I'm designing a site for a company that needs to offer visitors the opportunity to listen to about 300 little sound bytes (each about 30 seconds of low-quality music on MP3).

We've ruled out .asf and .ra because that would require a download. .mp3 seems the most universal, and to boot the files are quite small.

What's the best code to use on the page to allow the files to be streamed with a click?

MP3s would probably still require just the same as an asf. The MP3 would have to be opened in a player of sorts.

Actually, ASFs can be embedded into pages. Don't know of any way to embed MP3s.

You could convert them to Flash, since Flash is in nearly every browser and good at streaming.

I guess what I'm asking for is the most universal HTML code.

i would go with http streaming. here is some info on it:
http://www.realnetworks.com/resources/contentdelivery/documentation/httpstream.html?UK=X

I guess what I'm asking for is the most universal HTML code.


<a href="mymp3.mp3">check out my mp3</a>

As for it being the most universal code, there may be code more universal than it.

check out free shoutcast mp3 streaming server

http://www.shoutcast.com/download/serve.phtml

Hmm... I'm positive I saw code (similar to the code used to embed audio files) for MP3 that basically streamed em when clicked on.

it's over HTTP!

and...

you lose all the features of real streaming... bandwidth saving etc..

I second the suggestion of Shoutcast. It's a tiny download, easy to set up, and it works.

Oh, and it's free :D