# User Support > Forum Software Support >  Embedding YouTube & Vimeo Videos Redux

## Scott Tichenor

Providing detailed instructions on adding YouTube and Vimeo videos as I'm seeing folks with questions on how and new members that haven't figured it out. Embedding is preferred over a link because the latter requires you to leave the forum and if the video has been removed, you find out after clicking the link and going to YouTube or Vimeo--inconvenient, unnecessary and detracts from the flow of a discussion.

*Step 1* - Go to Advanced Posting mode. At the bottom of each thread or if you click the + Reply to Thread button (top left of each thread) you are placed in Quick Reply mode (not what you want). Click Go Advanced (lower right). Your posting area should now look like this below, only we've highlighted the YouTube and Vimeo buttons you're going to use to embed your video.

*This is what an Advanced posting window looks like:*


*Step 2* - Embedding YouTube and Vimeo is essentially identical but we'll show that below. To embed a YouTube video, you first need to acquire the YouTube video ID. Here's what you're going to see in your browser when you're at a YouTube page. Every web browser has an address or URL field. We've highlighted the video ID for you underlined in red:



*Step 3* - Copy _only_ the video ID, click the YouTube button in the Advanced window and paste the video ID into the dialogue box you received by clicking the YouTube button. Example:



*Step 4* - Click OK and your video is successfully embedded and you're ready to post.

*Same process as above demonstrated for Vimeo*

Vimeo video ID underlined in red as shown in a browser address or URL field:



Vimeo dialogue box you received after click the Vimeo icon in Advance Posting mode:



*The most important part of this tutorial:*

_Yes_, there are other ways to get videos to work, but _unless you're doing it exactly as shown here, there's no promise that video will be displayed properly in the future_. Example: Vimeo recently changed the way they allow their videos to be embedded. For old videos posted correctly in the past, those will now display on phones and hand-held devices. Cool! For those old Vimeo videos that are visible in the browser but were not added correctly, sorry--they don't display at all. Boooooo.

Look, we don't care if you just want to provide a link instead of embedding, but conversations flow better when videos are embedded, and embedded correctly. If you want someone to see a video you're interested in, the first rule is don't make them click on a link unless you just have to because half (or more) won't. This is one of the oldest and wisest known usability truths on the web. 

Questions? Post them here or post test videos of your own below. And for fun, here are the two videos we used to prepare this tutorial. Got an iPhone? Check out the Vimeo video on it. That rocks.

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Loretta Callahan, 

Stephen Porter

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## Scott Tichenor

A video we did recently on how to properly embed videos.

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## John Ritchhart

I assume this is why a lot of videos are just black screens and don't boot up when I click the red arrow?

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## Scott Tichenor

> I assume this is why a lot of videos are just black screens and don't boot up when I click the red arrow?


I don't understand what you're trying to say. This is a tutorial for how to properly embed videos. There are ways to do it improperly that work sometimes and sometimes don't but it doesn't impact the start button. The video either displays--or it does not. If you're having problems with videos playing locally on your personal computer it wouldn't be related to this tutorial.

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## John Ritchhart

OK thanks Scott. What I'm seeing is a black screen with a red start arrow button in it. But the button doesn't do anything. The videos that work for me are ones that I can see the first picture frame in.

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## Bill Snyder

That did not work so never mind.

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## Scott Tichenor

> Scott, when I try to embbed a video from youtube, click on the icon , I do not get a subject bar, only this...
> 
> [YOUTUBE[/YOUTUBE]
> 
> What am I doing wrong?


I don't know. I turned off the pop-up blocker in my browser (FireFox) and it still worked. All I can suggest is view the video tutorial carefully, here's the larger version. It does in fact work. There are thousands of videos embedded within the forum with dozens added daily between the forum and social groups so your browser is either badly outdated or has some setting preventing it from functioning as you wish.

Alternately you can use the video embed button (with the three stick figures, between the YouTube and Vimeo link) and enter the entire web address there, but if you're browser isn't showing the dialogue box this isn't going to help you.

I guess this answers the issue directly above this post as well. If you don't think it works then, there you go. There's no voodoo or secret technical trick here. Pretty basic, but you do need to follow either the written instructions above at the start of this thread or view the video tutorial.

