Adding WMV video to my site

[raverboi]

Hey guys,I am new to all .this and this is what i need.I need to add wmv video to my site but i am clueless.I have found some sites that will host it for me and more less give me the a link to paste but it is going to run into some cash so here i am looking for help

[Chilihost]

You basically have two options with this, you can either place a direct link in your members area to the wmv file or you can embed the video into an html page.

With the first option, if users click on the video link they will be able to either download it or open it in Windows Media Player (WMP) -in most cases, users have their IE settings to automatically open the video in WMP. One thing you will notice is that your security (htaccess) will require the user to login again to view the video. This is because IE is unable to pass the security credentials to WMP when it opens and tries to download the file. You can take care of this by using a modified htaccess file that places a cookie on the surfers machine when they enter the members area, then another htaccess file that protects ONLY the videos directory, which checks to see if the cookie is present before allowing the wmv file to be downloaded. It sounds complex but is just a matter of copying the correct code into your htaccess file. Oh, one other thing, this option allows users to right click on the link and download the video directly!

The second option is to embed the video into an html page, this takes care of all the authentication issues for you. Once again, this is a matter of using a bit of code in your html page to "stream" the video to the user.

A couple of other notes
- if you want to offer video downloads you can make it totally easy on yourself by zipping them and providing your surfers with zipped files for download.
- alternatively you can setup your server (via httpd.conf) or use an htaccess line to force all wmv files to be downloaded instead of automatically opened into WMP.
- if you are using Digital Rights Management (DRM) you will have to work directly with your DRM provider as they have very specific ways of allowing your files to be played

Now, its up to you to chose a method and then discuss this with your webhost to get the proper bits of code that will work. If your host is unable to help you, please post here & I will try to provide you with some code that I know works with our servers, but may or may not work with yours.

Ya know, just in general, when you have techie issues like this its always a good idea to contact your webhost first as they usually have solutions that will help you, and if they don't then maybe its time to look around for a webhost that will help you!

cheers,
Luke

[Corey Bryant]

You can also try this code:

<object id="MediaPlayer" width=320 height=286
classid="CLSID:22D6F312-B0F6-11D0-94AB-0080C74C7E95"
standby="Loading Microsoft® Windows® Media Player components..."
type="application/x-oleobject"
codebase="http://activex.microsoft.com/activex/controls/mplayer/en/nsmp2inf.cab#Version=6,4,7,1112">
<PARAM NAME="filename" VALUE="interview_fox_video.asx">
<PARAM NAME="autoStart" VALUE="true"> <PARAM NAME="showControls" VALUE="true">
<param name="ShowStatusBar" value="true"> <PARAM NAME="Autorewind" VALUE="true">
<PARAM NAME="ShowDisplay" VALUE="false"> 
  <EMBED SRC="interview_fox_video.asx" WIDTH=320 HEIGHT=286 type="application/x-mplayer2" name=MediaPlayer autostart=1 showcontrols=0 showstatusbar=1 autorewind=1 showdisplay=0>
</EMBED></OBJECT> 

Replace the source (interview_fox_video.asx) in BOTH places with the path to your WMV.

You might also check out www.streamingmedia.com for some more information