Hello,<br>In the following months, I am participating in the Google Summer of Code (GSoC). My project evolves around improving web streaming for open media formats and is mentored by Conrad Parker. The goal of the project is to write a FastCGI module that accepts ranged requests for smaller segments of media resources, using the liboggz library to perform the actual Ogg crunching.<br>
<br>There are a lot of ideas about features to include in the streaming application, ranging from caching the requested ranges using memcached to scriptability allowing the user to implement custom operations like analytics or authentication in Python. To make sure we'll end up with a working, useful project at the end of the summer, however, the initial focus will be to create a fast, scalable prototype of the basic streaming functionality with support for the Lighttpd web server.<br>
<br>There is a lot of work left to be done on the server end when it comes to supporting open media formats and with this project I'm hoping to make a contribution to that effort. Web browser support for open formats is increasing, thanks to Mozilla Firefox, so offering the right tools on the server end to enable publishers to adopt these open formats is key. It would be wonderful if, in a few years, proprietary multimedia technology on the web will be considered an awkward anachronism people had to put up with in the 1990's.<br>
<br>Apart from introducing my project, I would also like to use this message to quickly introduce myself to the community. I am a 22 year old programmer from the Netherlands, currently attending Law School at Tilburg University. My background is in web development, using the Python language. After the summer, I'm planning to drop out of law school, to get back to programming full time, as my passion for code turns out to be stronger than my interest in Law.<br>
<br>Please contact me if you have any questions, comments, suggestions or even just some general encouraging words. I am quite new to this community and not deeply familiar with the different Xiph projects yet, so I could use any help I can get. Thank you for accepting my project, and I'm looking forward to working with the community to make this project succeed!<br>
<br>Regards,<br><br>Filip de Waard<br>