colinkeenan / silentcast Goto Github PK

Thanks for the great tool 👍 ! Also Merry Christmas 🎄

After testing the tool it creates the files I requested (.mp4 & .gif), but also a file called ffcom as well as leaving temp.mkv

#!/bin/bash
# Output from genffcom for screencast#=1

printf "Click OK when ready to start recording.

To Stop Recording:
Click the stop icon in the Notification Area" \
| yad ---text-info --on-top --center --width=440 --height=280 --wrap --title="Get Ready" --window-icon="/home/lewis/.silentcast/record1".svg --text="\
<b>SILENTCAST 1                </b><span font='24' color='green'>1</span>"
(($? != 0)) && exit 1 #Cancel was clicked

ffmpeg -f x11grab -s 732x523 -r 8 -i :0+782,24 -c:v ffvhuff -an -y /home/lewis/silentcast/temp.mkv & ffmpegPID=$!
if [ "$XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP" = "Unity" -o "$XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP" = "Pantheon" -o "$KDE_SESSION_VERSION" = "5" ]
then
        echo "Unity, Pantheon, or Plasma 5 detected. Switching indicators..."
	python ./unity_indicator.py 1
else
    yad --notification --image="./stop1.svg" --text="1"
fi
kill $ffmpegPID
wait # make sure ffmpeg is killed before exit or else can get stuck here

Any way to auto-clean up these files?

: The repository 'http://ppa.launchpad.net/sethj/silentcast/ubuntu bionic Release' does not have a Release file.

Running silentcast on Ubuntu 16.04 yields

The error comes from this piece:

  if (!presets_file) {
    //can't open presets file so show error and use defaults
    char message[PATH_MAX + 100] = { 0 };
    strcpy (message, "<");
    strcat (message, filename);
    strcat (message, "> Using default list of sizes for middle-click drag");
    show_perror (widget, message);
    for (i = 0; i < PRESET_N; i++) presets[i] = preset_defaults[i]; 
    previous[0] = 0; previous[1] = 0;  
  } else { 
    //succesfully opened presets file so read it
    for (i = 0; i < PRESET_N + 2; i++) { //preset file also has previous rectangle geometry
      int ret = fscanf (presets_file, "%lf", &read_preset);
      if (ret == 1){
        if (i < PRESET_N) presets[i] = read_preset; //reading preset
        else previous [i - PRESET_N] = read_preset; //reading previous rectangle geometry
      } else if (errno != 0) {
        show_perror (widget, "fscanf");  // <<<<< HERE BE DRAGONS
        break;
      } else if (ret == EOF) {
        break;
      }
    }

So apparently it's an issue with some presets_file.

The program works (more or less smoothly) regardless, but the message is at least confusing.

great little tool. the only issue i'm seeing is that the box i draw on the screen does not accurately reflect the area being recorded when I'm using a 4k screen. Any idea how to remedy something like this? Thank you for your time.

When I run the program it runs as normal, but I manage to cancel it using "p" on the keyboard so I have to do pkill -f ffmpeg, the program then seems to stop without rendering the gif and the outputs shown are only 'temp.mvk' and the log, when I reinstall it and open it, it seems to render it and show it, but the problem is repeated, and if I open it again it's like I had several instances.

