Got my copy yesterday morning and am eating up the content. On page 132 Jan refers to a comment Stefan made about the streaming server managing the buffering process. I'm not clear as to whether or not setting a buffer time in parameters accomplishes anything if the video is served by progressive download. Can you clarify this please?
As a general remark I'm surprised by how relatively little attention the Flash VIdeo Encoder gets among the alternatives for producing a flv. I have Flash CS3, and Wildpresenter Pro which looks a lot like Flix - and I think comes from the same hands.
Hi David, a buffer can certainly make sense on progressive download too. Take users on slow connections: it's often recommended to set the buffer to the entire length of the video in order to preload the entire video - for slow connections that is to ensure uninterrupted playback once the buffer is full. For faster connections I would typically just set it to a couple of seconds as the connection speed is likely higher than the encoding bitrate so no rebuffering can occur. Re the Flash Video Encoder: it does not support 2pass VBR and is therefore regarded as a slightly lower end encoder while Flix or Squeeze offer more features. Nevertheless it's a good tool for casual encoding tasks.
Jan refers to a comment Stefan made about the streaming server managing
the buffering process. I'm not clear as to whether or not setting a buffer
time in parameters accomplishes anything if the video is served by progressive
download. Can you clarify this please?
As a general remark I'm surprised by how relatively little attention the Flash VIdeo
Encoder gets among the alternatives for producing a flv. I have Flash CS3, and Wildpresenter Pro
which looks a lot like Flix - and I think comes from the same hands.
a buffer can certainly make sense on progressive download too. Take users on slow connections: it's often recommended to set the buffer to the entire length of the video in order to preload the entire video - for slow connections that is to ensure uninterrupted playback once the buffer is full. For faster connections I would typically just set it to a couple of seconds as the connection speed is likely higher than the encoding bitrate so no rebuffering can occur.
Re the Flash Video Encoder: it does not support 2pass VBR and is therefore regarded as a slightly lower end encoder while Flix or Squeeze offer more features. Nevertheless it's a good tool for casual encoding tasks.