CRS Ticket Tracker

The Ticket Tracker is a web platform tracking process of video recording and ingest sources and video encoding progress. It guides users through manual processes like editing and checking and provides an API for scripts doing post processing and encoding.

The tracker is a PHP web application and distributes tasks in form of 'tickets' to various workers. The worker scripts – written in Perl, Python, or PHP – advance the state and update the ticket's properties via tracker's XML RPC API.

The core system was initially written by FeM – Forschungsgemeinschaft elektronische Medien e.V. for 27C3 in 2010, and was released under the Apache License 2.0 end of 2017. Our instance is deployed at https://tracker.c3voc.de.

source code:

https://github.com/crs-tools/tracker

workers

https://github.com/crs-tools/crs-scripts (Perl)

https://github.com/voc/publishing (Python)

https://github.com/crs-tools/tracker-lib-php (PHP)

custom fuse filesystem driver used by tracker workers

(VOC) encoding profiles: TODO

Further resources:

FeM tracker Beschreibung / FeM *C3 Doku

FeM tracker doku

old FeM tracker doku (probably outdated but still usefull

Concepts

The C3 Ticket Tracker enables the (semi-)automated recording, editing & release of multilingual videos. In order to complete a release successfully, certain project settings must be configured and a few of the state transitions must be operated manually:

Ticket types and hierarchy

One of the really good features of the C3 tracker is that propertyies are inherited through the hierarchy:

Project settings (Conference or Series)

Meta ticket (Parent with Fahrplan-ID & -Metadata)

Recording ticket (Language, etc)

Main encoding ticket (MP4)

additional encoding tickets, e.g. WebM, MP3, Opus, SD formats, etc.

Ticket states

For each ticket type, the tracker has a predefined set of states, which can be enabled and disabled on an per project basis. Here is an example workflow with only one manual checking step:

Now let's look into the steps done by worker scripts

Step A: Recording Scheduler

script-A-recording-scheduler.pl

Schedules and transitions tickets from scheduled to recording. Adds padding and optionally filters by room. Skips opt-out events.

Inputs: CRS ticket in scheduled state

Outputs: Ticket moved to recording or skipped

Notes: Uses CRS_ROOM, Record.StartedBefore, and Record.EndedBefore filters

Step B: Create virtual project files

script-B-mount4cut.pl

Mounts raw video segments via FUSE. Checks and sets cut marks, stores metadata like duration and framerate.

Inputs: Ticket in recording → preparing state

Outputs: FUSE mount created and cut marks optionally stored

Notes: Supports DV and TS formats

Step C: Cut Postprocessing

script-C-cut-postprocessor.pl

Validates cut marks, adds intro/outro clips if defined, and calculates cut durations. Fails tickets with incomplete data.

Inputs: Ticket in finalizing state

Outputs: Ticket updated with durations and metadata

Notes: Verifies intro/outro file paths and presence

Step D: Encoding

script-D-encoding.pl

Runs encoding tasks from job XML. Skips if Voctomix is detected. Supports VAAPI acceleration and logs execution times.

Inputs: Ticket in encoding state

Outputs: Encoded media file(s), ticket state updated

Notes: Uses CRS::Executor and task-type detection

Step E: Postencoding

script-E-postencoding-auphonic.pl

Runs audio processing and remuxing. Can optionally delegate to Auphonic for audio leveling and rendering.

Inputs: Ticket in postencoding state

Outputs: Updated audio tracks and metadata

Notes: Supports audio hash checking and production reuse

Step F: Upload

script-F-postprocessing-upload.pl

Uploads processed files to the target via ssh from encoder/storage to releasing.c3voc.de. Can skip uploads based on host config.

Inputs: Ticket in postprocessing state

Outputs: Files pushed to publishing target

Notes: Validates file presence, honors opt-out and skip-hosts

Usage during event

Task: Cut

see cutting

c3_tracker_-_schnitt_mit_kdenlive.mp4

Usage video YT link (german)

TODO: CCCamp15 Recording / Postprocessing integrieren

Task: Check

see checking

Ticket types and states

Parent tickets for each Fahrplan entry

one recording ticket for each parent

several encoding tickets, one for each format – e.g. MP4 HD, MP4 SD, WebM, MP3, Opus

Project setup

Create tracker project (you can also clone a matching project to have prefilled properties)

Import schedule.xml

Set all master tickets from staging to staged via mass-edit

Adjust project properties, recommendations: (full reference at the bottom of the page)

Compare project properties with previous instalment of the same event

see Project setup for more details

User Roles

User accounts can have different roles depending on what the user should be able to do:

“User” - can cut and edit tickets

“Restricted” - can only use already defined actions and can't define new actions

“Superuser” - can edit profiles and (re)import fahrplan

“Admin”

more details on https://github.com/crs-tools/tracker/blob/master/src/Config/AccessControl.php

Recording

Files that should be handled by the tracker (input files) should be named as follows:

<room>-YYYY-MM-DD_HH-MM-SS.<extension>

Files need to be placed in directories according to the room name “”“”“”

Naming for intro and outro:

Intro <frab-id>.dv

Outro: outro.dv

Postprocessing

Cut

The cutting process requires start and end marks. The tracker accepts frame numbers. If your player does not show frame numbers you can approximate with the formula

seconds * 25

assumed you have 25 frames per second. Note that this means you cut per second not per frame !!!

Trackerfahrer Scripts

see Trackerfahrer Scripts

Ticket Properties

see Ticket Properties