[mtasc] RE: Open Source RTMP Development?

[JesterXL]

Dude, $10 bucks a month:

http://www.influxis.com


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Darwin Airola" <darwin at hypergalaxy.com>
To: "'Bob Ippolito'" <bob at redivi.com>; "'MotionTwin ActionScript2 Compiler 
List'" <mtasc at lists.motion-twin.com>
Sent: Friday, April 29, 2005 12:10 AM
Subject: RE: [mtasc] RE: Open Source RTMP Development?


Bob,

Thanks for the tidbits.

Regarding paying Macromedia, have you checked their licensing fees for their
Flash Communication Server, lately? (They are ridiculously high.)

Over the years, I have came across a number of potential customers who would
like to purchase some of our Flash Communication Server products but do not
want to (or cannot) pay the FlashComm licensing fees.

Also, as you might expect, FlashComm leaves much to be desired. Thus, being
able to modify the server code would be extremely useful.

RTMP has got to be simple. (There serve is very small, although I am not
certain which system DLLs they might be taking advantage of.) So, if one has
time, reverse engineering the protocol should be doable...

Take care,
Darwin


                            Darwin Airola
                      Chief Technology Officer
                    http://hypergalaxy.com/flash/
                       Darwin at HyperGalaxy.com
                            (847)839-9491

       HyperGalaxy(R): We develop solutions for the future.(TM)


-----Original Message-----
From: Bob Ippolito [mailto:bob at redivi.com]
Sent: Thursday, April 28, 2005 10:57 PM
To: MotionTwin ActionScript2 Compiler List; darwin at hypergalaxy.com
Subject: Re: [mtasc] RE: Open Source RTMP Development?


On Apr 28, 2005, at 7:05 PM, Darwin Airola wrote:

> Thanks for the information, David!
>
> However, I am really looking for a complete replacement for RTMP that
> is
> compatible with Flash Communication Server (including audio and
> video). Is
> there any such beast out there?
>
> Also, is there a complete RTMP specification available, somewhere?
> (Although
> I would really prefer to adopt an existing open source solution, if
> someone
> is working on one.)

Well, good luck.  As far as I know, there is NO specification
whatsoever of RTMP anywhere.  However, I would "imagine" that it's
similar to the remoting protocol.

Even if you do get as far as reverse engineering RTMP, you will run up
against a patented and proprietary audio codec (licensed by
Macromedia).  IIRC, the video codec is "standards based", but I believe
it deviates (at least in the encoding, but perhaps not for decoding).
This is also licensed technology that Macromedia doesn't own and didn't
develop.  If you dig into macromedia's open specifications for the SWF
format you'll find definitive information on the issue, this is just
off the top of my head and I haven't read those documents in years.

If your goal is just to play switchboard and connect one user to
another user, you probably don't need to know how to decode these.  If
you have a bank of servers and want to use them to decode by hooking
them up to the flash player to "simply" hijack audio/video I/O such
that you (ab)use it to do the decoding for you, that would probably
work too..

In any case, you're probably better off (a) doing something else or (b)
just paying for it.  Personally, I would wait and see what Flash 8 has
in store.  Possibly there is enough there to implement something that
sucks less and is based on open standards and protocols.

-bob


--
MTASC : no more coffee break while compiling