Can anyone provide a kind of step-by-step set of instructions for:
creating a Flash video file (and what software is best to use)
how to set the file up on the server so it streams much like a YouTube video.
What HTML to use on the web page to embed the video.
Basically everything a person should do from woe to go. Must be fairly easy, right? 
Thanks!
These posts were awhile ago, so I’m wondering if this info still holds true. I have a customer who wants to show some training videos on his site. I was thinking we could simply use the method of creating them in flash, and using the progressive download option to display the video. I figure this way the only limitation would be the amount of server space he’ll require and/or whatever bandwidth issues may arise.
Is there a better way to do this? Better could mean: performance-wise, resource-wise, etc.
Please advise,
Thanks,
Gene
what about using an embedded video from another source? (it’s an option too)
I suggested to the customer to use something like streamhoster, as I think they will get better performance and, perhaps, even save money. But, he wants to manage a lot of aspects of it, and it’ll be easier for him if everything was contained on his site here. So, he’s ok with me charging him for whatever additional space requirements he’ll need. But, I still want to be sure that the performance won’t be totally awful as a result or, even worse, Jodo didn’t allow us to do that.
I don’t like it, but I’m filing it under ‘the customer is always right?’ Of course, I’m also prepared to do it, to have it be awful, then simply insist the customer host them on a streaming service.
Thanks,
Gene
If he wants it all in one place, we don’t prohibit it, but we don’t offer any special tools for live streaming, you can use http streams from a flash frontend or silverlight frontend.
IMO the benefits to using a CDN for this are good, as you have multiple points and it loads from a server nearest the customer dynamically, which is just something we can’t do.
This is just for example:
http://www.simplecdn.com/savings
CoffeeCup has some Flash movie software (CoffeeCup Web Video Player) that will convert your video (.mov, .wmv, .avi, etc.) to a Flash movie with a player and then give you the code to embed in your web page and the files to upload to the server. As long as the video doesn’t need to be HD quality and full screen, you can set it to different quality settings that will stream well over a normal broadband connection.
coffeecup software is normally good quality, and that looks like a good price for such as well.
Hey, thanks for the tip. I’ve used a couple of their products in the past, and found them to be pretty good. I’ll definitely take a look at that.
Gene
Thanks for the info guys.
I think I missed the notification of replies, hence the late thanks.
Videos rendered with the coffee cup app play back fine on Linux servers, but do not play back at all on Windows servers for some odd reason…
sounds like a MIME type issue to me.
Not sure how; identical code on both servers. ?(
right, but if a MIME type is not registered with IIS it gives 404 errors
Right, sorry, I should have clarified; embedded .swf files created in other applications play with no problem; the .swf files created in the coffee cup app, however do not. It’s likely something to do with the fact that the .swf is not encapsulated, but rather refers (via xml?) to a .fla file. Perhaps the mime type at issue is .fla?
yes I tihnkt he mime issue would be with FLA file there in that case.
Sorry, my bad, .flv NOT .fla
You were, as usual, Stephen, spot-on. Just added the Mime Type video/x-flv .flv and it works beautifully. My clients are going to love this. Thank you very much, Good Oyster for the link!