Looking at older code I could see that the FCSubscribe was being polled – but I couldnâ??t understand why the new code in Flex not using this FCSubscribe would work with our own FMS servers, but not with Limelight.

I tried looking up what the problem could be via google but found nothing. I asked the flexcoders list but was pretty much ignored. Through searching Flex blogs, I found John C Bland II, who recently left Limelight as an AS3 coder.

John was kind enough to explain to me that the real problem was how FCSubscribe works with Edge Servers:

A normal FMS install is just a straight up 1 server install. A CDN install uses edge servers which means there is an origin server with many other servers on the â??edgeâ? that communicate back to the origin. In order to connect to the proper stream, an FCSubscribe has to be called. That call basically calls the edge server which does a â??searchâ? to find the stream. Thatâ??s why you have to do the â??timerâ? trick to continuously ping to see if the server found the stream yet. My method isnâ??t a timer. It is with â??connected callsâ?. So, try to connect (subscribe), if it fails, wait 1 second (setInterval) and subscribe, if it fails, wait 1 second again and subscribe. Do that over and over until the maximum amount of connects is reached. Of course before each setInterval I clearInterval so I donâ??t have multiple running at once. You get a pretty much immediate response from the server so you can get away with firing off multiple setIntervals/subscribes but it could get hairy. I prefer to try and only try again if it fails (with a 1 second pause between the retries).

Kind enough to show me some example code, I changed it just a tad to fit in the way I was calling it (and I believe Iâ??ll make it into a subcomponent as part of the cleanup:

private var connection:NetConnection;

private var stream:NetStream;

private var video:Video = new Video();

private var vidTimer:Timer;

private var _fcSubscribeCount:int = 0;

private var _fcSubscribeMaxRetries:int = 3;

private var _fcSubscribeInterval:Number;

public function videoInit():void {

connection = new NetConnection();

connection.client = this;

connection.addEventListener(NetStatusEvent.NET_STATUS, videoStatusHandler);

connection.addEventListener(SecurityErrorEvent.SECURITY_ERROR, vidSecurityErrorHandler);

connection.connect(streamURL);

}

private function subscribe():void{

connection.call(�FCSubscribe�, null, streamName);

var nsClient:Object = {};

nsClient.onMetaData = ns_onMetaData;

}

public function onFCSubscribe(info:Object):void{

switch(info.code){

case â??NetStream.Play.StreamNotFoundâ?:

clearInterval(_fcSubscribeInterval);

if(_fcSubscribeCount >= _fcSubscribeMaxRetries){

_fcSubscribeCount = 0;

}else{

_fcSubscribeCount++;

//subscribe failed; wait 1 second then try again

_fcSubscribeInterval = setInterval(subscribe, 1000);

}

break;

case â??NetStream.Play.Startâ?:

_fcSubscribeCount = 0;

clearInterval(_fcSubscribeInterval);

connectStream();

break;

}

}

private function videoStatusHandler(event:NetStatusEvent):void {

//Alert.show(event.info.code);

switch (event.info.code) {

case â??NetConnection.Connect.Successâ?:

subscribe();

break;

case â??NetStream.Play.Startâ?:

//Alert.show(�netstream play start�);

break;

case â??NetStream.Play.StreamNotFoundâ?:

//Alert.show(�Stream not found: � + streamName);

break;

}

}

private function vidSecurityErrorHandler(event:SecurityErrorEvent):void {

Alert.show(�securityErrorHandler: � + event);

}

private function connectStream():void {

var nsClient:Object = {};

nsClient.onMetaData = ns_onMetaData;

stream = new NetStream(connection);

stream.addEventListener(NetStatusEvent.NET_STATUS, videoStatusHandler);

video.attachNetStream(stream);

stream.play(streamName);

stream.client = nsClient;

uic.addChild(video);

uic.addEventListener(ResizeEvent.RESIZE, resizeVideo);

video.width= uic.width;

video.height = uic.height;

}

private function resizeVideo(ev:ResizeEvent):void{

video.width = uic.width;

video.height = uic.height;

}

** originally posted at scribemedia

Saw this over at TUAW. Some guy named Dennis Liu made this music video for a band called The Bird and the Bee using his mac desktop. Pretty cool; and shows how a little ingenuity can go a long way.

** originally posted on scribemedia

** originally posted on scribemedia

This is a great example created by Brian Cane to Vince Vaughnâ??s monologue of â??The Perfect Girlâ?? in Wedding Crashers:

Thereâ??s other examples at Motionographer.

** originally posted at scribemedia

Created for two large 42″ plasmas that also showcased a directional audio setup. I created the videos from a number of images we had of our installations — think I made about 7 of them — and really just randomized through them as attracts to our booth.