Transcoder

Docker container to transcode videos in mounted volume to H265

To run

1. Change the volume to point at your root media folder
2. docker-compose up -d

To view live transcoding

docker logs transcoder_transcoder_1 && docker attach --no-stdin transcoder_transcoder_1

(CTRL-C is safe to exit with)

Telegram notifications

1. Create a .env file
2. Set BOT_KEY and CHAT_ID variables
3. Recreate the container

Ignoring files

You can ignore files using .transcodeignore, which will make it not transcode any files in that directory or subdirectories.

Re-Transcoding H265 -> H265

By default, the option to re-transcode H265 -> H265 is disabled. You can turn it on by setting environment variable H265_TRANSCODE to true

The other variable H265_MB_H defines how many MB/h is your target. If a file is below that target, it will not attempt to re-transcode the file.

It uses the formula size / duration instead of the reported bit rate by ffmpeg, as it seems it is often incorrect and not representative of the resulting file size.

All Environment Variables

Variable	Description	Default
ROOT_PATH	The path of media to transcode (inside the container)	/media
BACKUP_DIR	The directory to copy original files for backup (inside ROOT_PATH)	.backup
BOT_KEY	The Telegram bot key
CHAT_ID	The Telegram chat ID to report to
HOST	The Host to specify in Telegram messages
CRF	The Constant Rate Factor quality setting. Lower number, better quality	16
H265_TRANSCODE	Whether to re-transcode H265 content	false
H265_MB_H	Minimum MB/h to attempt to re-transcode H265 content	1000