[vlc] help VLC

[Warren Young]

Maria Pinto wrote:
> 
> which the differences in VOD (video on demand) streamed by VLC or Served 
> by Apache (plugin VLC)?

Streaming means the file comes down only as fast as needed for realtime 
playback.  Serving it through HTTP means it comes down as fast as your 
Internet connection allows, relying on the client to buffer the data and 
play back from the buffer.

If the video is encoded at 512 kbit/sec and your Internet connection is 
1.5 Mbit/s down, it only uses 1/3 of your bandwidth for the entire run 
time of the video in the streaming scenario, but uses all of your 
bandwidth for 1/3 the time in the HTTP scenario.

Which is better depends on whether you want to have all of your 
bandwidth back faster (HTTP) or be able to share the bandwidth reliably 
among multiple simultaneous users (streaming).  The download-and-play 
method means you can also skip ahead in the stream up to the point 
you've downloaded, without special help from the server.  To skip around 
in a streamed video requires trick play support, which isn't always 
available.