Image when reopening the program

• Arch linux
• AwesomeWM

ffmpeg started on 2023-04-07 at 21:44:04
Report written to "ffcom.log"
Log level: 32
Command line:
/usr/bin/ffmpeg -f x11grab -s 1048x656 -r 8 -i :0+720,162 -c:v ffvhuff -an -y temp.mkv
ffmpeg version n6.0 Copyright (c) 2000-2023 the FFmpeg developers
built with gcc 12.2.1 (GCC) 20230201
configuration: --prefix=/usr --disable-debug --disable-static --disable-stripping --enable-amf --enable-avisynth --enable-cuda-llvm --enable-lto --enable-fontconfig --enable-gmp --enable-gnutls --enable-gpl --enable-ladspa --enable-libaom --enable-libass --enable-libbluray --enable-libbs2b --enable-libdav1d --enable-libdrm --enable-libfreetype --enable-libfribidi --enable-libgsm --enable-libiec61883 --enable-libjack --enable-libjxl --enable-libmfx --enable-libmodplug --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libopencore_amrnb --enable-libopencore_amrwb --enable-libopenjpeg --enable-libopenmpt --enable-libopus --enable-libpulse --enable-librav1e --enable-librsvg --enable-libsoxr --enable-libspeex --enable-libsrt --enable-libssh --enable-libsvtav1 --enable-libtheora --enable-libv4l2 --enable-libvidstab --enable-libvmaf --enable-libvorbis --enable-libvpx --enable-libwebp --enable-libx264 --enable-libx265 --enable-libxcb --enable-libxml2 --enable-libxvid --enable-libzimg --enable-nvdec --enable-nvenc --enable-opencl --enab libavutil 58. 2.100 / 58. 2.100
libavcodec 60. 3.100 / 60. 3.100
libavformat 60. 3.100 / 60. 3.100
libavdevice 60. 1.100 / 60. 1.100
libavfilter 9. 3.100 / 9. 3.100
libswscale 7. 1.100 / 7. 1.100
libswresample 4. 10.100 / 4. 10.100
libpostproc 57. 1.100 / 57. 1.100
[x11grab @ 0x55d06c2c42c0] Stream #0: not enough frames to estimate rate; consider increasing probesize
Input #0, x11grab, from ':0+720,162':
Duration: N/A, start: 1680921845.120965, bitrate: 175996 kb/s
Stream #0:0: Video: rawvideo (BGR[0] / 0x524742), bgr0, 1048x656, 175996 kb/s, 8 fps, 1000k tbr, 1000k tbn
Stream mapping:
Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (rawvideo (native) -> ffvhuff (native))
Press [q] to stop, [?] for help
Output #0, matroska, to 'temp.mkv':
Metadata:
encoder : Lavf60.3.100
Stream #0:0: Video: ffvhuff (FFVH / 0x48564646), rgb24(pc, gbr/unknown/unknown, progressive), 1048x656, q=2-31, 200 kb/s, 8 fps, 1k tbn
Metadata:
encoder : Lavc60.3.100 ffvhuff
frame= 0 fps=0.0 q=0.0 size= 0kB time=-577014:32:22.77 bitrate= -0.0kbits/s speed=N/A
frame= 5 fps=0.0 q=-0.0 size= 2304kB time=00:00:00.62 bitrate=30199.0kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 10 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 6400kB time=00:00:01.25 bitrate=41943.0kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 15 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 10496kB time=00:00:01.87 bitrate=45857.7kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 19 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 13568kB time=00:00:02.37 bitrate=46799.6kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 24 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 17664kB time=00:00:03.00 bitrate=48234.5kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 28 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 20736kB time=00:00:03.50 bitrate=48534.1kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 33 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 24832kB time=00:00:04.12 bitrate=49314.8kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 38 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 28928kB time=00:00:04.75 bitrate=49890.1kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 43 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 33024kB time=00:00:05.37 bitrate=50331.6kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 50 fps=8.2 q=-0.0 Lsize= 40567kB time=00:00:06.12 bitrate=54256.7kbits/s speed= 1x
video:40564kB audio:0kB subtitle:0kB other streams:0kB global headers:0kB muxing overhead: 0.007018%
Exiting normally, received signal 2.
kB time=00:00:06.75 bitrate=36039.9kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 58 fps=8.1 q=-0.0 size= 33280kB time=00:00:07.25 bitrate=37604.1kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 63 fps=8.1 q=-0.0 size= 37888kB time=00:00:07.87 bitrate=39413.1kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 67 fps=8.1 q=-0.0 size= 41472kB time=00:00:08.37 bitrate=40565.8kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 72 fps=8.1 q=-0.0 size= 45824kB time=00:00:09.00 bitrate=41710.0kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 77 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 50176kB time=00:00:09.62 bitrate=42705.6kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 81 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 53760kB time=00:00:10.12 bitrate=43496.5kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 86 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 58112kB time=00:00:10.75 bitrate=44284.0kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 90 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 61696kB time=00:00:11.25 bitrate=44925.7kbits/s speed=1.01x
frame= 95 fps=8.0 q=-0.0 size= 66048kB time=00:00:11.87 bitrate=45563.4kbits/s speed= 1x
frame= 98 fps=8.1 q=-0.0 Lsize= 70719kB time=00:00:12.12 bitrate=47779.6kbits/s speed= 1x
video:70714kB audio:0kB subtitle:0kB other streams:0kB global headers:0kB muxing overhead: 0.006995%
Exiting normally, received signal 2.

