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How to use VLC to watch m3u8 playlist at URL with custom HTTP referrer and user agent · GitHub

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Original source (gist.github.com)
Tags: video-player vlc playlist m3u8 gist.github.com
Clipped on: 2024-09-17

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Image (Asset 1/22) alt= playlist.m3u

#EXTM3U
#EXTVLCOPT:http-referrer=https://somesketchysisterwebsiteofgivemesketchystream.eu/
#EXTVLCOPT:http-user-agent=Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.15; rv:109.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/117.0
https://givemesomesketchystream.website/hls/tsn/playlist.m3u8

(function (xhr) {
  var XHR = XMLHttpRequest.prototype
  var open = XHR.open
  XHR.open = function (method, url) {
    this._method = method
    this._url = url
    if ((arguments[0] == "GET") && ((arguments[1].indexOf(".mp4") > 0) || (arguments[1].indexOf(".m3u8") > 0)))
      console.log("open: url:", url)
    return open.apply(this, arguments)
  }
})(XMLHttpRequest)

noman-land commented Jul 14, 2024 •
edited

And to tie it all together, here's a bookmarklet that will construct and download a playlist.m3u8 file that can be opened in VLC.

(() => {
  const XHR = XMLHttpRequest.prototype;
  const open = XHR.open;
  let done = false;
  XHR.open = function (...args) {
    const [method, url] = args;
    this._method = method;
    this._url = url;
    if (
      done === false &&
      method === 'GET' &&
      ['.mp4', '.m3u8'].some(type => new URL(url).pathname.endsWith(type))
    ) {
      done = true;
      const playlist = [
        '#EXTM3U',
        `#EXTVLCOPT:http-referrer=${location.toString()}`,
        '#EXTVLCOPT:http-user-agent=Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.15; rv:109.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/117.0',
        url,
      ].join('n');
      const link = document.createElement('a');
      link.setAttribute('download', 'playlist.m3u8');
      link.setAttribute('href', `data:application/vnd.apple.mpegurl;base64,${btoa(playlist)}`);
      link.click();
    }
    return open.apply(this, args);
  };
})();

The yt-dlp generic extractor will be able to handle this and more. If you have both yt-dlp and mpv installed then you can often just do mpv $video_page_url
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