Invalid data

[mrx2024]

Your question

Hi, I used the plugin previously on a login site that I'm a member of and everything was fine before, but now I can't download anything without an error message coming up.

I'm on v8.2.0.23, mac 10.14.6 using Chrome. It asked me to update the companion app and I just did to v2.0.17.

Video DownloadHelper
Version 8.2.0.23
Browser locale: en-GB

Platform Mac x86-64
Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/116.0.0.0 Safari/537.36

The extension recognises the video but when I click to download, the same error message comes up that 'the host is down':

[tcp @ 0x7f892bf005c0] Connection to tcp://www.pianogroove.com:443 failed: Host is down
[in#0 @ 0x7f892be005c0] Error opening input: Host is down
Error opening input file https://www.pianogroove.com/?stream_loader=https%3A%2F%2Fpianogroove-com-encoded-vids-coconut-fra1.fra1.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com%2FWebsite-Tour-Orientation%2FHome-Page-Explainer%2Findex.m3u8&pl=3&expire=1708159749&track=4938&signature=d43b61cca136c6c134b4bc9f252c6b57.
Error opening input files: Host is down

I've tried going to a few public sites to get a public link I can share with you but I can't find one that the plugin picks up on.

I've never had an error message before and everything's always run fine up until now.

Addon & CoApp version and details

No response

[paulrouget]

Addon & CoApp version and details
No response

I'm missing this part.

We can't help you without that https://github.com/aclap-dev/video-downloadhelper/wiki/Where-can-I-find-my-versions%3F

---

Also, double checking, do you use a Mac antivirus or a firewall?

[GrampaWildWilly]

@paulrouget He's got that information in his post. It's just not in the format you might be expecting.

[paulrouget]

No I don't know which version of the coapp he's using (there are multiple flavors of the same version).

[GrampaWildWilly]

Oh right. He said he is on Mac 10.14.6. That means he needs the other CoApp 2.0.17 specifically for that version of Mac. I notice that his settings page that he posted a screenshot of below says it's verifying the CoApp. Maybe he needs to get the other CoApp 2.0.17.

[GrampaWildWilly]

For what it's worth, I just went to your pianogroove site & it's up. But like you said, it's a subscription site so I couldn't get in & look at anything. Well, I clicked on something & it took me to this page:

https://www.pianogroove.com/join/

There happened to be a video on that page, a short teaser of 2:30. Actually, there's a bunch of videos on that page but the teaser is the first one. I managed to download the 1920x1080 variant of that without any problem. I'm running Windows 11 Pro 64-bit version 23H2 build 22631.3155, Firefox 122.0.1 64-bit, licensed VDH 8.2.0.23a1 beta, CoApp 2.0.17. Different operating system, different browser, possibly different VDH (not sure), same CoApp. So this doesn't seem to be an issue with the site. I don't know how representative of paid content this teaser might be so this test has a bunch of maybes & ifs with it.

Let's try something different. Try this one:

https://www.medici.tv/en/operas/tchaikovsky-queen-of-spades-benedict-andrews-aziz-shokhakimov-asmik-grigorian-bayerische-staatsoper

That's also a membership site but that page has a universally available teaser of duration 0:36 on it. Are you able to download that?

[mrx2024]

I get an error message when trying to download the free trailer video.

I also tried to download the link you sent but it doesn't recognise it:

[mrx2024]

Thank you for you fast responses. I can't copy the information to my clipboard so I took a screenshot.

I do have a firewall but I have just enabled all Chrome processes. It helped in that it starts to run but now there's a different error message:

[hls @ 0x7fbf91504ac0] Error when loading first segment 'https://pianogroove-com-encoded-vids-coconut-fra1.fra1.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/Jazz-Piano-Foundations/1-Major-Scales/media-3/segment-0.ts?X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Credential=KBGW2JT4XWKQ3NFEXFIX%2F20240215%2Fams3%2Fs3%2Faws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20240215T103621Z&X-Amz-Expires=14400&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&X-Amz-Signature=817f9720095ca95bb14fd479c87c45d8202e1bc555d72cf6626ffccbb47659af'
[in#0 @ 0x7fbf915042c0] Error opening input: Invalid data found when processing input
Error opening input file https://www.pianogroove.com/?stream_loader=https%3A%2F%2Fpianogroove-com-encoded-vids-coconut-fra1.fra1.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com%2FJazz-Piano-Foundations%2F1-Major-Scales%2Findex.m3u8&pl=3&expire=1708166175&track=4938&signature=ad8da93098d560ba41b57fe0482055a7.
Error opening input files: Invalid data found when processing input

[GrampaWildWilly]

Licenses are for life & on whatever browser you bought it for on however many computers you own or will ever own. You might end up locking your license but that is supposed to trigger an E-mail that tells you what to do. I have recently had to do that myself & it worked fine, but that's for Firefox. I can only hope it works the same for Chrome.

