On Mar 24, 2007, at 12:44 AM, Michael Dale wrote:
Eric Carlson wrote:
Yes, the UA needs the offset/chunking table in order to
calculate a file offset for a time, but this is efficient in the
case of container formats in which the table is stored together
with other information that's needed to play the file. This is not
the case for all container formats, of course.
The UA would first use byte range requests to download the header.
If the information is stored somewhere other than the beginning of
the file, it may take several byterange requests to find it, but
this is not much less efficient with ISO-derived or RIFF type
formats. Once is has the headers, it will able to calculate the
offset for any time in the file and it can request and play the
media for *any* time range in the file.
This scheme has the added benefit of not requiring the header to
be downloaded again if the user requests another time range in the
same file.
There is no reason why both methods can't be supported.
Absolutely, each method has strengths and weaknesses.
eric