I'm having issues getting silentcast to work on my Arch installation running Awesome wm. I was going to open an issue with the output I'm getting, but redirecting stderr doesn't seem to output errors to a file. When I run: silentcast 2>&1 > silentcast.txt and then cat silentcast.txt I don't see the error output I saw when running the program. Worth noting that the error output is going to the terminal, so obviously the redirection isn't working.

x11grab uses the name of the current screenmode rather than the actual resolution - I currently use a manually set xrandr resolution and its unable to parse it as the image size

To replicate: Create a new screen mode at the current resolution and refresh as per here http://superuser.com/a/809799/10165 - Note the name of the new screenmode is 1280x800_60.00 and set it as the current screen resolution. Run silentcast on full screen mode. You will get Unable to parse option value "1280x800_60.00" as image size as an error, since its looking at the mode name rather than the actual resolution. xrandr does seem to list the 'correct' values

This is what silentcast outputs when fired up in terminal

geek@phoebe ~]$ silentcast
f
8
ffmpeg version 2.1.5 Copyright (c) 2000-2014 the FFmpeg developers
  built on Jul  8 2014 20:44:17 with gcc 4.8.3 (GCC) 20140624 (Red Hat 4.8.3-1)
  configuration: --prefix=/usr --bindir=/usr/bin --datadir=/usr/share/ffmpeg --incdir=/usr/include/ffmpeg --libdir=/usr/lib64 --mandir=/usr/share/man --arch=x86_64 --optflags='-O2 -g -pipe -Wall -Wp,-D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -fexceptions -fstack-protector-strong --param=ssp-buffer-size=4 -grecord-gcc-switches -m64 -mtune=generic' --enable-bzlib --disable-crystalhd --enable-frei0r --enable-gnutls --enable-libass --enable-libcdio --enable-libcelt --enable-libdc1394 --disable-indev=jack --enable-libfreetype --enable-libgsm --enable-libmp3lame --enable-openal --enable-libopencv --enable-libopenjpeg --enable-libopus --enable-libpulse --enable-libschroedinger --enable-libsoxr --enable-libspeex --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libv4l2 --enable-libvpx --enable-libx264 --enable-libxvid --enable-x11grab --enable-avfilter --enable-avresample --enable-postproc --enable-pthreads --disable-static --enable-shared --enable-gpl --disable-debug --disable-stripping --shlibdir=/usr/lib64 --enable-runtime-cpudetect
  libavutil      52. 48.101 / 52. 48.101
  libavcodec     55. 39.101 / 55. 39.101
  libavformat    55. 19.104 / 55. 19.104
  libavdevice    55.  5.100 / 55.  5.100
  libavfilter     3. 90.100 /  3. 90.100
  libavresample   1.  1.  0 /  1.  1.  0
  libswscale      2.  5.101 /  2.  5.101
  libswresample   0. 17.104 /  0. 17.104
  libpostproc    52.  3.100 / 52.  3.100
[X11grab indev @ 0x20eafc0] Unable to parse option value "1280x800_60.00" as image size
[X11grab indev @ 0x20eafc0] Error setting option video_size to value 1280x800_60.00.
:0.0+0,0: Invalid argument
ffcom: line 14: kill: (8943) - No such process

And this is the output of xrandr for my setup

[geek@phoebe ~]$ xrandr 
Screen 0: minimum 8 x 8, current 1280 x 800, maximum 32767 x 32767
VGA1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
HDMI1 connected primary 1280x800+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 697mm x 392mm
   1280x720      60.00 +  50.00    59.94  
   1920x1080     60.00    50.00    59.94  
   1920x1080i    60.00    50.00    59.94  
   1280x1024     75.02  
   1440x900      74.98    59.90  
   1280x800      59.81  
   1440x576i     50.00  
   1024x768      75.08    70.07    60.00  
   1440x480i     60.00    59.94  
   800x600       72.19    75.00    60.32    56.25  
   720x576       50.00  
   720x480       60.00    59.94  
   640x480       75.00    72.81    60.00    59.94  
   720x400       70.08  
   1280x800_60.00  59.81* 
DP1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
VIRTUAL1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
[geek@phoebe ~]$ 

I get a window saying "X11 error trying to get top window"
CLI output is

X11 error trying to get top window
xkbcommon: ERROR: Key "<LFSH>" added to modifier map for multiple modifiers; Using Lock, ignoring Shift```

I tried peek and silentcast (both mentioned here: http://askubuntu.com/questions/107726/how-to-create-animated-gif-images-of-a-screencast)

Finally I chose this silentcast, though it's less intuitive to use but!! Given the same settings. Silentcast's recorded image size is much smaller. it's really nice to have it, thank you.

