gHacks technology news » hulu

Hulu desktop for Linux

Jack Wallen — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 02:14:58 +0000

I’m sure by now everyone here knows about Hulu. If not, Hulu is a rather huge collection of television programs that can be viewed on line, for free, with few commercial interruptions. It’s brilliant. You can watch old reruns of What’s Happenin? or Mork and Mindy or Alf! Yes, Alf! But many of you may not know that there is a Hulu client available. This client makes the viewing experience very simple, and much more convenient than the standard browser viewing because, well, it doesn’t require a browser. Instead it’s like watching on a simple (but very impressive) desktop widget.

This desktop widget is now available for Windows, Mac, and (are you ready for it?) Linux! Yes, it’s available for Linux, so all of us Penguinistas can enjoy our Hulu as it was meant to be enjoyed. And best of all, it’s easy to install. Let’s see just how easy the Hulu desktop client is to install and use.

Distributions and installations

As of now the only distributions Hulu is available for are Ubuntu 9.04 and Fedora 11. So if you’re not running either of them you’re out of luck. Hulu does hope to, over time, support other distributions. But both Ubuntu and Fedora make sense. Now, I will tell you that I did successfully install the Hulu client on Elive Compiz which is a Debian-based installation. So – if you can install a .deb package on your machine, and you meet the requirements, you might be golden.

Let’s take a look at the installation process. The Hulu client depends upon:

GTK+ 2.12 or higher
GLib 2.16 or higher
LIRC 0.8.2 or higher (required for remote control functionality)
Adobe Flash Player 9.0.124

Most likely, if you are running either Ubuntu 9.04 or Fedora 11, you already have everything you need installed (minus Flash). Installing Flash is as simple (at least in Ubuntu) as visiting a site that requires Flash, and then walk through the steps for installation when prompted. To install Hulu you will need to download the file from the Hulu Linux page. When you have downloaded that file you will need to issue one of the following commands (from within the directory the file was downloaded).

For Ubuntu:

dpkg -i huludesktop*

For Fedora:

rpm -ivh huludesktop*

Once the command finishes up, you are ready to run the client.

Using Hulu desktop

To start up the desktop client, issue the following command:

huludesktop

Figure 1

You will most likely find Hulu desktop in your Audio/Video menu. If not, you can always add it. When the client opens (see Figure 1) you can immediately begin searching and watching your favorite television episodes.

The menu and overall interface are amazingly simple and sleek. More than likely you will be surprised just how well done this Linux client is (considering it is still in beta).

Figure 2

As you can see (in Figure 2) the player runs seamlessly on the Linux desktop. What you can not see is that the client requires very little in desktop resources. In fact, it’s no more noticeable than running a browser.

Final thoughts

The Hulu Linux desktop client makes watching TV (and movies) a breeze. I am thrilled that Hulu has brought out a Linux client without making the Linux community wait as the Windows and Mac community enjoy it’s services.

Tags: hulu, movies, multi-media, television

Access US-Only Services Like Hulu, ABC Or Pandora With UltraVPN

Martin — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 08:24:04 +0000

Many companies and organizations limit their services on the Internet to users of a specific country. This is especially true for streaming based services that stream media like music or videos over the Internet. It usually comes down to usage rights as the main reason for the limitation. Others say the limits are there to save money and bandwidth as the target audience is usually also limited to the countries the services are allowed in.

One of the best ways of accessing these services from outside the supported countries is to use a VPN, a virtual private network. This is helpful for citizens on holidays who want to access the services abroad but also – obviously – for users from other countries who want to access the services.

UltraVPN was discovered by Nakodari from Addictive Tips and we have to say that it is one of the easiest solutions right now. It works great currently and gives access to Hulu, Pandora and all the other US-only websites and services out there. The streaming quality is excellent unlike that of other free competitors (like Hotspot Shield). Our guess however is that it is only a matter of time – thanks to popularity – before the performance of UltraVPN will get a dent or two as well.

Installation is a breeze. All the user needs is to create an account at the UltraVPN website (only username and password required). The VPN setup is available for Windows and Mac OS. The username and password have to be supplied on startup. The vpn service will notify the user that the computer has been connected to it. What’s left is to access the websites and services to test the speed and quality of the service.

Head over to the Ultra VPN website to download the client, create an account and access additional information about the virtual private network. The vpn service has been successfully tested with Hulu, ABC and Pandora.

