Basic P2P / Port / Security Question

Question

I'm building an app that allows a user to stream a video from their home computer.

Where can I find more information about how I can make this stream accessible to users outside of the broadcaster's local network?

Let's say I'm broadcasting the video from 192.168.0.1:8080/video.mpg

I know that if I setup port forwarding to the broadcasting computer I could then direct people to my external IP:8080/video.mpg and it would stream from my computer.

But how do things like P2P downloading apps and remote desktop applications allow direct access to a user's computer without making the user hassle with port forwarding, etc..?

Hopefully I'm being clear enough - let me know if you need any clarification :)

Lewis

Answer 1

What you want to do is not possible unless you are writing the protocol being used to access the video stream. There are techniques available to allow P2P networks to work through NAT (for example hole-punching: http://www.brynosaurus.com/pub/net/p2pnat/) but their use requires you to write the protocol in use at both ends.

What you're doing is not P2P it's client/server, and it looks like you want people to be able to see the video using a browser. Since the HTTP protocol is not within your control, you can's do this behind a NAT gateway other than by using port-forwarding.

Sorry.