Re: [cobalt-users] Real Server Basic on RaQ4r

[Elmer Fuddpucker <elmer@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Wed, 25 Apr 2001, Chih-Lung Lin wrote:

} I did the following instruction on HTTP streaming and now my clients can
} view the Real video clips I put on my RaQ3i server.  But there is a problem
} of using HTTP streaming.  The .ram file is being copied to client's desktop
} every time the client clicks the link.  My client was complaining that his
} desktop is full with all those .ram files.  Is that normal or I did
} something wrong.  Please help.  Thanks.

	This is not normal. But, before we get into the gory details
have you tried from different machines? This particular client very
possibly may have their browser/player configured improperly
(happens a lot) and/or may be using a player that simply does not
handle these kind of things properly. Most of our clients are
entertainers. A couple of them produce their own CDs and Cassettes
and even they've been known to have trouble. We have one client that
produces a nationally syndicated radio show from his home very
impressive home studio and which couldn't hear the tracks from his
show that we put on his web site each week until we sent a
technition to his home to tweak his desktop.

	In other words, eliminate the user before hacking up your
machine. Try it from a couple of other machines. It's been a while
but as I recall some fairly recent versions of Netscape require a
plug-in to be installed before they can properly deal with this.
Worse yet, perhaps, every player that I've even installed either
just took or asked for permission to be the default player for all
related mime.types, even if the player was not capable of playing
some of those files. Windows Media Player 7.x, for example, if
allowed to be the default player, will return an error when it bumps
into a Real file.

	Least we forget the fact that if somewhere in the past, the
first time the user tried to play one of these files, their browser
asked them if they wanted to play it or download it and, if they
selected download and then eventually clicked the box that says
don't show this box again....

	I rambled a lot as my experience is that 99% of these kind
of problems are on the user's end.

	With all that said...

 	Check your /etc/httpd/conf/mime.types file and make sure the
following is in it (this is snipped directly out of ours):

audio/x-pn-realaudio		ram
audio/x-realaudio		ra

	Make sure you restart Apache after adding these.

	The .ram file itself should only contain one line, the URL
of the .ra file. There must be a hard carriage return (Hit ENTER) at
the end of that line:

	http://www.domain.ext/directory/playme.ra

	Then make sure that the .ram file is linked to from a web
page. You see, the .ram file is basically a redirect. Browsers
download content. Thus if you point a browser at the audio file it
will try to download it. So a .ram file is added. The browser then
downloads the .ram file which contains a link to the music and the
result is that the music plays instead of being downloaded.

	In other words, the .ram file should be downloaded. But it
should not be saved. That's why I rambled on so much as the users
end of things. My best guess is that they stumbled upon a ra file
before they had a player. At that time they were asked if they
wanted to open or save the file and they choose save and then
elected to not be asked how to dispose of this type of file in the
future. How to undo that I do not know...


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