Tags: abc, hulu, mac software, pandora, ultra vpn, virtual private network, vpn, windows software

Search Multiple Video Search Engines With Videosurf

Martin — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 10:32:01 +0000

Videosurf is a video search website that can search multiple video portals at once. Support video websites are among others Youtube, Hulu, Google Videos, Dailymotion, CNN Video, Reuters and dozens more. Video search results are mixed from all video portals and displayed on the website. One interesting feature of Videosurf are the categories that are automatically displayed in a small menu on the left side. These categories sort videos by content type (clips, slideshows, full episodes), TV shows, broad categories like tech, music or how and sources. A click on any of the available filters will filter the video search results list to display only videos matching the selected filters.

It is possible to combine filters as well using the checkboxes. Videos are displayed with their name, size, source and several thumbnail screenshots which usually gives a good indication of the video’s contents. Video search results can be sorted in several ways including relevance, popularity, duration or date they have been added.

It is furthermore possible to save a video search and to embed it in a website. Videosurf comes with two Firefox add-ons that make it more comfortable to search for videos. Videos at a Glance will display visual video thumbnails while the Videosurf Search Plugin adds the video search engine to the list of Firefox search engines.

Tags: firefox, firefox add-ons, hulu, search videos, video, video search, videos at a glance, youtube

Always VPN To Watch HULU And Similar Services

Martin — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 06:40:17 +0000

There is only one possibility to be able to access content that is restricted to select countries on the Internet: Virtual Private Networks. They basically route your traffic through their web servers so that the destination only communicates directly with their servers. If those servers are located in the country you want to access the content from then you normally can do so without difficulties.

Hotspot Shield was the Virtual Private Network that everyone was talking about. Mainly because it offered free access to their network albeit with limited bandwidth usage before they cut you off. Always VPN could be a viable alternative to watch Hulu or listen to Pandora from outside the United States.

The Virtual Private Network is easy to setup and can be downloaded as a client for Windows XP, Windows Vista, Mac OS X or Linux. Once the software has been installed the Virtual Private Network connection can be started from the Start Menu in Windows.

Users get the choice between compatible and faster editions and can also change the configuration if they want to tweak it further. Tests with Hulu and Pandora were successful. A lot of buffering was going on though which could have been a temporary problem or caused by the increasing popularity of the service.

There is one more “thing” that has to be mentioned. The Virtual Private Network is displaying advertisement on top of each web page to finance the service.

Always VPN can be a viable alternative to Hotspot Shield, especially if the latter service is not working for you or if you already used up all of your bandwidth and want to continue watching or listening to those services.

Tags: always vpn, hotspot shield, hulu, network, pandora, virtual private network, watch hulu

Watch TV online legally

Joe — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 22:23:03 +0000

The Internet is often a place where unlicensed television shows are easy to watch, albeit through websites offering streaming, torrents or USENET.

Recently, many websites have started to show shows free online but do so in a legal fashion, paying for the shows using advertisements.

Different websites seem to work in different jurisdiction but it is fair to say that a large amount is available to viewers from the United States only. Here are a few resources to watch tv shows online.

South Park Studios famously provided their shows online free of charge because the show’s creators were annoyed of people watching their shows illegally. Unfortunately, South Park Studios is not available in Great Britain; I suspect it is North America only.

Joost, the much hyped IPTV service which recently has recently made the transition from software to web-based, boasts a number of titles, both mainstream and online-only. In the UK, and possibly other countries, titles such as Babylon 5, Peep Show, Shameless and Robot Chicken.

YouTube has recently announced it will start ‘serving full-length TV dinners‘ including shows like Star Trek: The Original Series, MacGyver and Beverly Hills 90210. Unfortunately, this is unavailable in Europe.

Hulu is a site which offers free, ad-supported streaming video of TV shows and films from NBC and FOX, amongst others. This includes shows like The Simpsons, The Daily Show, Family Guy and even The Office! Predictably, this is also only for Americans.

BBC iPlayer is a free streaming video service kindly provided to people in the United Kingdom. iPlayer allows Brits to watch most shows broadcasted on a BBC channel in the past week on-demand. The BBC even admits that iPlayer technically does not require a licence fee, a type of tax which any British person with a TV set pays to help support the non-commercial BBC.

Tags: bbc iplayer, hulu, joost, southparkstudios, tv shows, tv-online, watch tv online, watch-tv, youtube

Joost Now Flash Based

Martin — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 20:51:32 +0000

Joost was previously only accessible by using a video player that had to be downloaded. That seemed to fail to bring in the desired user numbers and Joost decided to drop the software client and create a web based Flash portal with all their contents. The transition phase which ended yesterday required users to install a plugin to view shows but as of now everyone with an up to date Flash plugin can watch the shows at the Joost website.

