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> And what, exactly, is the difference for a server? Off the top of my head: * "Streaming" could imply a few different files of differing quality that the dow

> And what, exactly, is the difference for a server? Off the top of my head: * "Streaming" could imply a few different files of differing quality that the downloader dynamically changes between. * Scrubbing to see previews further ahead and back, in order to jump to playback at a particular point. * Throttling bandwidth to just that required for realtime playback. Most people don't watch the full video, so no need to download too far ahead of where playback is. * Not downloading too much further if the video is paused. There are definitely times that you want to download the file, but I definitely think of "streaming" as encompassing the above features. When I'm in a bandwidth constrained environment, in particular, I often prefer the streaming experience.

mikeash 11y ago
I don't think "streaming" implies any of that. I don't believe YouTube had any of these features when it first arrived. All "streaming" really implies is that you can watch as you download. That requires the download to be linear (e.g. traditional BitTorrent downloads aren't streaming), the format to be linear (can't put vital information at the end of the file), and the download speed to be high enough to download at least one second of content for each second of download time. Everything you describe is nice, but not necessary.
pdkl95 11y ago
All of those are features that have been supported with various file transfer tools. In the end, you're still opening a TCP socket, doing some management to request the file, and transferring that relevant data. There are numerous ways to accomplish this, but it's still a variation of (request file, receive data). "Streaming" isn't a technical feature. It's a fiction designed to fool non-technical people (often in management, marketing, or legal). Usually this used as a euphemism for a broken client that doesn't have a "save" button.

mikeash 11y ago

I don't think "streaming" implies any of that. I don't believe YouTube had any of these features when it first arrived. All "streaming" really implies is that you can watch as you download. That requires the download to be linear (e.g. traditional BitTorrent downloads aren't streaming), the format to be linear (can't put vital information at the end of the file), and the download speed to be high enough to download at least one second of content for each second of download time. Everything you describe is nice, but not necessary.

pdkl95 11y ago

All of those are features that have been supported with various file transfer tools. In the end, you're still opening a TCP socket, doing some management to request the file, and transferring that relevant data. There are numerous ways to accomplish this, but it's still a variation of (request file, receive data). "Streaming" isn't a technical feature. It's a fiction designed to fool non-technical people (often in management, marketing, or legal). Usually this used as a euphemism for a broken client that doesn't have a "save" button.