S2stream video not playing when logged out

#1

Hi everyone,

I’ve successfully set up the s2stream shortcode to play videos in my members area, although I’ve just realised that when a user/member is “logged out” and views one of the videos that is not in the members area, the video gives an error.

The error is a small black rectangular box with the wording “This video file cannot be played. (Error code: 102630)”

However… if the user logs back in and views that same video (which, to confirm, is not in the members area) it will play perfectly fine.

That particular error code on the JWplayer website gives absolutely no clue as to why the video, on a page not in the members area, can only be viewed when a member is logged into the website.

Is this hard-coded in, or is there a bug in the system?
Or is it something else?
Can anyone shed some light on the problem for me please because I’m going nuts trying to figure it out.

Thank you very much,
Mark

#2

Your members page is the only page that is never protected.

If you can view the videos on pages other than the members page then I would assume you have set up some content protections and not allowed the content to be played (otherwise why would you be using s2member!). What protection levels, restrictions have you set up for your site?

#3

Hi Tim, cheers for the reply.

I’m not quite following the first comment/line, as I have many pages on my site which are not protected by any level of membership and can be freely viewed by anyone. E.g., privacy information, terms and conditions, home page, optin funnel, etc. Are you able to clarify what you mean any further?

I guess in light of the first line that I’m not understanding I’m not quite clear on the context of your second paragraph. But what I will say, that your paragraph has made me need to clarify further, is that I’m also trying to use S2member as a video player for videos hosted on AmazonS3/Cloudfront. My thinking is that this functionality wasn’t necessarily built into the plugin to work site wide, but rather only on protected pages. What I’m after is definite confirmation of that one way or the other so I can either confirm the problem or mark that possibility off the list and continue looking for what the actual cause of the problem is.

Apologies for potentially misunderstanding you message, not trying to be thick.
Would appreciate any further insight you (or anyone) can give if you have any ideas.

Thanks very much,
Mark

#4

Regarding my comment about the member page…see https://s2member.com/kb-article/configuring-s2member-general-options/ . This was in your reference to your content being in the “members area”. I wasn’t sure if you were referring to the MOP which is a special page and thus may have special characteristics.

"The Login Welcome Page (LWP) will always require a logged-in Member . In fact, this Page will be protected from public access by s2Member automatically.

The Membership Options Page (MOP) is a unique WordPress Page you create where you will either place the s2Member Button or Pro-Form shortcodes you generate or place links to separate pages for selling multiple Membership options. Note : This Page must be public at all times. In fact, s2Member will not allow this Page to be restricted in any way.

W.r.t. functioning when logged in and not functioing when logged out…if you have a caching pkugin installed / enabled and you are caching pages for non-logged-in users you would need to fix that. You don’t want to cache the page that a streaming video is on.

#5

Hi again Tim,

Thanks for the info, I’ve been banging my head on the wall with this for days now and still can’t figure it out. I’m just assuming the plugin is badly coded at this point, or that it’s an intentional but crappy/pointless ‘feature’.

I’ll most likely just buy another plugin to make up for the problems I’m experiencing with S2Member.

Cheers,
Mark

#6

Good luck with your quest. Streaming video is always a challenge.

#7

Hi Mark.

If the problem happens when the user logs out, it seems like you protected the file with s2Member. A logged out user, i.e. guest, is not level 0 even. s2Stream works with files protected by s2Member. Public files would not be streamed from the protected s2Member files, you’d have them hosted normally without the added authentication.

Does that help understand the behavior or did I misunderstand your problem? :slight_smile: