Real-Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP) is a network control protocol used for streaming media, such as audio and video, over the internet. It is designed to facilitate the transmission of real-time media from a server to clients, allowing for interactive and on-demand streaming applications.
RTSP operates on top of the UDP or TCP transport layer protocols and is used to establish and control media sessions between a server and client. It provides commands for playing, pausing, and stopping media streams, as well as for negotiating parameters such as codec types and transmission rates.
RTSP does not transmit the actual media data but rather provides a control interface for clients to request and control the streaming of media from servers. The actual media data is typically transmitted using other protocols, such as RTP (Real-time Transport Protocol) for the actual media transport.
Example (RTSP Request): An example of an RTSP request to play a media stream:
PLAY rtsp://example.com/media/stream1 RTSP/1.0
CSeq: 1
Session: 12345678