HTTP streaming
As HTTP streaming refers to the delivery of streaming media - files via a conventional web server . The web server is used as a simple file server for the delivery of small parts of the entire file, so-called segments. The files can be stored in different quality levels on the web server. The terminal can change these levels depending on the available bandwidth , so that z. B. Streaming is also possible in poorly developed cellular networks.
The Mobile Safari for Apple's iPhone uses the first browser that procedure. It was also built into Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard and QuickTime X.
Flash Player 10.1 (released October 2009) allows HTTP streaming and hardware decoding of H.264 videos.
Live streaming can be realized via HTTP Live Streaming (also known as HLS) , an HTTP-based streaming protocol. First the source, e.g. B. the webcam, sent through an encoder that creates an H.264 video. This video is now broken down by a "media segmenter" into parts of the same duration. The resulting partial files are then delivered by the web server with at least the time delay that is required to encode the video, segment and download it in at least one partial file.
Web links
- Current version of the RFC Draft on the subject
- Article on applied HTTP live streaming
- Mobile Safari and HLS