Stream a file with restlet while it's being written to

Question

im trying to stream a File via the Java library Restlet. But the file gets written to while it been streamed. Here it how it should work.

I create a video and a audio file, then I combine the two files to one, this step takes a fair amount of time. So while the new file is creating I want to stream the file to a Browser that I can watch the Video without waiting 10 minutes.

At the moment I can read the File chunk wise with a FileInputStream, but i have no idea how to serve the file to a browser. Any ideas?

Is it even possible to serve a dynamic file with Restlet?

Thanks in advance, and sorry for my bad English ^^

ZimTis

[UPDATE]

I was able to playback a mp3 File, while its being created, thanks to Jerome Louvel :

public class RestletStreamTest extends ServerResource {

    private InputRepresentation inputRepresentation;
    public FileInputStream fis;

    @Get
    public InputRepresentation readFile() throws IOException {
        final File f = new File("/path/to/tile.mp3");
        fis = new FileInputStream(f);

        inputRepresentation = new InputRepresentation(new InputStream() {
            private boolean waited = false;

            @Override
            public int read() throws IOException {
                waited = false;

                // read the next byte of the FileInputStream, when reaching the    
                // end of the file, wait for 2 seconds and try again, in case
                // the file was not completely created yet
                while (true) {
                    byte[] b = new byte[1];

                    if (fis.read(b, 0, 1) > 0) {
                        return b[0] + 256;
                    } else {
                        if (waited) {
                            return -1;
                        } else {
                            try {
                                Thread.sleep(2000);
                            } catch (InterruptedException e) {
                                e.printStackTrace();
                            }
                            waited = true;
                        }
                    }
                }
            }

        }, MediaType.AUDIO_MPEG);

        return inputRepresentation;
    }
}

It is a bit blunt, but works and will be refined later. When I change the code to try streaming a video, the player reads all bytes of the video, then starting to play and read all bytes again. When I hit the play button after the video is finished, nothing happened. Restlet throws a timeout and then the video starts playing again. I try a .mp4 and a .flv file, but always with the same result.

I'm not sure if its a problem with Restlet or the palyer. I use the VLC player in Firefox, and tried the standard html5 player in Chrome. But the Chrome player didn't even start playing.

Did I missed something? Or is it just a problem with the player?

Answer 1

I suggest that you try returning either an InputRepresentation instance wrapping your FileInputStream, or directly a FileRepresentation wrapping the newly created file.

Answer 2

Maybe creating a small 1 minute files and play them in sequence until you finish the encoding will work.