EngageMedia and Unweb have made a preliminary copy of the Burnstation prototype available for you to experiment with on the Plumi test site. As you might expect from a prototype, it has a very basic front end but the concept is there. You can select a number of videos from the site then create a DVD ISO file that you can download then burn onto a DVD.

The Prototype Read Me file on the Plumi Wiki will give you an idea of how to use the system (see the How to use section). We will be creating a more detailed guide to using the prototype shortly.

Please feel free to try out the site and send an email to the plumi-discuss mailing list or post a comment in #plumi to let us know how you went. We’ll update this blog when there’s more news about our progress with the Burnstation prototype.

When first envisaged for Plumi, the Burnstation module was to produce either VCD or DVD format discs for distribution. During the design of the prototype, it was decided to focus solely on DVD format discs for the following reasons:

• DVD is more popular than VCD and more people are likely to have DVD players than VCD players
• DVDs use mpeg2 encoding providing a higher quality and more compressed file than the mpeg1 encoding used by VCDs
• No need to ask the user to select VCD or DVD

The Burnstation prototype will take video files that have been mpeg2 encoded by the transcode daemon (as normal), convert them to VOBs and then produce a DVD ISO file using the tovid utility.

The restriction to solely produce DVD format discs will also need to be reassessed. Research is required to determine whether the VCD platform is still common in Indonesia and other parts of Asia or whether it has been replaced by DVD players and is no longer required.

EngageMedia and Unweb have started development work on a prototype of a Burnstation module for Plumi. This module will allow a Plumi system to burn DVDs of videos from its collection.

Derived from the concept behind the original audio based Burnstation that provides disc burning systems in public places, the intention of this Plumi module is to facilitate distribution of video content to areas where Internet connections may not support streaming video online, or provide additional distribution options.

The Burnstation module will allow someone using a Plumi based system to select a list of videos and burn them to a DVD. At first we are producing a prototype system that will demonstrate the feasibility of taking a selection of Plumi hosted videos and producing an ISO format DVD image that can be burnt to disc using any standard disc production software. While the prototype will perform the bare minimum functions required, the final version will include a streamlined interface, total disc size checking and more.

We will produce further blog entries about the Burnstation project to capture the decisions we make during design & implementation of the prototype. Watch this space!