install nginx-rtmp under Linux

The nginx webserver is pretty lightweight and can be build with the addition of a rtmp-module. This module adds a whole “media server” to nginx. The feature list is pretty extensive and can be found here.
I got help by dodgepong’s guide on the OBS forum, but I changed it very slightly and will add some parts. First of all I am doing this setup on Ubuntu 13.4/64bit with a simple standard installation running on a Virtual Machine. You can use VMware player or even grab a complete VirtualBox image which is already configured with nginx right here. If you are using your own Linux installation, no matter if its a VM or dedicated PC, you will need the following packages for the building of nginx+rtmp module.

sudo apt-get install build-essential libpcre3 libpcre3-dev libssl-dev

Next we need to grab the nginx sources and the latest rtmp module sources.

wget http://nginx.org/download/nginx-1.6.2.tar.gz

wget https://github.com/arut/nginx-rtmp-module/archive/master.zip

I tested nginx version 1.2.7 and 1.4.2 so far without problems. Now lets extract both files to setup the make file.

tar -zxvf nginx-1.6.2.tar.gz

unzip master.zip

cd nginx-1.6.2

Make sure all folder names are correct, you might have to change some settings according to the version you downloaded. To build and install nginx now with the rtmp-module, we have to configure the add-module parameter and then start building and finally install everything.

./configure --add-module=../nginx-rtmp-module-master

$ make

$ sudo make install

Thats it, if you get no error code you now have installed nginx+rtmp-module. You can use the following command to open the nginx.conf in a text editor (in my example gedit) with root privileges:

sudo gedit /usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf

In the next guide I will talk about different configuration options, but for now I will give you the most simple rtmp server code for the config, and of course the startup parameter:

rtmp { server { listen 1935; chunk_size 4096; application live { live on; record off; } } }

Add these line to the end of your nginx.conf. To start nginx, you just enter this line:

sudo /usr/local/nginx/sbin/nginx

And to stop nginx you use this:

Sudo /usr/local/nginx/sbin/nginx -s stop

And streaming to this server is just as simple:

Streaming Service: Custom

Server: rtmp://serverip/live

Play Path/Stream Key: test (or whatever)

Be sure to check out my second guide for some usage examples, and more info on how to stream to this server, or use it to forward streams. And as always, if you have questions, just post them below.