This is the best screencast tool I have found so far for Linux, but one thing it really needs is a visual indication of click events on the screen. A small "blip" or other indicator that a click has occurred.

The "entire window" option doesn't seem to get the top borders on Ubuntu 14.04. For example:

In the above gif the window border isn't shown. The entire window looks like this:

Gedit isn't the only application. This also happens in gnome-terminal as well.

I receive the error temp.mkv not found, so can't generate anything from it.

When running from the command prompt, I noticed silentcast appears to be looking for ffmpeg but attempting to run ffmpeg in this verison of Ubuntu returns ffmpeg: command not found.

For a bit of research, it seems avconv is the alternative in this version of Ubuntu.

Hi.

Currently, COPYING is installed into /usr/share/licenses/

I suppose it is more reasonable to install it into /usr/share/licenses/silentcast.

Really loved silentcast, but is there any way to reduce the size of recorded gifs or any options for low quality?

at least on fedora, xwininfo is missing in the dependencies.

Hi there,

I just wanted to drop in and say thanks. I needed a tool to record a short screencast GIF for a new project I put on GitHub, and I stumbled upon yours on AskUbuntu, and in the time I had, it was the only one I could find that worked and output good quality. It was nice to have a PPA for it too.

So thanks, and keep up the good work!

(Sorry if you'd rather me not post an issue for this, but I figured that most FOSS authors don't get enough appreciation... =)

@colinkeenan thinks for this great tool (it's the only one that worked for me, thanks for that), it work great with archlux on openbox, is there a way using silentcast.conf to remove mkv after creating gif because it remain after creating the gif, anyway thanks again for your work.

Hi, I just tried to record something using transparent window, unfortunately it crashers.

Unity or Pantheon detected, switching indicators...
avconv version 9.18-6:9.18-0ubuntu0.14.04.1, Copyright (c) 2000-2014 the Libav developers
built on Mar 16 2015 13:19:10 with gcc 4.8 (Ubuntu 4.8.2-19ubuntu1)
[x11grab @ 0x15022a0] Couldn't parse video size.
:0.0+1920,61: Invalid argument
/home/peto/silentcast/ffcom: line 20: kill: (9323) - No such process
/usr/bin/silentcast: line 171: 4380 Terminated python "$py_script_dir"/transparent_window.py ""$all_keys""
1
15
gif

Version: 3.07

$ sudo ./install
install: cannot stat 'scpkg/silentcast': No such file or directory

Readme is too complicated!

Please put use case and easiest install instructions AT THE TOP.

I get this error with the new Silentcast. (With the new icon)
Unrecognized option 'c:v' Failed to set value 'ffvhuff' for option 'c:v' /home/zefk/silentcast/ffcom: line 20: kill: (20624) - No such process 1 8 gif

I am a ubuntu novice.

Anyway, I have installed it per instructions.

When I load it, it comes to the first screen. I edit my path to where I want the images at, and click ok, then nothing else happens. I don't know if this is intentional or not. Either way, it seems that is all I can do with this app.

The instructions say there should be additional setup pages? Also, there are no silentcast icons in the notification area.

I am using ubuntu 16.04.

First, I really want to thanks for this cool application.
before moving to i3, I was hard lover of silentcast, I produce some nice GIF on my work with this piece of software. but it does not work in i3wm.

• no icon for stopping record
• does not display active window when selecting region
• produce really big .mkv in just couple on second. it's around 2GB.

here is my machine

$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Debian
Description:    Debian GNU/Linux 9.1 (stretch)
Release:        9.1
Codename:       stretch

i3 version 4.13 (2016-11-08, branch "4.13") © 2009 Michael Stapelberg and contributors`

