New to Red5 Pro? 6 Frequently Asked Questions and Responses

New to live streaming with Red5 Pro? This one’s for you! Learning to use a new product can be challenging. To help you get started, we’ve rounded up some of the most commonly asked questions from new customers. Find our answers below.

1. Does Red5 Pro require an SSL certificate?

This depends on your streaming protocol. RTMP and HLS streaming can be used without an SSL certificate, however WebRTC requires SSL for secure streaming.

WebRTC was designed with security as a top priority, and because encryption is a mandatory feature of WebRTC, an SSL certificate is required for streaming. You will need to set up SSL as part of our WebRTC implementation. Please see our documentation outlining this process.

SSL is important because it allows you to have a secure HTTPS connection when using WebRTC, ensuring that your data is protected while streaming. Keep in mind that to access your server, you will need to use the domain URL associated with the SSL certificate for that server (for example, https://www.my-website-name.com/).

2. What ports need to be open and on which protocol? AKA: Where’d my broadcast go?

One common reason users cannot see their broadcast is because they’re using the incorrect ports. Make sure you have opened the necessary ports for your streaming method. If you have any firewalls up, you will need to allow port access on both the server and firewall.

See the list of default streaming ports for the most common protocols below:

• 5080 : default HTTP access of Red5 Pro
• 443 : modified HTTPS port
• 1935 : default Red5 Pro RTMP port
• 8554 : default Red5 Pro RTSP port
• 6262 : websockets for HLS
• 8088: second screen client registry
• 40,000 – 65535 : TURN/STUN/ICE port range for WebRTC (UDP)
• Note: If you need to connect to your server remotely, you will also need to open port 22 to connect via Secure Shell (SSH).

If you need to use non-standard ports, you can! Check out our guide on Using Non-Standard Ports from the Red5 Pro documentation website.

3. Why do I see a blank screen during local testing?

If you are seeing a blank screen during local testing, please make sure that you are running all your devices on the same network (using the same IP address or host). If you are using mobile devices, make sure the IP address is from your wireless connection. All devices must be on the same network to test your stream locally.

Please note that this is only a limitation of testing locally. If you deploy on a server (AWS, Google Cloud, etc.) your devices do not need to be on the same network to stream as expected. Alternatively, you can open up your local server if your Internet Service Provider allows you to publicly access the IP address. For this option, you will have to ensure that the necessary ports are open on that network.

4. What is Slack/How do I get support through Slack?

Slack is a great resource for support, both from the Red5 Pro team and our excellent community.

The Red5 Pro Community Slack Channel is an open text chat channel available to all Red5 Pro users. It is divided into several categories, including android-sdk, aws, google-compute, html5-webrtc-sdk, ios-sdk, server-side, stream-manager and general.

To use Slack, post your questions in the appropriate categories to receive the best answers. Upon posting, members of the Red5 Pro community will respond to your question as they are available. Red5 Pro staff also monitor the public channels and will post answers and information as needed.

Collaboration is at the foundation of Red5 Pro. Through the Slack channels, we encourage teamwork within our development community. If you haven’t already registered for Red5 Pro support through Slack, you can do so here:

• Through your License Account: Accounts (See the button on the left side)
• Through the Red5 Pro Slack URL: Red5 Pro Slack Signup

Already registered with us? Sign into the Red5 Pro Slack channels at Red5 Pro Slack Login.

5. Why can’t I log in and view my support tickets?

So you’ve submitted a support request and you wish to edit it, respond, or view all of your open tickets, but your login doesn’t seem to be working. What’s going on?

Red5 Pro uses Zendesk for our Customer Support tickets. This is a separate system from the Red5 Pro server account system. Therefore, the two systems do not share login credentials. The username and password for your Red5 Pro server will not log you into the support ticket system.

When you submit a support ticket, the email you used to submit it is automatically registered with Zendesk. If you want to access your tickets via Zendesk in order to close, respond to, or edit the ticket, the only thing you have to do is set a password. To change or set up a password manually, you can go to the Red5 Service Desk and click on the Sign In button on the top right corner. This will bring you to a sign-in dialogue, where you should click “Have you emailed us? Get a password.”

Set your password, login with your new credentials, and you can easily read, respond to, and edit your tickets!

6. Can I have a video conference with multiple people? Is Red5 Pro the right fit for my use case?

Yes, you can use Red5 Pro for your multi-person conferencing use case! See our conference examples for the WebRTC SDK, Android SDK and iOS SDK. This is a great option for applications related to education, meetings, group calls with friends, and more.

For more Frequently Asked Questions, please visit our FAQ homepage.

Running into an issue you don’t see listed? Contact us via Slack, or consider submitting a support ticket to our team.

Red5 Pro is an adaptable solution for a wide variety of use cases. If you have any questions about whether Red5 Pro is the right product for you, please feel free to reach out to us anytime at info@red5.net or schedule a call. We would love to hear from you!