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How to enable GIF Screen Recordings and install FFmpeg

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Timo Josten
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Dropshare 3.12 and newer

Dropshare supports GIF Screen Recordings when a statically linked version of FFmpeg is installed on your machine.

Step 1: Install statically linked version of FFmpeg

Please download a statically-linked build of FFmpeg from the official website. Unzip the archive with an app of your choice (we recomment The Unarchiver, a free and useful unarchiving app which supports 7-ZIP), and move the FFmpeg binary to the following location in Terminal.app:

sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/bin # making sure the target directory exists
mv ffmpeg /usr/local/bin/ffmpeg-static # moving ffmpeg to the target directory

Step 2: Remove quatantine flag from ffmpeg binary

As you might know, Mac OS X and Gatekeeper threat software downloaded from the internet with a quarantine status. In order that Dropshare is able to execute FFmpeg to convert your screen recording to a GIF file, you need to remove that quarantine status from the ffmpeg-static binary:

xattr -d com.apple.quarantine /usr/local/bin/ffmpeg-static

You can now enable the "Convert to GIF" checkbox in Dropshare for Mac.

Possible Issues and Workarounds

Dropshare tells me it cannot find ffmpeg-static although I installed it according to the user guide.

There is a known issue with custom python installations which we will address in a future update. In case you've installed python e.g. with homebrew, a possible workaround is to edit the shebang of /usr/bin/xattr to point to the system version of python, or to uninstall the custom python version with homebrew. Sorry for the inconvenience.

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  • Avatar
    Devon Blandin

    Another option if you're on a mac with homebrew installed:

    Moderator note: Please note that this only works for the Dropshare for Mac standalone version purchased from the website. Thanks!

    $ brew install ffmpeg
$ ln -s `which ffmpeg` /usr/local/bin/ffmpeg-static
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  • Avatar
    Travis

    Posting for others, in the event you run in to this problem.

    Dropshare was telling me it could not find ffmpeg-static. However, I could not figure out where the "system" version of Python was.

    In "/usr/bin/" you may find three "xattr" files there. "xattr", "xattr-2.6", "xattr-2.7". If you attempt to run xattr, you may see this error:

    '''
    python version 2.7.6 can't run ./xattr. Try the alternative(s):

    ./xattr-2.6 (uses python 2.6)
    ./xattr-2.7 (uses python 2.7)

    Run "man python" for more information about multiple version support in
    Mac OS X.
    '''

    Interestingly, xattr-2.6 contains the "system" version of Python. So, I expected modifying the "xattr" script to include the shebang from xattr-2.6, but that didn't work.

    Instead, do this: 

    cd /usr/bin
sudo mv xattr xattr_bak
sudo ln -s xattr-2.6 xattr

    Now enable GIF exports. Worked for me, but know that your mileage may vary depending on your system setup.

    If this breaks something, you can easily revert:

    cd /usr/bin
sudo rm xattr
sudo mv xattr_bak xattr
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