Mobile Cloud Computing & Adaptive Streaming

Mobile Cloud Computing & Adaptive Streaming 20 th Mar 2012 Suriya Mohan, Aricent Group, Chennai

Agenda Mobile Cloud Computing Tablet / Smartphone Evolution Cloud Computing 3 Fundamental Models Clouds in Cloud Computing Advantages of Cloud Computing Mobile Cloud Computing Thin Client Application Virtual Hybrid Cloud Imaging Server - Photo book Creation Adaptive Streaming & OTT Video Over The Top Video Solutions for OTT Challenge Adaptive Streaming Adaptive Streaming Solutions Apple HTTP Live Streaming Microsoft Smooth Streaming 3GP DASH Cloud based Streaming Server Cloud based Streaming Server Multi Client Streaming Technology & Features Content Adaptation Gateway Cloud based Content Adaptation Gateway End to End Setup & Features 2

Tablet / Smartphone Evolution EPG Remote Record Video On Demand TV Everywhere Live Streaming Mobile Cloud Computing Thin Client 3

Cloud Computing 3 Fundamental Models Applications APIs Data Content Metadata Integration, OS & Middleware APIs Connectivity & Delivery Virtualization Hardware IaaS PaaS SaaS Saas - Software as a service, sometimes referred to as "on-demand software," is a software delivery model in which software and its associated data are hosted centrally (typically in the (Internet) cloud) and are typically accessed by users using a thin client, normally using a web browser over the Internet IaaS, Infrastructure as a Service - Cloud providers offer computers as physical or more often as virtual machines, raw (block) storage, firewalls, load balancers, and networks. IaaS providers supply these resources on demand from their large pools installed in data centers. PaaS, Platform as a Service - Cloud providers deliver a computing platform and/or solution stack typically including operating system, programming language execution environment, database, and web server. Application developers can develop and run their software solutions on a cloud platform without the cost and complexity of buying and managing the underlying hardware and software layers 4

Clouds in Cloud Computing Public Clouds (Over Internet) Hybrid Cloud (Over Internets / Intranets) Private Cloud (Over Intranet) Provisioning of both physical and virtualized cloud resources Application Layer (SaaS) Platform Layer(PaaS) Infrastructure Layer (IaaS) Public Cloud - Applications, storage, and other resources are made available to the general public by a service provider. Public cloud services may be free or offered on a pay-per-usage model. Private Cloud - is infrastructure operated solely for a single organization, whether managed internally or by a third-party and hosted internally or externally. Hybrid Cloud - is a composition of two or more clouds (private, community or public) that remain unique entities but are bound together, offering the benefits of multiple deployment models 5

Advantages of Cloud Computing Access to Larger Market Lowers App Development Cost Bypass Apps Stores and save on Commissions Addresses Platform Fragmentation Cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility over a network. Cloud computing is a natural evolution of the widespread adoption of virtualisation, serviceoriented architecture, autonomic, and utility computing. Details are abstracted from end-users, who no longer have need for expertise in, or control over, the technology infrastructure "in the cloud" that supports them. Cloud computing describes a new supplement, consumption, and delivery model for IT services based on Internet protocols, and it typically involves provisioning of dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources Cloud computing providers deliver applications via the internet, which are accessed from web browsers and desktop and mobile apps, while the business software and data are stored on servers at a remote location 3/26/2012 6

Mobile Cloud Computing Mobile cloud computing refers to an environment where both the storage of data and its processing happens outside the mobile device. The app runs on a remote server and a user can get access to it through the browser available in his mobile device. Gmail, Google Maps etc., are some of the examples of applications making use of mobile cloud computing. With apps getting more feature rich and expected to handle volumes of data, on-the-device storage and processing would not only be difficult but to an extent impossible Mobile Cloud Computing with its capability to store data and process it outside the device, on the internet, without disturbing the real performance of the app would come handy to app developers. Client-Server Model in Cloud Computing reduces the footprint and portability overheads in the client side by just running a thin client application in the client device and having business logic and/or data storehouse in the server side CRITICAL CHALLENGES Lowering network latency to meet application and code offload interactivity Increasing network bandwidth for faster data transfer between the cloud and devices Providing adaptive monitoring of network conditions to optimize network and device costs against the user s perceived performance of cloud applications 7

