Streaming via http

05-10-2007 3:02 PM |

Hello Group,

I tried to stream via my Windows Media Server using a Uri like 'mms://server/<node>/myvideo.wmv -> I had no luck.

After reading, that silverlight (V 1.1) does not support the mms protocol, I tried http via my webserver -> Superb, everything fine.

But, as we want to stream a real live stream, streaming via webserver does not work out, so I configured my media server to support http access using port 10000. I could successfully open the url (http://server:10000/node/myvideo.wmv) in Windows Media Player, but - again - this Uri did not work out in silverlight.

Does anybody out here knows the magic trick to get a live stream from wms up and running in silverlight???

Thanks for any help!,

Olav

Re: Streaming via http

05-14-2007 3:20 PM |

Streaming via http is not supported in either the beta or alpha of silverlight.  For now the http: part of the url is only supported for progressive download from a Webserver.  If you would like to stream using a windows media server you must use mms: as the protocol listed in your url.   This is only temporary I am told. If you are trying to do a "broadcast publishing point" ie. Server-side playlist mms streaming does not currently work and will not show any video.    It should however work fine from a media encoder pushing out a "broadcast" stream.   Hope that helps.

PS. Please "mark as answered" if this has answered your question.

Re: Streaming via http

05-14-2007 4:36 PM |

hello,
i have a similar requirement.  however, i'm trying to stream my audio playlist from a shoutcast server in the form of http://myserver.com:port/listen.pls or http://myserver.com:port/listen.asx.

will this work?  if not, what suggestions might you have to accomplish this?
 

Re: Streaming via http

05-14-2007 10:01 PM |

I have not tried shoutcast but I expect it will not work, the issue being reading of a shoutcast playlist before they have built in windows media server support.  However an asx "client side" playlist should work as long as the videos listed are either http:// for progressive download or mms:// for windows media streaming server.  A server side broadcast from a windows media server will work if rebroadcasted through another broadcast point.  It will stop however at each playlist show end.  This is a silverlight bug and is expected to be fixed over the next few releases.

Re: Streaming via http

05-15-2007 7:00 AM |

So, I finaly made it...

Somehow strange to me but using mms:// in the Uri does not mean, the client will connect to the mms port using mms protocol. It just indicates, that the client should try to stream (so far I understand the posting: http://silverlight.net/forums/t/586.aspx) as Silverlight does not support mms at all.

So, if your Windows Media Server runs http protocoll on port 10000 the correct and working Uri for a live streams is:
mms://server:10000/<Publishing_Point>/

Have fun,

Olav

Re: Streaming via http

05-16-2007 5:25 PM |

You got it.  mms: currently just denotes a streaming server, whereas http:// denotes a progressive download from a webserver.   This is only a temporary fix by the silverlight team and should be fixed in a upcoming release.  If you are doing http:// from a streaming server you still must use mms:// and of course any additional port numbers if changed from the standard of 80.   Again, broadcast publishing points (Server-side-Playlists) are not currently supported and at best will only play one video in the playlist before stoping. 

Re: Streaming via http

05-18-2007 11:23 AM |

I think what they're doing is actually having the browser handle any and all HTTP traffic.

So the mediaElement itself does not have the capability to start a stream, and hence the lack of support for pretty much any and all features that make Windows Media Server what it is. The http / mms part of the url is simply a switching mechanism to tell silverlight that the datastream will be coming in a bit differently then from a regular webserver. Your browser does not support UDP and RTSP, or any of the mms roll over functionality, so neither does Silverlight.

This would also explain why the SL team, after saying they were working on server sided playlist support, have now gone back to stating that there are no plans to support that feature (later rephrased to "in the pipeline for a future version", which whatever way i turn it cannot be considered a serious rephrasing of "no plans to support"). Windows Media Player has a feature where it will wait for a publishing point to see if any more data will be sent, and this feature of Windows Media Player is critical for server sided playlists. Your browser does not have this functionality, so neither can SL.
That also means that if a user experiences any kind of hickups while receiving a stream that outlast the set buffertime, that's it for that stream ... SL will simply stop playing the stream without retrying for it. At this point I even doubt that it attempts to recover if a network glitch occurs while data is still in the buffer.
Let's wait and see if they're even able to implement Fast Start in this context.

The end result is pretty much that Windows Media Server support only exists as a bullet point on some powerpoint presentation. It's not real or usable in any shape or form to people who use the Windows Media Services seriously. Who does live streams without server sided playlists? Why host on-demand material on a streaming media server that has none of its key features supported?
What's even sadder is that now that we know that there will not be real support for Windows Media Server, go look at those Mix07 SL demos featuring video again, and tell me exactly which one of those concepts can actually make it to the market without real support for Windows Media Services.

You looked at the feature complete builds of Longhorn yet? The Windows Media bits on there are the same as on Windows 2003, there is exactly zero new functionality (minus a new UI for setting up a caching service that couldn't have taken more than 2 days to make).
The real question is a simple one. Why continue investment in a streaming media platform that MS itself is not investing in.

Re: Streaming via http

12-11-2007 3:05 AM |

Hi,

 I tried to play streams using on-demand as well as broadcast publishing points and I have http enabled on my streaming server but I am getting this error:

Access is denied. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80070005 (E_ACCESSDENIED))

Both publishing points work in windows media player. The urls are:

• mms:/MyServer:8080/OnDemand/pinball.wmv

• mms:/MyServer:8080/POC

I am using Silverlight version 1.1 and setting the mediaElement url as:

Re: Streaming via http

12-13-2007 6:50 PM |

Hi, you should try the Video and Media forum if you haven't already.

http://silverlight.net/forums/20.aspx

Cheers.

Re: Re: Streaming via http

12-31-2007 6:31 AM |

One note to be said,

To convert from a string to a Uri, use the following syntax

string strSource = "---";
Uri uri = new Uri(strSource, UriKind.Relative);
meTest1.Source = uri;

But, i'm still getting the same error message:

Access is denied. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80070005 (E_ACCESSDENIED))

 This is caused when i give the MediaElement mms url.

 Any ideas, guys???