Hi all,
Jibri is the component that is used for recording, streaming and SIP video gateway.
I’ve spent a whole day trying to get the latest version of Jibri to work with a Jitsi meet instance. Even with some good guides out there I found it challenging as things changed in the latest version of Jibri. Eventually I had to combine knowledge from several guides so I decided to put forth all I found in one guide in the hopes it’ll help others figure out Jibri faster.
Same happened to me before with setting up region routing via OCTO which made write my previous guide (link in the first comment).
So… let’s get to it.
Writing this guide I’m assuming you already have a working instance of Jitsi that includes Jitsi meet, Jicofo, JVB.
In this guide we’ll create a separate server for Jibri and connect it to the Jitsi shard so we won’t infringe on one server’s resources.
With this topology (Jibri on a separate server) you can scale and add as many Jibri servers you need and scale your system up.
Before we begin
Please make sure your Jitsi meet instance has a SSL certificate from a SSL authority like ZeroSSL or Let’sencrypt. Self-signed certificate will not work.
Step 1 setting up servers and domain
Get your servers. Get a Debian 10 machine with 2GB of RAM at least. Through trial an error I tried using a 1 gig machine for recording and the service crashed after half a sec.
Get your domain A record for your Jibri server and point it to your server’s IP. You’ll need it to connect the Jitsi meet servers and Jibri.
In this example I’ll use “mydomain.com” as my domain.
The A record I set up for my Jibri server is “recording.mydomain.com”.
Step 2 installing Jibri and dependencies
First update your server
apt update -y
apt upgrade -y
Set your servers host name to match your domain’s A record.
hostnamectl set-hostname recording.mydomain.com
Configure your hosts file
nano /etc/hosts
Add your domain A record to your hosts file
127.0.1.1 recording.mydomain.com {your machine’s name}
127.0.0.1 localhost recording.mydomain.com
Get JAVA 8 (you have to get JAVA 8. Version 11 and probably higher will not work)
Make sure JAVA is not installed on your machine. Run
java -version
You should get
-bash: java: command not found
Install JAVA 8 and dependencies from AdoptOpenJDK Repo.
apt install wget gnupg software-properties-common -y
wget -qO - https://adoptopenjdk.jfrog.io/adoptopenjdk/api/gpg/key/public | sudo apt-key add -
add-apt-repository --yes https://adoptopenjdk.jfrog.io/adoptopenjdk/deb
apt install adoptopenjdk-8-hotspot -y
Verify JAVA 8 is installed
java -version
You should get
> Openjdk version “1.8.0_242”
> OpenJDK Runtime Environment (AdoptOpenJDK)(build 1.8.0_242-b08)
> OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM (AdoptOpenJDK)(build 25.242-b08, mixed mode)
Now you’ll need to verify the path of your JAVA 8 using
update-alternatives --config java
You should get
There is only one alternative in link group java (providing /usr/bin/java):/usr/lib/jvm/adoptopenjdk-8-hotspot-amd64/bin/java
Nothing to configure.
Now we’ll need to set the JAVA Home Environment Variable by running
nano ~/.bash_profile
Paste this line into the file - (verify the path below is the same as the one shown in the output of the command update-alternatives --config java)
export JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/adoptopenjdk-8-hotspot-amd64/bin/java
Save and exit the file. Now source the file.
source ~/.bash_profile
Run
echo $JAVA_HOME
You should get
/usr/lib/jvm/adoptopenjdk-8-hotspot-amd64/bin/java
Now we’ll install packages we’ll need to make changes to the kernel, in case you’re using a cloud provider like DigitalOcean. They install cloud kernel by default which we’ll need to remove.
Run
apt install linux-image-amd64 unzip ffmpeg curl alsa-utils icewm xdotool xserver-xorg-input-void xserver-xorg-video-dummy -y
when prompt for Keyboard layout choose the one you use and press enter .