$ compton --version
0.1~beta2+20150922

$ ffmpeg --version
ffmpeg version 3.2.5-1 Copyright (c) 2000-2017 the FFmpeg developers
  built with gcc 6.3.0 (Debian 6.3.0-18) 20170516
  configuration: --prefix=/usr --extra-version=1 --toolchain=hardened --libdir=/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu --incdir=/usr/include/x86_64-linux-gnu --enable-gpl --disable-stripping --enable-avresample --enable-avisynth --enable-gnutls --enable-ladspa --enable-libass --enable-libbluray --enable-libbs2b --enable-libcaca --enable-libcdio --enable-libebur128 --enable-libflite --enable-libfontconfig --enable-libfreetype --enable-libfribidi --enable-libgme --enable-libgsm --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libopenjpeg --enable-libopenmpt --enable-libopus --enable-libpulse --enable-librubberband --enable-libshine --enable-libsnappy --enable-libsoxr --enable-libspeex --enable-libssh --enable-libtheora --enable-libtwolame --enable-libvorbis --enable-libvpx --enable-libwavpack --enable-libwebp --enable-libx265 --enable-libxvid --enable-libzmq --enable-libzvbi --enable-omx --enable-openal --enable-opengl --enable-sdl2 --enable-libdc1394 --enable-libiec61883 --enable-chromaprint --enable-frei0r --enable-libopencv --enable-libx264 --enable-shared
  libavutil      55. 34.101 / 55. 34.101
  libavcodec     57. 64.101 / 57. 64.101
  libavformat    57. 56.101 / 57. 56.101
  libavdevice    57.  1.100 / 57.  1.100
  libavfilter     6. 65.100 /  6. 65.100
  libavresample   3.  1.  0 /  3.  1.  0
  libswscale      4.  2.100 /  4.  2.100
  libswresample   2.  3.100 /  2.  3.100
  libpostproc    54.  1.100 / 54.  1.100`

imagemagick  8:6.9.7.4+dfsg-11+deb9u1

Please ask me more, on what do you need me to produce an output of my sistem packages or configuration.
any other system tray e.g Telegram, Veracrypt, Kazam works fine.

Thanks so much.

I've installed silentcast via the Arch user repository (AUR) under openbox.

When I run it, it creates a black overlay which takes up the area of a single monitor.

I'm not sure if this is a Silentcast issue or a packaging issue; if it's the latter I can mention this to the maintainer of the AUR or seek support there.

I've used silentcast before to great effect, but that was under Debian.

Hi I have done a full install of Silentcast on Lubuntu 14.10. When I choose Transparent Window Interior, the resulting window is actually black, no transparency at all. Why? Can it be fixed? Thanks.

Hello,

Thank you for your effort and the software.

I would like to report an issue that occured on CentOS 7 x64 with GNOME shell version 3.14.4.

I hadn't used CentOS in a while and this particular version of GNOME shell. I'll observer the issue and check if my settings aren't appropriate for this to work and will update this issue if I have more info.

I'm currently cannot build this, because of error

gtk/gtkx.h: No such file or directory

I tried to figure out which package to install to have this and I see several choices from
apt-cache search libgtk | grep libgtk3 :

libgtk3-perl - Perl bindings for the GTK+ graphical user interface library
libgtk3-nocsd0 - Library to disable Gtk+ 3 client side decorations (CSD)
libgtk3-simplelist-perl - Perl simple interface to GTK+ 3's complex MVC list widget
libgtk3-webkit2-perl - WebKit2 bindings for Perl
libgtk3.0-cil - CLI binding for the GTK+ 3.0 toolkit
libgtk3.0-cil-dev - CLI binding for the GTK+ toolkit 3.0

I'm not sure which to install. Should it be libgtk3.0-cil-dev ?
I think it would be better to have a ready apt-get command in documentation, explaining exactly what package should be installed.

I'm on ubuntu xenial, installed manually (make, then sudo install), and copied the i3 workaround into my ~/.config/i3/config at the end. I have no other bindings to $mod+Shift+s, $mod+z, or $mod+x.

I start silentcast from the commandline, get the big green box, and as soon as I do $mod+Shift+s it triggers the pop up that it's going to convert the gif and asks if I want to drop frames.

I had success skipping that and just doing $mod+z and it recorded.

Subsequently I found that trying to use F2 to change the numbers/positions triggered the recording, and that as soon as I was done entering those values it triggered the mkv -> gif process as well, and I got a screencast of changing the values.

In addition, the process even triggers a bizarre wallpaper change from what I set via i3 with feh to the canned Ubuntu unity wallpaper! I think it's the auto-opening of a file browser after perhaps?

Any thoughts on how I can troubleshoot this?

