate for the resolution is used.

From the logs it seems that no episodes have the exact same bitrate and since streamfab does not find it, selects the highest bitrate for the selected resolution.

Possible solutions:
1) If bitrate not matched, ask the user with a popup to select the new bitrate.

2) add an option to disable/enable the autoscan. The user plays the episode and selects to scan and download that episode.

3) use the bitrate that is closer to the initial selected.

4) Instead of using absolute numbers to enforce the bitrate assign names to them during the scan.

e.g. an episode on 720p has bitrates 7105, 6501, 6004, 5010, 4110, 3200. Instead of using 4110 to download the low bitrate streamfab could during the scan
assign names from the highest to the lowest
7105 = 1st, 6501 = 2nd , 6004 = 3rd, 5010 = 4th, 4110 = 5th, 3200 = 6th.
the user selects the 4110 = 5th.
So on the next video the has (for 720p) bitrates 7010, 6408, 5950, 4920, 3999, 2998... it will correctly select the 3999 = 5th and won't try to guess the correct bitrate

[jpp72]

When selecting the resolution and video bitrate to download series StreamFab does not respect it (e.g. it happens on netflix and disney).
The video episode that was used to detect the bitrates downloads correctly, but all other episodes downloaded the maximum bitrate for the resolution is used.

From the logs it seems that no episodes have the exact same bitrate and since streamfab does not find it, selects the highest bitrate for the selected resolution.

Possible solutions:
1) If bitrate not matched, ask the user with a popup to select the new bitrate.

2) add an option to disable/enable the autoscan. The user plays the episode and selects to scan and download that episode.

3) use the bitrate that is closer to the initial selected.

4) Instead of using absolute numbers to enforce the bitrate assign names to them during the scan.

e.g. an episode on 720p has bitrates 7105, 6501, 6004, 5010, 4110, 3200. Instead of using 4110 to download the low bitrate streamfab could during the scan
assign names from the highest to the lowest
7105 = 1st, 6501 = 2nd , 6004 = 3rd, 5010 = 4th, 4110 = 5th, 3200 = 6th.
the user selects the 4110 = 5th.
So on the next video the has (for 720p) bitrates 7010, 6408, 5950, 4920, 3999, 2998... it will correctly select the 3999 = 5th and won't try to guess the correct bitrate

Sure there are many many ways to mitigate this issue but only 1 is foolproof:

Let us scan individual episodes from within StreamFab.

Right now, we need to use an external browser to do that. Some providers are easier than others. For example, Netflix is very time consuming. Here are my steps:

• Open StreamFab and make sure monitor clipboard is enabled
• Open regular browser and navigate to Netflix
• Find your show and click the carat to bring up the season selector
• Choose season
• Enable developer tools
• Click the Elements selection tool
• In browser window, select the thumbnail of the episode
• In dev tools, find the video_id in the metadata
• Open Notepad++
• Copy the video id and append it to the end of the string https://www.netflix.com/watch/ in Notepad++
• Copy the full URL to the clipboard
• In StreamFab, click download on the clipboard prompt
• Select the bitrate you want
• Repeat for additional episodes

If we had a simple "Analyze now" button next to each episode in the initial pop-up, those extra 12 steps are not needed.

[MrGrackle]

Sure there are many many ways to mitigate this issue but only 1 is foolproof:

Let us scan individual episodes from within StreamFab.

Right now, we need to use an external browser to do that. Some providers are easier than others. For example, Netflix is very time consuming. Here are my steps:

• Open StreamFab and make sure monitor clipboard is enabled
• Open regular browser and navigate to Netflix
• Find your show and click the carat to bring up the season selector
• Choose season
• Enable developer tools
• Click the Elements selection tool
• In browser window, select the thumbnail of the episode
• In dev tools, find the video_id in the metadata
• Open Notepad++
• Copy the video id and append it to the end of the string https://www.netflix.com/watch/ in Notepad++
• Copy the full URL to the clipboard
• In StreamFab, click download on the clipboard prompt
• Select the bitrate you want
• Repeat for additional episodes

If we had a simple "Analyze now" button next to each episode in the initial pop-up, those extra 12 steps are not needed.

Developer tools? You mean the Dev tools of the browser? If I was using Firefox, I go to Tools, Browser Tools, Web Developer Tools, but then the rest of the page doesn't behave as you suggest.
I have accidentally found the Element Selection tool before by some goofy key combo, but to intentionally find it, no joy.

[Wilson.Wang]

Hi,

We are working on it this week, StreamFab needs to download the closer to the initially selected bitrate for the following episodes.

Wilson

[jpp72]

Developer tools? You mean the Dev tools of the browser? If I was using Firefox, I go to Tools, Browser Tools, Web Developer Tools, but then the rest of the page doesn't behave as you suggest.
I have accidentally found the Element Selection tool before by some goofy key combo, but to intentionally find it, no joy.

Yes the dev tools of the browser. The Element Selection tool looks like this in different browsers:

Edge:



Firefox:



Chrome:

[jpp72]

Hi,

We are working on it this week, StreamFab needs to download the closer to the initially selected bitrate for the following episodes.

Wilson

Although this is better than how it currently works, i hope that doesn't mean they decided NOT to give us a way of analyzing individual episodes...

[MrGrackle]

Hi,

We are working on it this week, StreamFab needs to download the closer to the initially selected bitrate for the following episodes.

Wilson

Although I understand this approach, this does not sound like it is going to properly offer and select the correct available subtitles. The only way to do that is analyze the individual episode.

[MrGrackle]

Yes the dev tools of the browser. The Element Selection tool looks like this in different browsers:

Edge:



Firefox:



Chrome:

I see a lot of titlecard related code, but no actual video_id in the data. When I click on the actual episode thumbnail it refers to Playicon.

Maybe Firefox really is quite different. In your example you're using edge, but I have the same button layout. When I click the element, there are multiple panels to look through, but I do not see a video id.