What is the purpose of FMS server and how does it figure into my requirements ?

Question

Hello,

I had a project requirement which was to stream video to people across the globe (max 100 simultaneous connections) and i was under the impression that a single HTTP server is sufficient. However, a friend of mine said i will have to use an FMS server. How does this basically work ?

• If i record video from my webcam and store it for future consumption, where will it be stored ? On my site server ? or on the FMS server ?
• What is so special about an FMS server ? Can i turn any server into an FMS server ?
• I read somewhere that streaming video via my own server does not allow the user to jump to a particular part in a video. Is this true ?
• If the requirement is to stream live video to people, how does this work ? Does the video from the source (webcam) get transferred to my server and then to the FMS server or directly to the FMS server ?

I'm pretty confused about the FMS server concept and some articles or links would really help too, however your expert answers will be invaluable ! Thanks alot for your time.

Answer 1

FMS is an Adobe software product

Once installed on a hardware server, it enables you to do a number of things but the one you are interested in is video streaming.

To get FMS to stream recorded video, you put the files on the server where FMS is installed and configure FMS to use those files.

Streaming is different to just linking to a video file on an HTTP server. We call linking to a file and playing it progressive download - the file is progressively downloaded starting at the beginning and the client side player can play the part that has downloaded.

In video streaming, there is more two way communication between the client and the server. The server sends the client the parts of the video stream that it requests. This means that the viewer can skip ahead to parts the video that have not been sent and the server will happily start sending that part of the video.

Now, there are some ways to add seek-ahead features to progressive download (for example, this is what youtube does). Essentially, you implement the ability to request a video file starting at a certain way through it in your server side platform of choice. Solutions exist for php, asp.net and I'm sure other platforms too.

True streaming does have some other advantages:

• Bandwidth monitoring can enable switching to the optimal stream for a user's connection
• It can deal with live video streams
• It can provide better control over how video is used (better, but not complete - if someone can view your stream, they can record it if they really want to)

On the negative side, streaming can have more issues getting through corporate firewalls and obviously costs more to implement.

For live streaming the way it works is as follows:

1. You provide a video source (e.g. webcam, video capture)
2. You deliver the video stream to a FMS instance (this is called publishing in FMS speak) - there is software to do this or you can build a flash movie that does it 3 - FMS delivers the video stream to all the viewers who are connected to it.

One thing worth noting is that, if your requirements are quite limited (and it sounds like they are), you could well be better off using a hosted streaming service rather than installing FMS yourself. There are lots of services out there and the prices have come down a lot in the last couple of years. Such a service will usually provide you with:

• FTP location to upload video files for hosting
• Ability to publish live streams

These service range from single server setups to global content distrubution networks - all depends what your needs are.