I don't know if you are familiar with screencloud, but it allows you to take an instant screenshot, uploads via ftp to a server for you, and generates a link to be pasted to share. I feel like this would be a nice feature for the application that may be doable. I don't know if you wish to monetize by hosting a server that would be linkable, but atleast the option to upload to the end-user's ftp server would be nice.

As a trackpad user, I right click by tapping 2 fingers on my touchpad. It's really rather awkward (but not impossible) to right click and drag. I propose that Ctrl + Left click is added as an alternative here, as it's much easier for trackpad users to do.

Hi,

Just wondering If there's a ppa/.deb release for Debian Jessie or later?

I tried installing using ppa in Debian

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/sethj/silentcast/ubuntu/dists/jessie/main/binary-amd64/Packages  404  Not Found

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/sethj/silentcast/ubuntu/dists/jessie/main/binary-i386/Packages  404  Not Found

I also installed add-apt-repository command using sudo apt-get install software-properties-common, someone may find this useful ;)

Just installed silentcast on Ubuntu 14.04 (Unity) and when I select the option for "Transparent window interior" and click OK, the transparent window displays for a moment, then disappears and you can't bring it back up? On the window switcher from the launcher it shows that it's still open but it does not display at all

I'm coming from Gif Recorder, which was pulled by the author. Thanks for making Silentcast free!

However, the wizard/setup experience is unnecessarily confusing IMO. There are about 5 screens before you can start recording. The second time I ran bash silentcast there were fewer dialogs, but it was unclear what exactly was being recorded, and I ended up recording my entire desktop instead of a given window (see #31).

Gif Recorder has a much simpler and more effective UI: its window is a frame (transparent, with borders and a stop button at the bottom). You resize this window to enclose the area to record, and click the Record button.

That was it. No compression step, no complicated instructions, no out of memory messages. It just worked.

Unfortunately, it truncated the last seconds of the gif, which is why I've been searching for an alternative.

I think everyone would benefit if this could be installed using simple apt install command, possibly with some added repositories, if it's easier this way.

For some reason when I'm running silentcast on ubuntu from the terminal, it works, but if I run using desktop entry in /usr/share/applications/silentcast.desktop - then either nothing happens or it immediately shows SIGSEGV. Recently it stopped even showing SIGSEGV and just nothing happens.

Or a timeout option to stop?

I'm on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS. I installed silentcast via the sethj/silentcast ppa. When I try to run it, I am warned that I am "already doing a recording of a recording".

I did not install Topicons, but then I don't think I'm using Gnome. Or is Unity Gnome? I stopped paying attention to these things a long time ago.

Anyway, the error message is still incorrect. :)

I get this error (+ "Try closing other applications, creating a swap file, or removing unecessary images.") after recording less than a minute of (accidentally) my dual-monitor desktop (1920x1200 +
1920x1080), and trying to create an animated GIF

The available memory is 12.3GB of RAM + 2GB swap.

Why does Silentcast need so much memory? I'm far from an expert on animated GIFs or video, but concatenating PNGs into one animated GIF is a streaming kind of operation; you shouldn't have to load all GIFs in memory? Or is that necessary to figure out the color palette? Can a two-pass approach be used then instead?

The python script that launches the unity/panthon/plasma 5 indicator shows up in Unity as a red "do not enter" icon (for lack of the proper expression). This appears to be because the python script does not append a file extension to the icon path.

(I will have a fix incoming, I'm documenting this for packaging purposes so I can update the PPA now and not wait for a new release)

When I use silencast, all images and the gif get blank/transparent

Blank images and gif

Sorry, this may be elementary... not much up on workings with Ubuntu, but I have tried both through the software center and command line to install and I get the following through command line:

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:sethj/silentcast

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get install silentcast

Upon execution of the last command, I get the following messages:

Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
silentcast : Depends: ffmpeg but it is not installable
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

If I try from the Synaptic Manager, I get the following:

silentcast:
Depends: ffmpeg but it is not installable
Depends: yad but it is not going to be installed
Depends: xdotool but it is not going to be installed
Depends: imagemagick
Depends: wmctrl

I would like to try the program and would appreciate any advice as to how to proceed.

Thanks!

When downloading the latest release and running it from terminal with bash silentcast I get this error in terminal:

[X11grab indev @ 0x204dca0] Unable to parse option value "-322x300" as image size
[X11grab indev @ 0x204dca0] Error setting option video_size to value -322x300.
:0.0+2242,321: Invalid argument
/home/cameron/silentcast/ffcom: line 20: kill: (4692) - No such process
silentcast: line 171:  4669 Terminated              python "$py_script_dir"/transparent_window.py \""$all_keys"\"
1
8
gif

after which I get a popup that says "cannot find mkv..."

