Tech necessary to build a live video chat site?

Question

Hi,

I'm looking to build a live video chat site. Before writing a project description, hiring a developer, etc., I'm doing a little research on what types of technologies / web development skills are necessary in order to build this type of site.

The site will feature live video and audio for users to be able to chat with eachother, a simple profile which they can fill out, and the ability to filter the types of users they are connected with.

Your feedback is appreciated.

Thanks, Tom

Answer 1

Quite a vague question, seeing as it depends on specifically what sort of functionality you will need, but broadly speaking...

For the site itself, you may need any of the following:

• PHP or ASP
• HTML & CSS
• MySQL or some other database
• Javascript

For the video and audio, you could do this in Flash & ActionScript or via a Java applet. If you're going the Flash route then you may need a copy of Adobe Flash Media Server to support live streaming.