Pillarbox Web: GoogleCastSender

This plugin integrates Google Cast functionality into a video.js player, allowing users to stream video content to a Chromecast device. It supports subtitle and audio track selection. It also allows for custom source resolution, which is useful for integrations that play custom sources based on IDs or other middleware logic. Finally, it also supports live streams with DVR capabilities.

Requirements

To use this plugin, you need the following installed on your system:

• Node.js

Quick Start

To get started with this plugin, install it through the following command:

npm install --save video.js @srgssr/google-cast-sender

Once the player is installed you can activate the plugin as follows:

import videojs from 'video.js';
import '@srgssr/google-cast-sender';

const player = videojs('my-player', {
  techOrder: ['chromecast', 'html5'],
  plugins: {
    googleCastSender: true
  }
});

To apply the default styling, add the following line to your CSS file:

@import "@srgssr/google-cast-sender/dist/google-cast-sender.min.css";

API Documentation

Options

The component's behavior can be customized by passing options during player initialization under the googleCastSender key:

| Option | Type | Default | Description | |-----------------------------|------------|----------------------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | androidReceiverCompatible | boolean | true | Indicates whether the receiver application is compatible with Android TV devices. | | autoJoinPolicy | string | chrome.cast.AutoJoinPolicy.TAB_AND_ORIGIN_SCOPED | The policy for automatically joining a Cast session. See AutoJoinPolicy docs. | | enableDefaultCastLauncher | boolean | true | Indicates whether the default GoogleCastLauncher component should be displayed in the controlBar. |
| receiverApplicationId | string | chrome.cast.media.DEFAULT_MEDIA_RECEIVER_APP_ID | The ID of the receiver application to use. The default receiver does not handle DRM content. | | script | object | { id: 'gstatic_cast_sender', src: '...' } | Configuration for the Google Cast sender script. | | sourceResolver | function | undefined | A function to resolve the source to be played on the cast device. |

Example:

const player = new videojs('my-player', {
  techOrder: ['chromecast', 'html5'],
  plugins: {
    googleCastSender: {
      receiverApplicationId: 'YOUR_APP_ID',
      sourceResolver: (source) => {
        // modify the source for the cast device
        return {
          ...source,
          src: source.src.replace('example.com', 'cast.example.com')
        };
      }
    }
  }
});

Events

The following event is emitted by the Google cast sender plugin:

| Event | Description | |----------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | statechanged | Triggered whenever there is a change in the cast state or availability. This event provides an object containing the properties that have changed, allowing you to react to these changes. |

Event Payload:

| Property | Type | Description | |-----------|--------|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | changes | Object | An object containing the properties that have changed. Possible keys are sessionState. |

Example Usage:

player.googleCastSender().on('statechanged', ({ changes }) => {
  if ('sessionState' in changes) {
    // React to 'sessionState' changes
  }
});

User Interface

The plugin provides two ways to integrate a Cast button into your player.

1. Chromecast Launcher (default)

This is the standard Google Cast launcher wrapped as a Video.js component. It is plug-and-play and automatically manages Cast sessions.

• Pros: Zero configuration required.
• Cons: Limited customization and not fully accessible.

Disable the default launcher

To disable the default launcher simply use the enableDefaultCastLauncher property:

const player = new videojs('my-player', {
  techOrder: ['chromecast', 'html5'],
  plugins: {
    googleCastSender: {
      enableDefaultCastLauncher: false
    }
  }
});

2. Chromecast Button (customizable)

import "@srgssr/google-cast-sender/button";

This is a custom button that extends the shared SvgButton component. the Chromecast button manages its own icon depending on the current cast session state.

By default, the component defines two icons:

• idleIcon is shown (no active cast session).
• activeIcon is shown (cast session started or resumed).

The component listens to cast session state changes and automatically toggles the displayed icon. You can override these icons via player options if you want to customize them.

Options

| Option | Type | Default | Description | |---------------------|-------------------------------------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | idleIcon | { icon: SVGElement\|string\|URL, iconName: string } | { iconName: 'google-cast', icon: googleCastIcon } | The icon shown when no cast session is active. Accepts the same formats as SvgButton.icon. | | activeIcon | { icon: SVGElement\|string\|URL, iconName: string } | { iconName: 'google-cast-active', icon: googleCastIconActive } | The icon shown when a cast session is active (started or resumed). | | endSessionOnClick | Boolean | false | If enabled, clicking the chromecast button will end the current session without displaying the session menu. |

[!IMPORTANT] Unlike SvgButton, the top-level icon/iconName options will be overridden automatically by the component depending on cast state.

Example

import idleIcon from './cast-idle.svg?raw';
import activeIcon from './cast-active.svg?raw';

const player = videojs('player', {
  techOrder: ['chromecast', 'html5'],
  controlBar: {
    googleCastButton: {
      idleIcon: {
        icon: idleIcon,
        iconName: 'custom-idle'
      },
      activeIcon: {
        icon: activeIcon,
        iconName: 'custom-active'
      }
    }
  },
  plugins: {
    googleCastSender: {
      enableDefaultCastLauncher: false
    }
  }
});

Placement & Removal

Since the GoogleCastButton component is automatically injected into the control bar, you can modify its placement like you would do with any other control bar component:

• Disable via options:

  const player = videojs('my-player', {
    controlBar: {
      googleCastButton: false
    }
  });

• Reorder manually: update the controlBar.children array with your desired button order.

The default styles are included in the plugin’s CSS.

Contributing

For detailed contribution guidelines, refer to our Contributing guide. Please adhere to the specified guidelines.

Setting up a development server

Start the development server:

npm run start

This will start the server on http://localhost:4200. Open this URL in your browser to view the demo page.

The video player (player) and the Pillarbox library (pillarbox) are exposed on the window object, making it easy to access and manipulate from the browser's developer console for debugging.

Available URL parameters

The demo page supports several URL parameters that modify the behavior of the video player:

• debug: Set this to enable debugging mode.
• ilHost: Specifies the host for the data provider.
• language: Sets the language for the player interface.
• urn: Specifies the URN of the video to load. Default is urn:rts:video:14683290.

You can combine parameters in the URL like so:

http://localhost:4200/?language=fr&urn=urn:rts:video:14318206

Known issues

• Chromecast default button accessibility properties
• Live stream resume playback on local player

Licensing

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for more details.