The best way to stream movies
I'm trying to make an interface for all my music and video files on a spare PC I have, but came up with a little road block. I originally wanted to stream movies (avi, mpeg, flv, etc.) with a flash player, but after a bit of searching it seems like the flash can only stream FLV. Obviously I don't want to convert my entire hard drive to flv # s.
The only other option I could find is the following code ...
<object classid="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" codebase="http://www.apple.com/qtactivex/qtplugin.cab" height="195" width="340" name="CRUNKCinema" align="left">
<param name="src" value="/path/to/video.avi">
<param name="autoplay" value="true">
<param name="controller" value="true">
<embed height="195" width="340" align="left" src="/path/to/video.avi" autoplay="true" controller="true"></embed>
</object>
But it seems very choppy, sometimes the video doesn't load at all. There is also no such buffering using this option.
Can anyone suggest a better solution to my problem? Thank!
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Why reinvent the wheel? Check out XBMC or boxee .
edit: With most media players these days, you can also share your library directly so that another media player can see it. or just export the media directory as a network share and import it into the media player you are using on another PC (however SMB is not that good for streaming in my experience, unless over Ethernet).
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If you want to play these files in a web browser, converting them to FLV (or MP4, or whatever works for you) might be your best bet. (Something like MediaCoder might make this possible.) No matter what else you do, chances are that some of your videos are using codecs (if not file formats) that aren't processed.
But if you just want the video to play on a PC, not necessarily in a browser, then a regular desktop app (like VLC) can fix the problem without conversion, and as Frank suggests, if you try one of the popular ones you are likely to find , they are already doing everything you planned and more.: D
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