Thin Client Application Photobook Creation

Social Networking Sites The Virtual ( Hybrid ) Cloud Imaging Server Public Clouds (External) Frog s Cloud Imaging Server Server Features: Photo Book Creation using Image Processing Algorithms: Image De-Noising Panorama Stitching Low Light Enhancement Vivid colour effect Noise reduction White Balance Enterprise / Digital Home Image De-noising Printer Clouds (External) Frog s (Thin Client) Base Station (Femto Cell) Face / Smile Detection Today s Problem Statement: Multimedia information such as Photos and Videos are increasingly viewed and shared through social networking sites such as YouTube and Facebook. In Today s Scenario, the users even don t have time to organize their photos and videos on their Handheld devices. Many users on day-2-day life snap/capture large numbers of photos either from Mobile (or) from Digital Camera to capture events in their lives, but only a very small fraction of Photos are tagged. Although online sharing makes the content easier to access, users continue to face many challenges in dealing with multimedia operations. Concept: Photobook creation is one of the most technically challenging workflows for Photo Product solution. These problems are only magnified when the authoring platform is expanded beyond PCs to mobile and social platforms. Our Auto Photo book creation with Cloud Imaging Server uses core imaging algorithms to streamline the workflow and automate many of the more cumbersome steps, which both simplifies the creation process and makes it more amenable for mobile devices and social networks 9

Adaptive Streaming & Over The Top Video

Over The Top Video OTT, Over the Top is the delivery of video & audio media streams to connected devices via the internet and there will not be any need for a dedicated network (or) infrastructure provided by the operator, as OTT is transported through regular internet data protocols and uses open internet or unmanaged networks IPTV is delivered over a dedicated and managed network that is used only for broadcasting TV and the operator has full control over the network OTT used HTTP protocol which has already been used as a transport solution for video on demand (VOD) media embedded into web pages, especially on Flash-based sites, such as YouTube or Dailymotion 11

Drawback of Progressive Download YouTube does not use real time streaming concept. It uses progressive downloading of one media file, where the browser downloads the file from the HTTP web server and when it has a sufficient amount of data, starts to play the content while downloading the rest of the file. The main drawback to this approach is the length of time it takes to fill the initial buffer. The player downloads other portion of the video where the user is not interested to watch OTT Challenge Solution for OTT Challenge Since the video is transferred through open network, the quality of video playback depends on end user broadband connection speed Content streaming may be subject to stalling if there are fluctuations in bandwidth, leading to frame freezing The arrival of OTT streaming, however, has brought a new approach and its now possible to achieve levels of streaming quality over HTTP that allow live content to also be broadcast over the internet Adaptive Streaming Solution for OTT Challenge Servers in the network will split one media file into multiple segments or chunks or fragments with different bit rates OTT Clients in the network will request for segments of specific bitrate during playback which ensures smooth playback (limited or no rebuffering & only required segments will be downloaded instead of downloading entire clip) 3/26/2012 12

Adaptive Streaming Adaptive streaming is a hybrid delivery method that acts like streaming but is based on HTTP progressive download In a typical adaptive streaming implementation, the video/audio source is cut into many short segments ("chunks") and encoded to the desired delivery format. Chunks are typically 2-to-4-seconds long. At the video codec level, this typically means that each chunk is cut along video GOP (Group of Pictures) boundaries (each chunk starts with a key frame) and has no dependencies on past or future chunks/gops. This allows each chunk to later be decoded independently of other chunks at the client end It requires the use of an encoder which can encode a single source video at multiple bit rates at the server end. The "adaptive" part of the solution comes into play when the video/audio source is encoded at multiple bit rates, generating multiple chunks of various sizes for each 2-to-4-seconds of video. The client can choose between chunks of different sizes. The player client switches between streaming the different encodings depending on available resources. It works by detecting a user's bandwidth and CPU capacity in real time and adjusting the quality of a video stream accordingly. Adaptive streaming is the process of efficiently delivering streaming video to users by dynamically switching among different streams of varying quality and size during playback. Another major goal of adaptive streaming is to make this process smooth and seamless to users, so that if up-scaling or down-scaling the quality of the stream is necessary, it is a smooth and nearly unnoticeable switch without disrupting the continuous playback. "The result: very little buffering, fast start time and a good experience for both high-end and low-end connections. 3/26/2012 13

Apple's HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) The Apple variant communicates available chunks by using a text file format.m3u8 (A playlist. With list of URLs) The top-level playlist contains the list of available qualities, each with their individual sub-playlist. This sub-playlist explicitly enumerates the individual URLs for each chunk. The chunks contain both audio and video in an MPEG-2 Transport Stream format supporting H264 video and AAC or MP3 audio. Microsoft's Smooth Streaming Adaptive Streaming Solutions Microsoft s implementation3 uses an XML Manifest file to communicate the table of URLs to the client. The URLs are then formed by filling in a supplied template with the required parameters. Each chunk contains either audio or video material in a fragmented MP4 container. Audio and video are thus requested separately and can be switched to different qualities separately. 3GP Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) Server communicates the list of segments using a playlist file named MPD file 3GP DASH client checks MPD playlist to find the segment that best matches the current network bandwidth and continues streaming with the newly selected segment with different bitrate Adobe's HTTP Dynamic Streaming Adobe uses yet another XML format. It has its own MP4 variant which also fragments the metadata. The Flash player only supports H.264 and VP6 video and AAC and MP3 audio. 14