Works easily.

Using Gnome 3.16 in Fedora 22

➜  ~  silentcast 

(yad:4499): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkButton:use-stock is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.

(yad:4499): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkSettings:gtk-button-images is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.
Gtk-Message: GtkDialog mapped without a transient parent. This is discouraged.
/home/voor
t
8
/tmp/silentcast

(yad:4546): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkButton:use-stock is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.

(yad:4546): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkSettings:gtk-button-images is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.
Gtk-Message: GtkDialog mapped without a transient parent. This is discouraged.

(yad:4551): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkButton:use-stock is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.

(yad:4551): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkSettings:gtk-button-images is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.
Gtk-Message: GtkDialog mapped without a transient parent. This is discouraged.
/usr/bin/genffcom: line 222: ((: 421+1281 > 1920
2560: syntax error in expression (error token is "2560")
/usr/bin/genffcom: line 223: ((: 149+711 > 1080
1440: syntax error in expression (error token is "1440")

(yad:4607): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkButton:use-stock is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.

(yad:4607): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkSettings:gtk-button-images is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.
Gtk-Message: GtkDialog mapped without a transient parent. This is discouraged.
ffmpeg version 2.6.3 Copyright (c) 2000-2015 the FFmpeg developers
  built with gcc 5.1.1 (GCC) 20150422 (Red Hat 5.1.1-1)
  configuration: --prefix=/usr --bindir=/usr/bin --datadir=/usr/share/ffmpeg --incdir=/usr/include/ffmpeg --libdir=/usr/lib64 --mandir=/usr/share/man --arch=x86_64 --optflags='-O2 -g -pipe -Wall -Werror=format-security -Wp,-D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -fexceptions -fstack-protector-strong --param=ssp-buffer-size=4 -grecord-gcc-switches -m64 -mtune=generic' --enable-bzlib --disable-crystalhd --enable-frei0r --enable-gnutls --enable-ladspa --enable-libass --enable-libcdio --enable-libdc1394 --disable-indev=jack --enable-libfreetype --enable-libgsm --enable-libmp3lame --enable-openal --enable-libopencv --enable-libopenjpeg --enable-libopus --enable-libpulse --enable-libschroedinger --enable-libsoxr --enable-libspeex --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libv4l2 --enable-libvpx --enable-libx264 --enable-libx265 --enable-libxvid --enable-x11grab --enable-avfilter --enable-avresample --enable-postproc --enable-pthreads --disable-static --enable-shared --enable-gpl --disable-debug --disable-stripping --shlibdir=/usr/lib64 --enable-runtime-cpudetect
  libavutil      54. 20.100 / 54. 20.100
  libavcodec     56. 26.100 / 56. 26.100
  libavformat    56. 25.101 / 56. 25.101
  libavdevice    56.  4.100 / 56.  4.100
  libavfilter     5. 11.102 /  5. 11.102
  libavresample   2.  1.  0 /  2.  1.  0
  libswscale      3.  1.101 /  3.  1.101
  libswresample   1.  1.100 /  1.  1.100
  libpostproc    53.  3.100 / 53.  3.100
Invalid MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 key[x11grab @ 0x10f5de0] Cannot open display :0.0+421,149, error 1.
:0.0+421,149: Input/output error
/tmp/silentcast/ffcom: line 20: kill: (4609) - No such process
/usr/bin/silentcast: line 171:  4541 Terminated              python "$py_script_dir"/transparent_window.py \""$all_keys"\"
1
8
gif
/tmp

(yad:4619): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkButton:use-stock is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.

(yad:4619): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: The property GtkSettings:gtk-button-images is deprecated and shouldn't be used anymore. It will be removed in a future version.
Gtk-Message: GtkDialog mapped without a transient parent. This is discouraged.

(nautilus:4616): Gtk-WARNING **: Failed to register client: GDBus.Error:org.gnome.SessionManager.AlreadyRegistered: Unable to register client

The ensuing popup states temp.mkv not found, so can't generate anything from it

Since APNG is now supported by all major browsers and it's generally smaller than an animated GIF (not to mention the lack of a colour limit), it would be great if this tool supported saving to it.