[icecast] Newbie question - on demand streaming?

[Contact @ musicmine.net]

Hi Jack,

Thnx for the feedback....a strong argument and I'll consider it.  Somewhat
puzzled you're making a case for using Apache for on-demand streaming
though....since Icecast is your baby.  Is Icecast so inferior here?

And I agree that RTP will be a big leap forward.  There IS a server on the
way for this....check out http://www.danubio.org.

Rgds,

Steve Huckle

>> Well, a number of reasons.  Dedicated streamers are better at
>> streaming audio/video than webservers,
>
> In theory.  In practice this is not true.  Apache is far more robust
> than any streaming server I've seen yet, and far more stable.  Many of
> the scaling issues have been addressed, and the drawbacks are minimal.
>
> Streaming servers should be better for two reaosns.  1) they can be
> more efficient.  they are serving a very specific kind of data.   2)
> they can use protocols like RTP to improve quality.
>
> Neither of these things is true of any server yet.  Apache offers more
> functionality and works better than the alternatives for on demand
> streaming.
>
> Once more clients use RTP then there's a large case for using a
> streaming media server for on-demand as opposed to using apache.  As
> right now they both use TCP and most HTTP too, it's better to use the
> better tool.
>
>> al.  .m3u files suck (which is how I presume you feel I should be
>> streaming from my webserver).....I seem to remember you have to play
>> around with mime types et al.
>
> Use a simple cgi script or some such to autogenerate m3u's and set
> mimetypes correctly.  This is trivial.
>
>> Dedicated streaming gives me the ability to do livek
>> broadcasts and thus gives me greater flexability than just using my
>> webserver.
>
> I wasn't talking about live streams or even simulated live streams.
> I'm only proposing apache for on-demand streaming of static content.
> Hell, it even supports seeking.
>
>> Webservers are intended for delivering markup language and are
>> good at it.
>
> This was true years ago.  Webservers are now built for serving general
> data over the HTTP protocol.  They commonly do serve large files, and
> HTTP has replace FTP in most cases for file download.  Web server
> evolved to handle generic data more and more, and teh fact that they
> have been around forever, have lots of tool support, and lots of
> configurability makes them the right tool for the on-demand streaming
> job on today's internet.
>
>> Seperating duties tends to give a nicely cohesive environment...i.e.
>> My webserver dishes up web pages, my audio server dishes up audio.
>> Nice design principles in there somewhere.  etc etc.....I could go on.
>
> You can use the same argument a different way to argue for keeping them
> together.  They both travel over HTTP.  Use a common server.  When
> audio data starts getting pumped over RTP or some other non-HTTP
> protocol, then there is a strong case for not using a web server.
>
>> The reason I wanna go Icecast is that I'd like a truly GPL'd
>> environment, not some pseudo one like Shoutcast.
>
> Apache is also Free Software.
>
>> So lets just take it for given that I'm mad and that I'm gonna use a
>> dedicated streamer such as Icecast.  Can I make it behave like
>> Shoutcast's on demand feature detailed in my original mail?
>
> Yes.  The support is there, but it's not great.  The staticdir config
> option points to a dir of files.  And then you can access these at
> http://url:port/files/blah.mp3.  Note that it probably won't generate
> m3u's for you.  I have forgotten if it does that or not.
>
> jack.
>
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