There is a repository of CoApps here: https://github.com/mi-g/vdhcoapp/releases/. I think there are versions for older Macs on most of the recent versions. As for the browser extension itself, the beta versions used to be kept here: https://www.downloadhelper.net/firefox/betas. But beginning around 8.1.5.0a1 beta, that archive stopped being updated. Plus that's for Firefox anyway. There has never been an archive of backlevel VDH versions, neither general availability nor beta, for Chrome (nor Edge, but that's not relevant here). The general availability & beta versions for Chrome (and Edge) have always been housed on the Google Chrome web store (& Microsoft Edge web store), & they don't keep archives. For Firefox, the Mozilla add-on repository does have a few backlevel versions of the VDH browser add-on. Those would all be what were general availability versions. Clearly, that wouldn't include all the 8.2.x versions because those have all been betas.

N0. Wait. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/video-downloadhelper/versions/. That small archive has been removed. In fact, I've just spent about a half hour doing searches for VDH on the Mozilla site & can't find VDH. The VDH page is here, https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/video-downloadhelper/, but I found that by starting at https://www.downloadhelper.net/. I think Mozilla might be shadow banning us.

Now, is it worth trying some backlevel software? Beats me. You know I don't work for VDH. I'm just another user. Plus I know Firefox on Windows & nothing else. From where I sit, it's your call. Paul may have other ideas.

After your removal & reinstall, is the name of the CoApp any different in that applications folder on your Mac?

[mrx2024]

Wow, thank you so much for all of your help. I feel like we're so close but I don't know what to do to get over the last hurdle.

The name stayed the same when I reinstalled. I followed your links and I tried installing two previous coapps and restarted the mac each time and then I tried adding the Chrome beta but it keeps showing the same error as the stable version - "Error when loading first segment"

Not sure what else to do at this point. Might try adding the licence to chrome on another laptop and see what happens.

[GrampaWildWilly]

There's a lot of generalized complaining in here about the current release. You can see it if you read the most recent dozen or so discussions in the forum. Maybe you're just hitting one of the problems that's supposed to be resolved in the next version. By all appearances, Paul is feverishly trying to fix this. It's probably worth trying that whenever he gets it finished & ready for us all to install. I have to admit defeat here. If I knew anything about Mac, I might have some brilliant ideas. But I don't. So you'll have to look for brilliance elsewhere.

[GrampaWildWilly]

If you're willing to use something other than VDH to get your content, at least for the moment, I might be able to help you with that. I see in your Hit Details you posted above that the master manifest is an m3u8. That means your pianogroove content is probably available as standard HLS streaming content. I could suggest an alternative to VDH if you try this:

Go to one of your pianogroove pages & get the Hit Details on the highest resolution variant VDH displays.
Copy to your clipboard the URL shown in the masterManifest of the Hit Details.
Execute ffprobe providing it one parameter. That would be the URL you just copied pasted from the clipboard. That should look something like this:
ffprobe "URL"
The quotation marks are required in Windows for anything that contains such weird characters as : / ? & %, all of which appear in the URL in your image above. I don't know how the Mac command processor differs from Windows. You'd have to know this. I'm assuming there's something in Mac for executing commands at a command prompt. Do you call it Terminal? Something like that?

There is an ffprobe & an ffmpeg included with the CoApp. Let's try to use those & see if we can get it to work. Execute that ffprobe with the URL as input & post the output it generates here. We can take it from there.

[mrx2024]

I tried installing VDH and the licence on a new macbook but it said something about a disconnected port and it wouldn't let me download.

I followed your instructions but tbh its been a long time since I used terminal and it looks over my head right now. I guess I don't have much of a choice but to wait and see if a fix is coming at some point.

Much respect to you for trying to help out @GrampaWildWilly. It's much appreciated.

[paulrouget]

Is there a MKV option, or only MP4?

[GrampaWildWilly]

Didn't show any MKV for me. Medici doesn't generally offer MKVs, only MP4s.

[mrx2024]

I only see mp4