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## Charles E.

Testing Testing

It turned out I had a javascript error on the page, I am blessed to have a techie wife.

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## Charles E.

Testing, testing

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## dmcginnis

Hello - I want to upload a video but have not made friends with establishing a Vimeo or YouTube account.  I recorded the videos on my iPad.  Can someone provide help in how to move a video from my iPad camera roll to a Mandolin Cafe thread?

From the technically challenged...

Thanks,
Dave

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## Scott Tichenor

> Hello - I want to upload a video but have not made friends with establishing a Vimeo or YouTube account.  I recorded the videos on my iPad.  Can someone provide help in how to move a video from my iPad camera roll to a Mandolin Cafe thread?
> 
> From the technically challenged...
> 
> Thanks,
> Dave


Dave, videos need to first be uploaded and then hosted by a YouTube, Vimeo or similar site. Videos that appear on this site (and most others) are not actually hosted by the site. They're uploaded to YouTube, Vimeo or others and then _embedded_ into our forum using the instructions provided starting at the opening post of this thread (ie, they're made to appear on this site even though the physical video does not actually reside on our site--it's like TV--the film doesn't reside inside your television but rather is transmitted to your home). Those sites do a far better job instructing you than we can. This may sound confusing--the best way to learn is to first open an account on YouTube and follow their uploading instructions.

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## sunburst

_<this comment has nothing to do with the issue at hand. if you wish to start a separate discussion about technical difficulties involving internet use, please do so in the General Mandolin Discussion area. this area of the forum is for support and those seeking assistance with questions about forum use, not personal statements bemoaning the perceived difficulties of internet use.>_

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## dmcginnis

Thanks, Scott - I appreciate you taking the time to reinforce your previous instructions.  I guess I will have to work on the YouTube or Vimeo account.

Dave

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## delsbrother

OK, I thought I followed the tutorial correctly when I posted these embedded videos from YouTube, but Pete subsequently posted that they didn't work and posted a "corrected" YouTube embed instead.. I can see both videos - mine and Pete's - fine on my browser (IE), so I don't know what exactly I did wrong. Also, I find it interesting the the same videos appear to be different sizes (aspect ratio? resolution?) on my post compared to Pete's.  ??

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## Larry S Sherman

Hi Delsbrother,

I can see the three videos you embedded just fine in my browser. I'm on a mac using Google Chrome, and they also are fine in Firefox.

I don't know why Pete couldn't see them.

Larry

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## Scott Tichenor

> OK, I thought I followed the tutorial correctly when I posted these embedded videos from YouTube, but Pete subsequently posted that they didn't work and posted a "corrected" YouTube embed instead.. I can see both videos - mine and Pete's - fine on my browser (IE), so I don't know what exactly I did wrong. Also, I find it interesting the the same videos appear to be different sizes (aspect ratio? resolution?) on my post compared to Pete's.  ??


Your videos are visible. 

There are two ways to insert videos. For the best chance your video will still be displayed for the long-term (people rarely consider this important but it is) you want to use the YouTube and Vimeo tools to add videos from those sites which the tutorial here addresses. If those sites ever change the rules of how videos are embedded or the links to them we can likely alter the programming on our end so they continue to display. This has already happened once. The general video embed link is a catch-all for all kinds of video hosting sites and doesn't have that capability so if the web URL changes or is not forwarded correctly or other rules of where it is hosted change then the video will more than likely not display. There are people here that may try to tell you they're identical. They are not. My recommendation is to continue to embed as you did on the thread you linked to.

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## Beanzy

Since moving over to an iPad I can't use the YouTube button  to embed videos, as it just crashes and closes my Safari browser. Luckily reopening the browser takes me back to the thread being edited. Is there something in the YouTube button that I need to alter settings on my browse to get it to work without crashing out the browser?

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## Scott Tichenor

> Since moving over to an iPad I can't use the YouTube button  to embed videos, as it just crashes and closes my Safari browser. Luckily reopening the browser takes me back to the thread being edited. Is there something in the YouTube button that I need to alter settings on my browse to get it to work without crashing out the browser?


Can't think of anything to suggest. I tested this on my Apple devices and it seems to work fine. Might try rebooting your iPad.