Once done, run the following command to see your installed kernels
apt list --installed | grep linux-image-
You should get something similar to this output with your machine’s kernel.
WARNING: apt does not have a stable CLI interface. Use with caution in scripts.
linux-image-4.19.0-10-cloud-amd64/now 4.19.132-1 amd64 [installed,local]
linux-image-4.19.0-13-amd64/stable,now 4.19.160-2 amd64 [installed,automatic]
linux-image-4.19.0-13-cloud-amd64/stable,now 4.19.160-2 amd64[installed,automatic]
linux-image-amd64/stable,now 4.19+105+deb10u8 amd64 [installed]
linux-image-cloud-amd64/stable,now 4.19+105+deb10u8 amd64 [installed]
Remove all the cloud kernels (type in the version of your kernel as shown in previous output.
apt remove linux-image-cloud-amd64 linux-image-4.19.0-10-cloud-amd64 linux-image-4.19.0-13-cloud-amd64
When prompt choose Yes then (pay attention - the question is if to abort or not) choose No
Kernels have been removed, You can verify by running the following command again.
apt list --installed | grep linux-image-
Reboot system.
systemctl reboot
Configure Alsa and loopback device to start on boot
echo “snd_aloop” >> /etc/modules
modprobe snd_aloop
Verify the module is loaded
lsmod | grep snd_aloop
You should get
snd_aloop 28672 1
snd_pcm 114688 1 snd_aloop
snd 94208 5 snd_timer,snd_aloop,snd_pcm
Get Google Chrome on your server. This will allow Jibri to join your conference as an invisible user and record it.
curl -o - https://dl-ssl.google.com/linux/linux_signing_key.pub | apt-key add
echo deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome.list
apt update
apt install google-chrome-stable -y
CHROME_DRIVER_VERSION=
curl -sS chromedriver.storage.googleapis.com/LATEST_RELEASE
wget -N http://chromedriver.storage.googleapis.com/$CHROME_DRIVER_VERSION/chromedriver_linux64.zip -P ~/
unzip ~/chromedriver_linux64.zip -d ~/
rm ~/chromedriver_linux64.zip
sudo mv -f ~/chromedriver /usr/local/bin/chromedriver
sudo chmod 0755 /usr/local/bin/chromedriver
Turn off warnings about scripted control in Chrome:
mkdir -p /etc/opt/chrome/policies/managed
echo ‘{ “CommandLineFlagSecurityWarningsEnabled”: false }’ >>/etc/opt/chrome/policies/managed/managed_policies.json
Install Jibri
wget -qO - https://download.jitsi.org/jitsi-key.gpg.key | sudo apt-key add -
sh -c “echo ‘deb https://download.jitsi.org stable/’ > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/jitsi-stable.list”
apt update
apt install jibri -y
Add Jibri’s user account to the necessary groups
usermod -aG adm,audio,video,plugdev jibri
That’s it, Jibri is all set. Now let’s connect the servers.
Step 3 connect the servers
On your Jicofo server we’ll need to make changes to the Prosody config file. We’ll add a MUC (Multi User Component) and the Jibri’s domain A record we created earlier.
cd into the folder
cd /etc/prosody/conf.avail/
Run
ls
and see what’s the name of your lua configuration file.
Open the configuration file
nano /etc/prosody/conf.avail/meet.mydomain.com.cfg.lua
Please note:
meet.mydomain.com → is your Jicofo server.
recording.mydomain.com → is your Jibri server.
You’ll get the config file with all Prosody’s configurations. Go to the end of that file and past the two parts one under the other.
(Please note the first line needs to be commented out using two dashes “–”)
– internal muc component, meant to enable pools of jibri and jigasi clients
Component “internal.auth.meet.mydomain.com” “muc”
modules_enabled = {
“ping”;
}
storage = “memory”
muc_room_cache_size = 1000
VirtualHost “recording.mydomain.com”
modules_enabled = {
“ping”;
}
authentication = “internal_plain”
Save and exit. Go back into the file using
nano /etc/prosody/conf.avail/meet.mydomain.com.cfg.lua
Check if the quotation marks are shown properly and the values are in order. like “ping” at the bottom. If not mantually correct the file and save.