One of the initial advantages of Joost was the software client. Yes, it had its problems but it provided interesting features that are hard to impossible to realize in a web client. For one, switching between channels and shows was more or less instant, the web client delays requests because that is how the web works.

Users do need an account before they can watch any show on the website which is one of the big drawbacks of the system. The other drawback is the lack of mainstream media. Yes, you find some tv shows that are free to watch for users from authorized countries but there is not a lot mainstream wise that you cannot watch somewhere else on the Internet.

What Joost needs more than anything else is killer content. Not necessarily tv series like 24 or Alias. It could be something more geeky exotic like a huge Anime archive or Independent movies. There should also be room for educational content.

Joost cannot compete with Youtube because of the sheer mass and sites like Hulu because of their content.

Tags: hulu, joost, joost client, joost flash, video

Web Video Downloader And Converter

Martin — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 11:25:42 +0000

Web video is so popular that Internet Providers throughout the world are feeling the network bandwidth increase and trying to find ways to lower the bandwidth consumption. The popularity of web video caused a strong increase in web video downloaders and converters that download videos from video portals to the local computer.

TubeMaster (via Download online video using TubeMaster Plus) is one of those applications. The portable application supports more than 100 video portals including the ever popular Youtube and Dailymotion but also some unsuspected ones like Hulu, IGN or ESPN. Not all web video portals could be tested because some will only show the videos to users of specific countries. A test of downloading web video from Hulu would be greatly appreciated.

The application uses its own browser that can be used to display the video portal websites. Videos will be automatically downloaded when they are played on the portal. This is unfortunately the only way to download videos from the various websites.

It is still a comfortable way to download web video. Besides the option to load the websites directly users can also use the search engine included to search for various on single or all web video websites.

A maximum of 500 search results can be displayed. The videos cannot be downloaded directly from the search. A click displays additional information about the selected web video and an option to load the video on the video portal’s website from where it will be automatically downloaded when it starts playing.

Another option is the mp3 search which leaves the user in the dark from where the files are coming. Quicktime is needed to play and download the mp3.

Videos can be automatically decoded which is the default option in TubeMaster. The user can choose between various video codecs and stop the conversion.

Tubemaster supports adult web video sites as well but that option is locked for users who subscribe to the service. Downloading from the “normal” web video portals is completely free though.

Tags: espn, hulu, online video, tubemaster, video, video browser, video conversion, video download, video software, web video, youtube

Hulu now publically available kind of

Martin — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 13:54:17 +0000

Hulu has left private beta and is now publically available to US-consumers which is definitely a good thing. Users can just go and visit the official Hulu website and browse the contents and play anything they like in their browser. Hulu does have a good selection of movies and tv episodes from popular media companies like Fox, Universal Pictures, Sony or MGM.

The selection of tv shows is actually pretty good. You get to see Animations like The Simpsons and Family Guy, Crime & Mystery like Bones or Team Knight Rider but also pretty old – but still cool tv shows – like Simon & Simon or Emergency Room. Should be something for everyone, great if you do not know what to do for a certain amount of time.

Users from outside the United States, for example US citizens traveling to Europe or another location, can use the free application Hotspot Shield to view Hulu content even if they are abroad. Check out my article on accessing Hulu – and other services – using Hotspot Shield.

Tags: hotspot shield, hulu, internet-tv, movies, Online TV, tv shows

FanCast watch TV Shows online

Martin — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 10:28:54 +0000

Fancast is a service by the cable provider Comcast who streams dozens of popular tv shows from Battlestar Galactica to The Office and The Unit free on their website. The service is available to viewers with a US IP only which means that everyone else will not be able to view the tv shows unless they hide their IP with a service like Hotspot Shield.

The amount of tv-shows offered at FanCast is incredible, seems to be more than 100 shows that can be selected. A quick test revealed 11 full episodes of 24, 2 Numb3rs episodes, 7 30-days episodes. The usual amount seems to be between 2-10 for most shows.

Most episodes show advertisements before playing the shows but that is fine I guess, it has to be financed somehow. Resolution is 384 x 288 and the quality of the video is good enough and far superior to those of Youtube. You do get recommendations on the right side of the video and a short description of the video that you are currently viewing.

Tags: comcast, fancast, hulu, tv episodes, tv shows

Grab your Hulu Beta invites

Martin — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 23:11:27 +0000

Hulu is doing a huge promotion currently offering several websites 2500 beta invites each and lots are still available. I found three website promotions with roughly 4000 invites left for Hulu, make sure you head right out and sign up using any of the following links:

Mashable have roughly 1100 left, Download Squad are still good with 2300 left for the taking and Techcrunch has another 1100 left. There are probably more sites out there that received those 2500 invites and as you can from the links the url is always http://www.hulu.com/beta/ followed by the site name without spaces.

