Understanding protocols

To enable streaming, Windows Media Services supports the Microsoft Media Server (MMS) protocol, Real Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP), and Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) through the use of control protocol plug-ins. This section contains the following topics:

• Protocol overview
• Using the MMS protocol
• Using the RTSP protocol
• Using the HTTP protocol
• How protocol rollover works
• How unicast works
• How multicast works

Note

• Multicast streaming and the WMS Multicast Data Writer plug-in are available only if Windows Media Services 9 Series is running on the following editions of the operating system: Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition and Windows Server 2003, Datacenter Edition. If you are running Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition, these features are not supported.

Related topics

• Networking and content delivery