Microsoft DirectX 9.0

Using Multimedia Streams in Applications

The multimedia streaming interfaces greatly simplify the process of manipulating multimedia data by removing the dependency on specific characteristics of the hardware or software source and providing support for all Microsoft DirectX® media formats. Streams abstract the data to a very high level; applications can even move data from one stream to another without knowing anything about the data's format.

Perform the following steps to create a multimedia stream.

  1. Create the multimedia stream. The method of creation and initialization of the stream is architecture specific. DirectShow supports the IAMMultiMediaStream interface, which is used to initialize the stream. Other in-process server implementations of IMultiMediaStream will be created and initialized using different mechanisms.
  2. After the multimedia stream object is initialized, the application will use QueryInterface to retrieve the IMultiMediaStream interface for the object. Use this interface to determine the stream's properties and enumerate the streams themselves. You can retrieve a specific stream by calling the IMultiMediaStream::GetMediaStream method with a specific purpose ID. MSPID_PrimaryVideo and MSPID_PrimaryAudio, which represent the primary video and audio streams, are the most commonly used purpose IDs.
  3. Call IUnknown::QueryInterface for an interface specific to the stream's media type. If you want to render a video stream, for example, retrieve its IDirectDrawMediaStream interface. Media-specific interfaces define additional methods necessary for taking full advantage of a format's capabilities.
  4. Create one or more samples from the stream data. Every media stream supports the IMediaStream::CreateSharedSample method for sample creation. The resulting sample supports the IStreamSample interface, which provides control over the sample and its characteristics. Typically, the media stream supports a format-specific method of sample creation that is more powerful than the aforementioned IStreamSample methods. IDirectDrawMediaStream, for example, can create samples attached to a desired DirectDraw surface and clipping rectangle. In some situations, however, you must handle data without knowing about its data format. If you want to stream data independent of its format, use the IMediaStream::CreateSharedSample method to create the data samples.
  5. After creating all desired stream samples, start the stream by calling the IMultiMediaStream::SetState method and pass in the STREAMSTATE_RUN flag as its parameter.
  6. Call IStreamSample::Update to update the stream sample. When the IStreamSample::Update method exits, you can access the sample's data. If you want a trigger a specific event or function call when the update returns, pass the appropriate pointers to the IStreamSample::Update method.

For more information on the multimedia streaming interfaces, see Multimedia Streaming.