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How to Allow Viewers to Download Your Video

Here’s how to enable your viewers to download your video in MediaSpace.

By default, viewers of your media aren't able to download any of your videos that you make visible. For each video, however, you have the option to allow your viewers to download it. Do note that this feature must currently be enabled on a video-by-video basis.

The way to download your video may not be obvious to many users, so you may need to instruct them how to do so. We've included those instructions as well.

Instructions

  1. If you're not already logged into MediaSpace, go to https://mediaspace.ucsd.edu, click "Guest" at the top right of the screen and select "Login." Enter your active directory credentials. The screen will refresh and "Guest" at the top of the screen will be replaced with your name.
  2. Click your name at the top of the screen and select "My Media."
  3. Locate the video that you want viewers to be able to download, and click the pencil icon on the right side of its row.
  4. Click the "Downloads" tab beneath the video preview. The information below the tab will repopulate. You should see several options (which Kaltura refers to as "flavors") for downloads that you can enable.

Download Quality Options

  • Source is the highest-quality version that you can download. It's the original file you uploaded, or that Kaltura Capture or Zoom created.
  • High quality enables a video download that's 1,920 pixels wide and 1,080 pixels tall (commonly referred to as "1080p") and has a target bitrate of 6,000 kilobits per second.
  • Medium quality enables a video download that's 1280 pixels wide and 720 pixels tall (commonly referred to as "720p") and has a target bitrate of 2,500 kilobits per second.
  • Low quality enables a video download that's 640 pixels wide and 360 pixels tall and has a target bitrate of 400 kilobits per second.
  • Audio only enables a video download that, while technically within an .mp4 container, contains only the audio from the original video at 128 kilobits per second.

Don't worry if you're not familiar with the specifications above. We recommend just checking all the options. Particularly for viewers in bandwidth-constrained areas, it's useful to have a variety of quality choices from which to choose.

Quality Levels May Not Exist

It's important to be aware of the fact that all quality options will present as options when enabling downloads even if the quality level doesn't actually exist. So if you only check, say, "Medium Quality," and that quality level doesn't exist on the back end, users might not be presented with that option for download. This is why we recommend that you check all the option qualities.

Why does this happen? Well, Kaltura refers to the various quality levels as "flavors." They have a complicated set of variables that they use to determine whether or not to generate a flavor (chiefly the quality of the source video), and if the criteria aren't met, then the flavor isn't created.

  1. Once you've selected your desired quality level(s) for the video download, be sure to click "Save" at the bottom of the screen.

A screenshot of the flavor download options.

Have additional questions about video? Contact Multimedia Services at kaltura@ucsd.edu.