Extracting thumbnail from server video url swift - ios

Question

Want to get thumbnail from video url for that I followed this code which is recommended on most of SO questions:
import AVFoundation
private func thumbnailForVideoAtURL(url: NSURL) -> UIImage? {
let asset = AVAsset(URL: url)
let assetImageGenerator = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
var time = asset.duration
time.value = min(time.value, 2)
do {
let imageRef = try assetImageGenerator.copyCGImageAtTime(time, actualTime: nil)
return UIImage(CGImage: imageRef)
} catch let error {
print(error)
return nil
}
}
Then my viewdidload method is like this:
override func viewDidLoad() {
super.viewDidLoad()
// Do any additional setup after loading the view, typically from a nib.
let url = NSURL(string: "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrKwx8EdSAE")
if let thumbnailImage = generateThumnail(url!) {
print("hello");
self.imageView.image = thumbnailImage;
}
self.view.addSubview(imageView);
}
But I am getting this error for all of my video urls:
Error Domain=AVFoundationErrorDomain Code=-11850 "Operation Stopped" UserInfo={NSUnderlyingError=0x7fb4a3c04870 {Error Domain=NSOSStatusErrorDomain Code=-12939 "(null)"}, NSLocalizedFailureReason=The server is not correctly configured., NSLocalizedDescription=Operation Stopped}
Can anyone suggest where I am doing wrong or this code is just for local videos? Also if there any alternatives please suggest.

Answer 1

I had go to a lot of places to have found the solution for this.
Basically you have to first get list of video id's(if you need to) and then use the following to get a page that returns a json with link to the actual thumbnail image.
Here is the api link for thumbnails:
https://api.dailymotion.com/video/x26ezrb?fields=thumbnail_medium_url,thumbnail_small_url,thumbnail_large_url
in the above URL, "x26ezrb" is the video id and the "fields" attributes defines the size for thumbnail image. Use the video id's to get their respective thumbnails.
if you hit this link "https://api.dailymotion.com/video/x26ezrb?fields=thumbnail_large_url" you'll get a json like below:
{"thumbnail_large_url":"http://s1.dmcdn.net/HRnTi/x240-oi8.jpg"}
Now all you have to do is parse this json to get the link and then use that link to get to the thumbnail.
NOTE: you have to convert the thumbnail link from "http" into "https" otherwise it won't return anything.
get the url from JSON, split it into components with separator ":" and then combine "https:" with second part of the split url string.