I just visited Technorati and discovered several other blogs that received invites as well. Those are Webware with 2200 left, Read Write Web with 1300 left and Gigaom with 500 left.

Everyone can signup but only users from the United States can view Hulu without problems.

Tags: hulu, internet-tv

Watch NBC Shows in Veoh

Martin — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 07:38:56 +0000

NBC offers two official ways to watch their tv shows online. The first is NBC Direct which forces uses to download and install DRM infested software that adds the permanent MediaAgent.exe process to your system wasting resources even though the NBC Direct client is not running.

The second is the website Hulu which is currently invite only and hard to get in. Even if you do you still need to access it from the United States to be able to watch the tv shows. A reader, M.Keezay, told me in the comments that the software Veoh TV would also play NBC Shows free of charge and without country restrictions. (Did I ever tell you, my readers, how much I value your comments and remarks ? They are incredible !)

Veoh TV is a client software comparable to Joost. Once installed the user has to log in, or create an account, and will then be able to watch tv channels in the software. There is NBC with 22 shows including Heroes, My Name is Earl, The Office, Las Vegas, Scrubs and more as well as 154 other channels, most offering similar content that Joost offers.

Not all episodes or seasons are available but you do find five episodes of your favorite tv shows listed and you can opt to watch some or all of them.

Every show begins with a 10-20 second advertisement which is understandable if you consider bandwidth and server costs to run a service like Veoh TV.

Another remarkable channel is CBS which offers additional tv shows like all of the CSI series, Shark, Survivor China, How I met your Mother (the best), Big Bang Theory (even better) and Numbers.

This is probably the best way of watching those tv shows if you do not reside in the United States currently. Great news for every US-American who does not want to miss his favorite tv shows if he is on a trip outside the country.

Tags: hulu, nbc direct, tv shows, watch free tv series

Use Hotspot Shield to access US-only websites like Hulu and Pandora

Martin — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 07:21:18 +0000

Websites like Hulu and Pandora stop non-US-American visitors right at the doorstep telling them that the contents of the website are not available to them at all. Only US-Americans are allowed and able to view the contents, in the case of the mentioned sites movies and Internet radio.

Lob was pointing out in my article on accessing Hulu from outside the United States that there was another possibility to watch Hulu movies even if you would be living (currently or permanently) outside of the United States. His suggestion was to download and install a software called Hotspot Shield which is a free VPN solution located in the United States.

Download and installation worked fine and I did not have to configure anything by myself to get the VPN service up and running. A quick test at Hulustuff (I do not have an invite yet for Hulu, if anyone has one left feel free to pass it on to me, that would be really nice) revealed that most videos were working while some told me this: “Sorry, this video is currently unavailable. We apologize for any inconvenience.”

This did not seem to be a problem with the VPN but a internal problem., maybe the video was not available anymore at all or Hulu had difficulties streaming the content.

Tags: hulu, pandora, vpn

Access Hulu from outside the United States

Martin — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 16:59:23 +0000

So, you have received one of those much though after Hulu private invitations only to find out that you can’t watch a single movie on their website because of their geo-targeting ? Viewers who do not live in the United States get the following line whenever they try to watch a video at Hulu.

“Unfortunately this video is currently not available in your country or region. We apologize for the inconvenience”. That means that if you live in the United States but are currently abroad you can’t watch the videos at Hulu. Unless, you have found a way to use a service that hides your IP and displays one from the United States.

The following method is unfortunately not free but works perfectly to watch all videos at Hulu. Secure-Tunnel offers a software that tunnels your connection through their service which is located in the United States. This means that you can use their software to watch videos at Hulu plus use any other service that is geotargeted to the United States. This includes Pandora for instance.

Secure-Tunnel offers several packages and all work beginning with the Gold package which costs roughly $8 per month. What I really like about this solution is that the software that you install is recognizing software that is connecting to the Internet and is asking you if you want to tunnel that software.

Besides the obvious effect that you can watch Hulu videos and listen to Pandora Radio streams you also hide your own IP and use an encrypted connection. This increases the security level of your connection as well as your own privacy.

As you can see it is possible to access Hulu from outside the United States and watch all shows without interruption.

Sample Video:

Read More:

Secure Tunnel (aff)

Tags: anonymous internet, hulu, P2p, privacy, secure tunnel, vpn

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