bug: CWTV creating .ismv files all of a sudden

[jschwalbe]

• [X ] I've verified and I assure that I'm running youtube-dl 2017.04.16
• [X ] Bug report (encountered problems with youtube-dl)

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When downloading certain shows from CWTV I've noticed that often the file type is .ismv rather than .mp4. Once I re-ran the command and that fixed it but lately not so. I've tried on two different machines (both macOS). Strangely enough, other CWTV programs do work.
Any ideas?
Thanks! Log below.

$ youtube-dl -v "http://www.cwtv.com/shows/dcs-legends-of-tomorrow/aruba/?play=280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c"
[debug] System config: []
[debug] User config: []
[debug] Custom config: []
[debug] Command-line args: [u'-v', u'http://www.cwtv.com/shows/dcs-legends-of-tomorrow/aruba/?play=280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c']
[debug] Encodings: locale UTF-8, fs utf-8, out UTF-8, pref UTF-8
[debug] youtube-dl version 2017.04.16
[debug] Python version 2.7.10 - Darwin-16.4.0-x86_64-i386-64bit
[debug] exe versions: ffmpeg 3.0.1, ffprobe 3.0.1, rtmpdump 2.4
[debug] Proxy map: {}
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Downloading JSON metadata
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Downloading m3u8 information
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Downloading JSON metadata
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Checking http-8628 URL
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: http-8628 URL is invalid, skipping
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Checking http-464 URL
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Checking http-664 URL
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Checking http-6628 URL
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: http-6628 URL is invalid, skipping
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Checking http-3596 URL
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Checking http-1296 URL
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Checking http-264 URL
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Checking http-5128 URL
[CWTV] 280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c: Downloading ISM manifest
[debug] Invoking downloader on u'http://cwsmooth-vod.hss.adaptive.level3.net/09f2b26a-1479-4802-abe3-acd38956ad8e/LegendsOfTomorrow-217-Aruba-T1320017-CW-Stereo.ism/manifest'
[ism] Total fragments: 1244
[download] Destination: Aruba-280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c.fmss-3372.ismv
[download] 100% of 1002.09MiB in 20:40
[debug] Invoking downloader on u'http://cwsmooth-vod.hss.adaptive.level3.net/09f2b26a-1479-4802-abe3-acd38956ad8e/LegendsOfTomorrow-217-Aruba-T1320017-CW-Stereo.ism/manifest'
[ism] Total fragments: 1242
[download] Destination: Aruba-280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c.fmss-aac_UND_2_127-127.isma
[download] 100% of 39.11MiB in 04:21
[ffmpeg] Merging formats into "Aruba-280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c.ismv"
[debug] ffmpeg command line: ffmpeg -y -i file:Aruba-280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c.fmss-3372.ismv -i file:Aruba-280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c.fmss-aac_UND_2_127-127.isma -c copy -map 0:v:0 -map 1:a:0 file:Aruba-280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c.temp.ismv
Deleting original file Aruba-280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c.fmss-3372.ismv (pass -k to keep)
Deleting original file Aruba-280d9392-d40c-4a42-b1be-775316e9677c.fmss-aac_UND_2_127-127.isma (pass -k to keep)
<end of log>

Also - one might think that the url http://www.cwtv.com/shows/dcs-legends-of-tomorrow/aruba might work, but it fails as well:

$ youtube-dl -v "http://www.cwtv.com/shows/dcs-legends-of-tomorrow/aruba"
[debug] System config: []
[debug] User config: []
[debug] Custom config: []
[debug] Command-line args: [u'-v', u'http://www.cwtv.com/shows/dcs-legends-of-tomorrow/aruba']
[debug] Encodings: locale UTF-8, fs utf-8, out UTF-8, pref UTF-8
[debug] youtube-dl version 2017.04.16
[debug] Python version 2.7.10 - Darwin-16.4.0-x86_64-i386-64bit
[debug] exe versions: ffmpeg 3.0.1, ffprobe 3.0.1, rtmpdump 2.4
[debug] Proxy map: {}
[generic] aruba: Requesting header
WARNING: Falling back on generic information extractor.
[generic] aruba: Downloading webpage
[generic] aruba: Extracting information
ERROR: Unsupported URL: http://www.cwtv.com/shows/dcs-legends-of-tomorrow/aruba
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/local/bin/youtube-dl/youtube_dl/extractor/generic.py", line 1888, in _real_extract
    doc = compat_etree_fromstring(webpage.encode('utf-8'))
  File "/usr/local/bin/youtube-dl/youtube_dl/compat.py", line 2526, in compat_etree_fromstring
    doc = _XML(text, parser=etree.XMLParser(target=_TreeBuilder(element_factory=_element_factory)))
  File "/usr/local/bin/youtube-dl/youtube_dl/compat.py", line 2515, in _XML
    parser.feed(text)
  File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/xml/etree/ElementTree.py", line 1642, in feed
    self._raiseerror(v)
  File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/xml/etree/ElementTree.py", line 1506, in _raiseerror
    raise err
ParseError: not well-formed (invalid token): line 4, column 319
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/local/bin/youtube-dl/youtube_dl/YoutubeDL.py", line 760, in extract_info
    ie_result = ie.extract(url)
  File "/usr/local/bin/youtube-dl/youtube_dl/extractor/common.py", line 429, in extract
    ie_result = self._real_extract(url)
  File "/usr/local/bin/youtube-dl/youtube_dl/extractor/generic.py", line 2750, in _real_extract
    raise UnsupportedError(url)
UnsupportedError: Unsupported URL: http://www.cwtv.com/shows/dcs-legends-of-tomorrow/aruba

[dstftw]

This is expected. If you don't want ism (that is bestaudio/bestvideo) to be downloaded then setup format selection appropriately.

[jschwalbe]

Can you comment what .ismv is? The link you showed me doesn't mention it at all.. Thanks!

[dstftw]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_bitrate_streaming#Microsoft_Smooth_Streaming

[Chariblaze]

Does is matter that bestvideo+bestaudio isn't the best quality overall on this site? At least if filesize is an indication:

http://www.cwtv.com/shows/supergirl/nevertheless-she-persisted/?play=acdc4520-b0f3-47c9-8bdc-b8245f1fb351

Nevertheless, She Persisted-acdc4520-b0f3-47c9-8bdc-b8245f1fb351.ismv | 1.05 GB
Nevertheless, She Persisted-acdc4520-b0f3-47c9-8bdc-b8245f1fb351.mp4 | 1.47 GB

I got the second one with -f best. bestvideo+bestaudio as default is good for YouTube, but does it work here if it's downloading a lower-quality format that most players can't handle out-of-the-box (tried PotPlayer, VLC, WMP)?