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## Clinton Johnson

Testing iphone

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## dang

> *The most important part of this tutorial:*
> 
> _Yes_, there are other ways to get videos to work, but _unless you're doing it exactly as shown here, there's no promise that video will be displayed properly in the future_.


I read this thread a little bit ago and didn't realize I have been doing it wrong the whole time.  My misunderstanding!

So if I use the "Insert Video" function and paste my Youtube link _in whole_ like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-fLkS0oPxI

instead of using just the Video ID tag at the end into the YouTube Embed function (like this):

Q-fLkS0oPxI

My videos may not show up in the future if Youtube changes any of the text before the = sign???? Like any of this part? :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=

Why would they change that???? Anyway...

So only use the video ID tag, and it should work in the future, like (hopefully) this:



Sorry Scott, I think I get it now.  And I see why you advocate for just using the video ID tag.  Just when I thought I knew what I was doing...

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## Mark Gunter

Testing embed methods:

1. Advanced Editor, YouTube button, video id only:


2. Advanced Editor, YouTube button, entire YouTube URL:
_This produced a malformed, doubled URL, removed._

3. Simple Editor BBCode VIDEO tag:



----------------------

The quick editor method is creating an iframe embed method, whereas the advanced editor method is using the object tag for embedding a flash object.

Scott, is this what you mean about not using the quick edit video button, is the iframe method anathema to phone browsers?

I've been using the quick edit button because it works and I was unaware I needed to read this thread to embed properly here, but yesterday a member posted in Newbies group and I couldn't see his video while others could. He claimed to have read this thread and used the advanced method. I came here to see what your instructions are and to test, but I can see the videos both ways here.

This post is a couple years old now, can you confirm that BBCode VIDEO should not be used, and BBCode YOUTUBE=??? is always preferred?

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## Mark Gunter

I just checked on my iPhone 5 and both the videos in my last post are viewable. The thumbnail for the video created by the advanced editor code is cropped to fit the mobile screen, whereas the one for the video created by the quick editor code is not, it goes off the screen. Tapping the thumbnails in either case opens the video in exactly the same manner on my phone.

Updated:
Sorry Scott, I had missed this post, which makes your thinking clear:



> There are two ways to insert videos. For the best chance your video will still be displayed for the long-term (people rarely consider this important but it is) you want to use the YouTube and Vimeo tools to add videos from those sites which the tutorial here addresses. If those sites ever change the rules of how videos are embedded or the links to them we can likely alter the programming on our end so they continue to display. This has already happened once. The general video embed link is a catch-all for all kinds of video hosting sites and doesn't have that capability so if the web URL changes or is not forwarded correctly or other rules of where it is hosted change then the video will more than likely not display. There are people here that may try to tell you they're identical. They are not. My recommendation is to continue to embed as you did on the thread you linked to.


I have one final comment, isn't it possible to add the "good" buttons to the quick editor? These things are usually configurable by the web developer. I think it would be great if you could make those buttons available in the editor outside of advanced mode. Some of your visitors can easily and intuitively understand how to post a video in the quick editor, and so they will not be likely to seek this thread out and find this information. Having the "good" buttons in the quick editor would help a great deal.

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## Mark Gunter

Just a follow-up to my last post, last paragraph, to say that I have noticed an inconsistency here in the HTML Editor's toolbars. I've noticed that when I post a new discussion inside a social group, the editor's toolbar already has the buttons for youtube, etc. without going into advanced mode. That is cool, and very convenient.

Then, when replying to an already existing discussion in a social group, the editor does not have the youtube button in the toolbar, instead you have to proceed to the advanced state to get it. Not cool. And throughout the rest of the forum, it behaves this way.

So once again I'm asking, can't you enable the youtube button in the toolbar of the editor at all times, so that we do not need to go to advanced mode to use it? As a web developer I have customized tool bars on these editors and I know how simple this is to do, generally speaking, so once again just making this request.

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## Mandolin Cafe

I want to be sure I understand your request. Are you saying we're asking too much to click the Reply or Advanced buttons highlighted in red for social groups?

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## Mark Gunter

_<cheap shot. take it elsewhere>_

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