Reload Prosody
/etc/init.d/prosody reload
Create the necessary users for Jibri on Prosody. Make sure you write down the passwords you set for the users. Change the passwords below as you see fit.
prosodyctl register jibri auth.meet.mydomain.com {JibriPassword}
prosodyctl register recorder recording.mydomain.com {RecorderPassword}
Configuring Jicofo, open
nano /etc/jitsi/jicofo/sip-communicator.properties
Add the following lines
org.jitsi.jicofo.jibri.BREWERY=JibriBrewery@internal.auth.meet.myfirewall.org
org.jitsi.jicofo.jibri.PENDING_TIMEOUT=90
Reload Jicofo
/etc/init.d/jicofo reload
Configure Jitsi Meet, open
nano /etc/jitsi/meet/meet.mydomain.com-config.js
Search with Ctrl+w for the following options - uncomment and set to ‘true’
If you want to enable file recording
fileRecordingsEnabled: true,
If you want to enable live streaming
liveStreamingEnabled: true,
Add this line under one of the mentioned above options
hiddenDomain: ‘recording.mydomain.com’,
Save and exit the file.
Now let’s verify the options to record and stream are shown in the Jitsi menu.
For that open
nano /usr/share/jitsi-meet/interface_config.js
Under TOOLBAR_BUTTONS (run a search for it using Ctrl+w) locate ‘recording’ and ‘livestreaming’.
If they’re there you’re all set.
Configure your servers’ firewall to allow TCP 5222. Run
ufw allow 5222/tcp
And open the port on your external firewall as well.
Jibri’s configuration -
On your Jibri server we need to create the folder to store the recordings
mkdir /recordings
chown jibri:jitsi /recordings
Now configure Jibri’s configuration file, open
nano /etc/jitsi/jibri/config.json
You’ll see the file is empty - that’s because this type of config is considered legacy but Jibri still check for it and run it.
Paste this file content - make sure to change the passwords below with the passwords we previously set for Prosody:
{
"recording_directory":"/recordings",
"finalize_recording_script_path": "/path/to/finalize_recording.sh",
"xmpp_environments": [
{
"name": "prod environment",
"xmpp_server_hosts": [
"meet.mydomain.com"
],
"xmpp_domain": "meet.mydomain.com",
"control_login": {
// The domain to use for logging in
"domain": "auth.meet.mydomain.com",
// The credentials for logging in
"username": "jibri",
"password": "{JibrisPassword}"
},
"control_muc": {
"domain": "internal.auth.meet.mydomain.com",
"room_name": "JibriBrewery",
"nickname": "jibri-nickname"
},
"call_login": {
"domain": "recording.mydomain.com",
"username": "recorder",
"password": "{RecordersPassword}"
},
"room_jid_domain_string_to_strip_from_start": "conference.",
"usage_timeout": "0"
}
]
}
Restart Jibri
service jibri restart
Check Jibri connected to your instance of Jitsi.
nano /var/log/jitsi/jibri/log.0.txt
Look for the line
2021-01-13 17:09:23.002 INFO: [25] org.jitsi.xmpp.mucclient.MucClient.log() Joined MUC: jibribrewery@internal.auth.meet.mydomain.com
Success!
If not:
- Circle back make sure all the characters saved properly.
- Verify no firewalls blocking your way.
- Restart all servers
service prosody restart
service jicofo resraet
service jibri restart
I wrote this guide then followed it myself. The only issue I noticed is weird characters when copying from the forum. Always verify your files changes.
That’s it - and very exciting. Open a Jitsi conference and click on start recording on the menu. Recordings will be saved in the recording folder we created before.