based on the idea of stream-tab and inspired by the library puppeteer-stream a webrtc implementation was born.

stream-webrtc-tab

cast one or more web pages to one or more chrome devices programatically (via web rtc stream). Very useful for streaming your dashboards!

• Auto restarts stream
• uses a custom app as webrtc receiver (APP ID 14E2E176)
• can stream one tab to several chromecasts
• allows you to set cookies (e.g. for login or similar things)

Introduction

This app starts a puppeteer browser instance (in headless mode) and streams the screen via webRTC to specified chromecast devices.

To get things started you need:

• one webpage you would like to stream ;)
• a chromecast device in your network

Setup

1. Clone this repository and run npm install
2. run npm run build
3. rename config.example.json to config.json and adapt it to your needs (inside of src directory)
4. start it with npm run start

Config File

Parameter	Description	Default Value
networkInterface	the network address where the server should run on, e.g. 192.168.0.1
browserExecutable	path to a custom chromium/chrome installation, see Puppeteer Launch Options. E.g. you can set it also to your chrome installation. You need to use chrome (not chromium) if you want to use "directRenderMode"	null
chromecastMapping	specifies which device should get which website stream, you can specify the same stream for several devices. E.g. { "Küche": "KitchenScreen", "Inside Sales": "InsideSalesScreen", "Dev": "DevScreen", "Dev 2": "DevScreen" } this field is optional, if default screen is set.
defaultScreen	for not explicitly mapped chromecast devices, which stream should be used
screens	defines which streams / screens are avaialble. bascially what websites you want to stream.
screens.url	the url of the website
screens.name	a name that you use for chromecastMapping and the defaultScreen config
screens.cookies	a name/value pair for setting cookies (optional)

Known Issues

• the resolution for the webrtc screen is limited (due to chromecast limitations it seems), it would be possible technically speaken, but a custom app is not allowed to use the full resolution
• performance in general: this approach needs quite a good server to stream multiple dashboards. the higher the resolution, the more ressources are needed.

CONTRIBUTIONS WELCOME! If you are willing to help, just open a PR or contact me via bug system or [email protected].

Frontend

There is a little status page included, which runs on port 8000 by default. Open http://<networkInterface>:8000/ in your browser.

About the code

There are three things in this repository:

1. a node js server with socket.io support (/src)

   • this handles all the communication (with socket.io) and setup, it also listens for chromecast devices and brings them up.

2. a chrome extension (/extension)

   • this is used to create the webrtc stream source, that is streaming to the deviecs

3. a chromium app (/dashboard-cast-receiver)

   • this is the receiver that is launched on the chromecasts