Streaming video and Gmail

Hi everybody,

I have a idea but don't know if it is possible.

I know it is possible to put some MP4/mov video's on a website and link
them to SL. But is it possible instead of using a website to use a Gmail account?

i have seen a firefox extension that can use a gmail account as kind of network
drive (gdrive) and that extension can play mp3 from a gmail account.

does anyone know if my idea is possible?

Thanks

May be....but I don't know if it worth the effort doing it for just watching videos. You can upload them to blip.tv instead.

But it would be a nice experiment.

the way that the gmail to network drive works requires a translation through another source... assuming you could get an external server to log into the gmail account, then serve any requests for your file by feeding it the gmail stored video, not as a redirect, but as a buffer it would work...

easier to gust use on of the free storage or uplod services out there, but you may run into similar bandwidth problems as running a server from your computer (because most upload sites are bandwidth limited)

Thanks for the answer.
Think its to difficult for me (now at least). maybe i can try it in the future.

Will look at free websites or upload sites instead.

I think that you could have problem also with streaming.
In gmail you can store audio and video files, but I think that it's required to have a stream in order to play audio and videos in secondlife.

dunno about video, but audio only requires a file.

You can upload videos for free at http://www.blip.tv

yeah video only requires a file as well.

Gmail and most other video hosting services wont work.

You need a streaming server. It's different than a web server.

And..you can't just use any streaming server. It has to stream in the Quicktime (.mov, qtl) formats.

You will be hard pressed to find a decent free streaming host.

Othen than paying for a good host, you can set up your own streaming server from home...provided that your a Linux guru who is capible of compiling the Darwin Opensource streaming server and have a T3 or OC3 fiber pipe running to your door.

But I do know of one place that offers you a free trial of their streaming service. You're allowed 500 minutes of free streaming. (eg: 50 people viewing 10 minutes each)....the website is: http://www.veodia.com/

Cheers!

actually, if ElQ is correct (and I believe so), a normal server will work fine, the limitation would be storage capacity and bandwidth.

Streaming video and hosting a file on a web server are 2 very different things.

When hosting a video on a web server, the client generally has to download and buffer video first before it will play. When you watch such a downloaded video, you *always* start watching at the beginning of the file....like a movie you rented.

When streaming, the client can jump right in to the video at the same point where everyone else is watching because the stream is "live". Everyone watching gets the same copy of the same stream at the same time...just like TV.

The "file" on a streaming server is only a reference pointer...not the actual video file being transmitted. In many cases, the file being transmitted isn't even a real file on storage since it could be a live broadcast being streamed.

Take a club for example....you want everyone watching the same videos at the same time...so we're all grooving together! What kind of club would it be if everyone was watching the same video..but at different stages in that video?

I don't want to get too technical, but streaming offers many other benifits over hosting a file on a webserver. Streaming uses the one-way protocal UDP which is alot faster in many cases than the TCP protocol that HTTP transfers ride on.

I'm not sure if you can actually watch a quicktime video in world that is hosted on a webserver. I'll give that a try because it might be useful in it's own regard. But it certainly shouldnt be confused with concurrent streaming video, cuz it's not.

Cheers!

I think some types of media you might be able to use if just hosted on a web server. For example, I know you can point the media URL at some types of images for a static display (useful for slideshow presentations). Not sure what kind of video content might allow it.

A streaming video server certainly has it's benefits, but it is definitely not required for using video in SL. A regular 'ol web server is fine for most purposes.

I have hosted video events with 40 - 40 viewers using a normal webhost. We all enjoyed watching the same videos at the same time, or close enough to simultaneous that it did not matter. With a proper script and setup you can start everyone's video at the same time - or at least within a few seconds. The Fast Start option in a Quicktime file is a big help, as well as a properly formatted video.

actually now that I think about it, I should have known for sure that it didn't 'require' streaming.... because I've been on more than one plot, and had a differently timed view of the playing video than the person I was with... which wouldn't occur with a stream. a stream is only necessary if you need to synch it for all viewers, or want some kind of auto continuation, or replay.