Can't Establish Video Calls on MSN

[Andrew Bancroft]

Binary package hint: empathy

When I try to establish a video call with an MSN user, I can see my webcam, but not the other user's. The other user see's two 'No Webcam' symbols. If they initiate the video call the same thing happens.

[postenga (gustavovasconcelos)]

Some bug for me

[Dr. Kenobi (drkenobi)]

Audio and video calls is not working at the moment. You can find more information at http://live.gnome.org/Empathy/FAQ#Does_Empathy_support_audio_and_video_chat.3F

I'm closing this bug. Thank you for helping make Ubuntu better. Cheers!

[Tony Pursell (ajpursell)]

As far as I know, this is not true. That FAQ is out of date. Work has since been done to enable the new peer to peer MSN service in empathy and was made available in Ubuntu version 10.10.

Are you using 10.10? If you are, please say if this bug is still affecting you.

[papukaija (papukaija)]

We'd like to figure out what's causing this bug for you, but we haven't heard back from you in a while. Could you please provide the requested information? Thanks!

[Tony Pursell (ajpursell)]

Hi

I have been following this problem over many recent versions of Ubuntu. The position as far as I understand it is that the new MSN P2P method of working has been implemented but there still are problem with NAT traversal that haven't been resolved yet. This means I can have a full AV chat with my wife, who is on our local network in the same room, but not with my brother over the wide area network in another town.

My information comes from a recent enquiry I made on #papyon on irc.

Tony

[papukaija (papukaija)]

What versions do you mean by "recent versions of Ubuntu"? The audio/video support for MSN isn't very promising at the moment: According to http://telepathy.freedesktop.org/wiki/Protocols%20Support and the aMSN blog referred in Empathy's FAQ (link in comment 2), MS has removed the necessary servers for MSN audio/video chat. A newer blog post at http://www.amsn-project.net/blog/2010/12/amsn-0-98-4-is-out/ mentions that the support will arrive with aMSN 0.99.

[Tony Pursell (ajpursell)]

By "recent versions of Ubuntu", I mean the last 4 or 5 versions of Ubuntu - am currently on version 11.04.

The comment about MSN removing its servers is very old news. I don't know why the Protocols Support list still refers to it as it certainly is not the current reason why MSN AV chat is non-functional over a WAN. As I said, it is completely functional on a local area network.

It is my understanding that both Empathy and aMSN use the package python-papyon. So when aMSN 0.99 arrives with full AV chat, Empathy will have it too.

The papyon project is at

http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/papyon

if you want to follow this up.

[DarkRedman (darkredman-deactivatedaccount)]

I've the samebug on Ubuntu 11.04 sometimes it shows the error "could not link source" sometimes the video call window crash but not empathy itself.

And most of time if freezes the sound server (banshee freeze) and the sound panel configuration tells me to wait for the audio serveur.

That's not a normal behavior !

[Bilal Shahid (s9iper1)]

Thank you for taking time in filing the bug to make ubuntu better.
can you please attach the empathy audio video log file with the bugs report?
you can get it from help==> debugg menu

[papukaija (papukaija)]

This is a known upstream issue. Please see comment #6 and earlier for details.

[Bilal Shahid (s9iper1)]

Thank you for your bug report. This bug has been reported to the developers of the software. You can track it and make comments

[Bilal Shahid (s9iper1)]

Binary package hint: empathy 11.10 version
empathy 3.2

When I try to establish a video call with an MSN user, I can see my webcam, but not the other user's. The other user see's two 'No Webcam' symbols. If they initiate the video call the same thing happens.

[Omer Akram (om26er)]

thats not a bug in telepathy-haze also since telepathy-butterfly (the one related to MSN) is being depreciated since xmpp support was added by M$ so i see less hope for this bug being fixed.

[Tony Pursell (ajpursell)]

Lets get this straight - Empathy has many layers associated with each protocol. The package which handles MS calls, including video calls, is called python-papyon.

I'm going to try an get an update from the papyon people and maybe do some testing.

From my point of view this is an important problem for Ubuntu as part of the solution to bug #1

[Tony Pursell (ajpursell)]

I have asked for the current position with MS Live audio/visual calls on #papyon. I was told that the current problem is with the proprietary codecs that MS Live is using.

These are the WMV3 video codec and the Siren audio codec (see http://imfreedom.org/wiki/MSN:AV). This explains the 'Can't establish video stream' message I get.

I don't think these codecs are available in the gstreamer plugins packages (good, bad and ugly).

[David Anthony Elston (drowz0r)]

This is definitely an issue in empathy not just MSN.

I find I cannot open video calls to:

MSN users correctly
Other Empathy users correctly
Facebook users at all

BUT

I can connect to an MSN user who is logged into ebuddy instead of the usual msn client.

[Tony Pursell (ajpursell)]

David

This bug is about AV calls in MSN with MS Live Messenger users. I suppose it is possible to use an MSN connection with someone not using MS Live Messenger, but using some other IM client, because you can then negotiate a codec that will work. However, as far as I understand it, MS Live Messenger will only work with the proprietary WMV3 video and the Siren audio codecs. ebuddy is, of course, a web based IM client, so who knows how it works.

If you have problems establishing AV calls with other protocols, then please open a new bug for them.

Tony

[Bilal Shahid (s9iper1)]

marking this bug as invalid because now telepathy butterfly is replaced by telepathy haze's so if any body has the bug in newest version they must file a new bug in telepathy haze's
thanks