The following instructions enable using Live555 Media Server as a RTSP simulator in a docker container.

Note: References to third-party software in this repo are for informational and convenience purposes only. Microsoft does not endorse nor provide rights for the third-party software. For more information on third-party software please see Live555 Media Server.

1. Install Docker on your machine
2. Install a RTSP player such as VLC Media Player on your machine. This will be useful for testing.

Build the container image (should take around 10 minutes or less) by running the following docker command from a command window in that directory

    docker build . -t live555:latest

The build may generate warnings, but they should not prevent the server from working.

Run the container using the following docker command

    docker run -p 554:554  -i live555:latest

Test the stream using a RTSP media player such as VLC media player

    vlc rtsp://localhost:554/media/win10.mkv

You can also run the container while mounting the /media folder in the container to a local media folder (e.g. /home/xyz/Videos/) on your host machine

    # This exposes the 554 port on the host and mounts the local media folder to the /media folder in the server
    docker run -p 554:554 -v <local_media_folder>:/live/mediaServer/media -i live555:latest 

Test the stream

    vlc rtsp://localhost:554/media/<my-media-file>

my-media-file refers to a media file in your local_media_folder.

Note that only file formats supported by Live555 will work. Further, in order to use Live555 with Live Video Analytics, we recommend that you use an MKV, MPEG-TS, or MPG file with H.264 video (and, optionally, AAC audio).

Another option is to run the container on Azure Container Instance while mounting the /media folder inte container to Azure Files Share

#set script parameters
resource_group=change_to_your_resource_group_name
location=change_to_your_azure_region
storage_account_name=change_to_your_account_name

#create azure storage account
az storage account create -n $storage_account_name -g $resource_group -l $location

#get storage primary key
storage_key=$(az storage account keys list -n $storage_account_name --query [0].value
 -o tsv)

#create file share
az storage share create -n media --account-name $storage_account_name

#create container instance mounted to your azure files share
container_name=change_to_your_container_name
az container create \
    --resource-group $resource_group \
    --name $container_name \
    --image mcr.microsoft.com/lva-utilities/rtspsim-live555:1.2 \
    --dns-name-label $container_name \
    --ports 554 \
    --azure-file-volume-account-name $storage_account_name \
    --azure-file-volume-account-key $storage_key \
    --azure-file-volume-share-name media \
    --azure-file-volume-mount-path /live/mediaServer/media \
    --query ipAddress.fqdn \
    -o tsv

after running the last command you should see your container FQDN with the following format: "yourcontainerdns.yourregion.azurecontainer.io".

upload some video files into the file share using Azure Storage Explorer / azcopy / Azure portal.

open vlc player with the following uri:

rtsp:https://<container_fqdn>:554/media/

example:

rtsp:https://yourcontainerdns.yourregion.azurecontainer.io:554/media/camera-300s.mkv

Once you are done, stop the docker container by executing the following commands

    docker ps -a

This will enumerate all the containers. Copy the container id of the live555:latest container

    docker stop <container-id>

Once stopped, you can remove the container with the following command

    docker rm <container-id>

Follow the instructions in Push and Pull Docker images - Azure Container Registry to save your image in your private Azure container registry for later use on another machine.

Note: In the next section, you will be using Azure portal in order to deploy the container as an IoT Edge module. The Azure portal today requires you to provide a user name as password to enable IoT Edge to connect to your container registry. A quick way to accomplish this is by creating an Admin Account for your container registry.

Follow the instructions in Deploy module from Azure portal to deploy the container image (in your private registry) as an IoT Edge module (use the IoT Edge module option). In step 5 of this section, use the admin account credentials created in the previous section.

To play videos from an RTSP client, you will need to bind the container port to a host port and mount a local media folder to the /media folder. You can do this by specifying the following in the "Container Create Options"

    {
        "HostConfig": {
            "Binds": [
                "<local_media_folder>:/live/mediaServer/media"
            ],
           "PortBindings": {
                "554/tcp": [
                    {
                        "HostPort": "5001"
                    }
                ]
           }
        }
     }

Note: after you have reviewed and created the IoT Edge module, on your Edge device, you can run "sudo docker ps -a" to list the available containers. The "live555" container should be in that list, and it should have an entry such as "0.0.0.0:5001->554/tcp" under the PORTS column.

You can now play a video file, in the appropriate format, (located in local_media_folder) on the IoT Edge device using a RTSP media player such as VLC media player

    vlc rtsp://localhost:5001/media/<my-media>