Wowza Community

Live HTTP Streaming Player for ANDROID

Hi,

I saw that there is a Live HTTP Streaming player SDK for Android by the company Nextreaming (http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20100910005048/en). It seems to be quite easy to integrate in Android apps. and it supports the iPhone streaming format: Did anybody try it?

Thks!

Haven’t seen it until now, but thanks for the tip. I’ll have to take a look.

The problem is that Android devices do not support RTSP/RTP interleaved (RTP over TCP). Because of this reason Android phones will not work if UDP is blocked. Most Android phone do support Flash which uses RTMP or HTTP over TCP. This should work. So instead of using RTSP to Android phone use RTMP to Flash.

Charlie

You can embed player in HTML like you do for desktop.

C

You can embed player in HTML like you do for desktop.

C

hi,

i have this issue which i hope i can help with from someone on this forum.

I setup my wowza app to stream for iPhone/Android/Blackberry) and i have http link for iPhone to play the stream and rtsp link for Android and Blackberry to play the stream.

iPhone and Blackberry work like a charm, but there is a very strange story with Android and RTSP.

It does work no problem on AT&T devices - both 2.1 and 2.2 (Froyo), but it does not work on Verizon device with 2.2 (have not tried with T-Mobile or Sprint yet).

I read somewhere on this forum about Verizon not allowing RTSP over 3G and stuff like that, so I kind of expected something of the like.

However, in addition to my Wowza servers which i run and manage myself, I also got an account with provider called Influxis that recently launched mobile delivery option for its customers. They are FMS based and after i have setup my test stream on their platform, i got HTTP link for my live stream which supposedly should be good for all mobile devices.

Guess what - this HTTP link for the live stream indeed works everywhere - even Android device from Verizon which could not play RTSP stream from wowza.

My question - is it possible somehow to “mask” RTSP stream as HTTP?

What is so special FMS can do that Wowza can not in order to make live stream delivery to work on all Androids no matter which carrier they use?

hi Robert & Charlie,

thank you so much for your replies!

Robert - I had influxis http mobile stream link working on Verizon’s LG Ally with Froyo (Android 2.2). So, indeed, whatever postprocessing you do for the stream - it does help.

The problem I have (and I have emailed customer support of Influxis), is that with all due respect, your mobile streaming facility is not ready for any kind of serious streaming shop (yet!). You require to keep your mobile streaming webpage open all the time and operator is required to do data entry into your mobile streaming wizard, press button on the webpage etc. This is ok, I guess, for testing, for playing with the setup, but by any means this kind of setup is not usable for any serious production operation. We run 8 encoders managed from one custom written control panel and we also use 23 different profiles for them. In this kind of setup, we just can load operator with complexity required by Influxis to keep up 1 mobile stream, let alone introducing more then one mobile stream. I am in the pickle here - I’d love to use my own wowza servers the same way you do, but I dont know how :slight_smile: and I cant use my Influxis account, cause it would be impossible for me to have this kind of setup supported by my staff.

The problem is that Android devices do not support RTSP/RTP interleaved (RTP over TCP). Because of this reason Android phones will not work if UDP is blocked. Most Android phone do support Flash which uses RTMP or HTTP over TCP. This should work. So instead of using RTSP to Android phone use RTMP to Flash.

Charlie

Charlie,

Thank you for this tip!

I was under impression that Flash works only on Android 2.2, but seems like its ok on 2.1 and even on some devices with 2.0 (at least based on what i see on the Net). Then this is definitely the way to go for Androids!

Maybe you could suggest the best way to embed streaming video in Android app then?

Can this be done as a simple RTMP link on html page or more complex setup is needed?

Eugene

Robert,

sorry, I forgot to add that the Verizon phone with 2.2 was playing stream over 3G (not Wifi).

Hi eugfri,

This is Robert at Influxis. The issue you are seeing is the same one we have seen, however we are not using FMS in any way for the mobile system. It’s based off Wowza and some other products.

We’re using HTTP delivery for pre-recorded streams to Android due to the Verizon issue, but we are still using RTSP for live streams to Android. It seems that they block UDP packets, and as Charlie said, the current version of Android doesn’t support RTSP interleaved streams. I’ve seen RTSP working on AT&T too on my Nexus One running 2.2, where the Verizon Android phones in our office (Droid, Droid X, Droid 2, Droid Eris) don’t work.

The live streams are post-processed by us, which may make them more compatible with certain phones, however I can’t promise that they will work on any Verizon Android phones. If you got a live stream working to one of these phones, was it on 3G, or Wifi?

We’re hoping that the 2.3 update later this year will help with some of these issues, until then we’re at the mercy of the Android OS.

If you have any more questions or need help with the mobile system, send me an email at robert@influxis.com

Thanks,

Robert Parker

Lead Mobile Platform Developer

Influxis