Apple HTTP Live Streaming HTTP Live Streaming (also known as HLS) is an HTTP-based media streaming It works by breaking the overall stream into a sequence of small HTTP-based file downloads, each download loading one short chunk of an overall potentially unbounded transport stream ( ts ). At the start of the streaming session, client downloads an extended M3U playlist containing the metadata for the various sub-streams which are available. As the stream is played, the client may select from a number of different alternate streams containing the same material encoded at a variety of data rates, allowing the streaming session to adapt to the available data rate based on bandwidth adaptation algorithm implemented on the client side Apple HLS supports Video On Demand as well 3/26/2012 15

Microsoft Smooth Streaming Smooth Streaming is Microsoft's implementation of HTTP-based adaptive streaming, which is a hybrid media delivery method. When a client requests a specific source time segment from the IIS Web server, the server dynamically finds the appropriate Movie Fragment box within the contiguous MP4 file and sends it over the wire as a standalone file, thus ensuring full cacheability downstream. ISMC file is an XML document that contains metadata required by a MSS client for streaming the media fragments. The ISMC file contains appropriate fragment duration, audio/video codec details etc. A MSS client starts the streaming by downloading the client manifest (ismc) file and parsing the ismc file from server and issues RESTful URL to download the media fragments. The client parses the ISMC file and understands the media content available in different bitrates for seamless streaming and downloads required fragments based on current download rate Providing multiple encoded bit rates of the same media source also allows clients to seamlessly and dynamically switch between bit rates depending on network conditions and CPU power. 3/26/2012 16

3GP DASH DASH (Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP) is a multimedia streaming technology where a multimedia file is partitioned into one or more segments and delivered to a client using HTTP. A media presentation description (MPD) describes segment information (timing, URL, media characteristics such as video resolution and bit rates). Segments can contain any media data, however the specification provides specific guidance and formats for use with two types of containers: MPEG-4 file format or MPEG-2 Transport Stream. 3/26/2012 17

Cloud based Streaming Server

Cloud based Streaming Server Multi Client Streaming Storage Server Edge Server MPEG TS Chunks HTTP Live Streaming MP4 Audio Video Fragments Origin Server Edge Server Smooth Streaming 3gp Segments Edge Server Dynamic Adaptive Streaming 19

Cloud based Streaming Server - Technology The Unified Streaming Server runs on the Origin Server. This is the server that has access to the video files for VOD presentation or acts as a publishing point for encoders to ingest Live streams. It delivers the Video-On- Demand/Live content and metadata files required by the different clients. In front of the Origin Servers are optional edge servers. These are standard HTTP caching nodes and their number depend on the expected 'load', i.e. the number of simultaneous viewers. Requests are spread over the available edge servers. The initial request will be forwarded to the origin server. Once the response is retrieved, it is stored in a caching server at the edge and passed on to the requesting client. All subsequent requests for this object will be served from the cache. The object is removed from the cache when it s no longer valid (as specified by the origin server). Valid objects may also be deleted by the cache management to free up space for more popular objects. When a client (iphone/silverlight/flash) starts a presentation it connects to the closest Edge server. On a cache-miss the Edge server requests the media fragment from the Origin server and caches it. USS delivers video in a series of short fragments. The content is available in different qualities allowing viewers with high-bandwidth connections to enjoy high definition (HD), while others may receive a lower quality stream depending on the current network conditions, the screen size and CPU capabilities. 20

Adaptive Streaming Streaming Media Origin Server Low Bandwidth 300 kbps Edge Caching Server Video served by server dynamically adapts to network conditions Server collect reports and understand the client network condition and serve contents suitable for quality streaming in the client side Server supports switching video contents based on client request (Dynamic Adaptive Streaming) which includes support for Apple HLS, MSFT Smooth Streaming, 3GP DASH & Adobe HTTP Dynamic Streaming 21

Cloud based Streaming Server - Features Video served by server dynamically adapts to network conditions One time encoding Handling multiple clients Live Streaming Live Video Broadcasting Video on Demand IPTV Support Transcoding TransMux Improved Throughput Efficiency (Saving Bandiwidth) Secured Video Delivery (SVD) Support for standard HTTP delivery systems Uses the MP4 standard container format, the industry standard for adaptive bitrate delivery (Adaptive Streaming) Multi Client Streaming Support - Apple HTTP Live Streaming, Microsoft Smooth Streaming, 3gp DASH & Adobe Dynamic Streaming Supports PlayReady and AES encryption 22

Cloud based Streaming Server - Advantages Advantages to the Operator Operator will be able to save bandwidth pipe and also will be able to serve all the users with best quality One solution will address all different clients like IPhone, Windows Phone & Android with different adaptive streaming technologies Manage space effectively with one time encoding logic Advantages to the Content Distributor Lower cost to deploy. Generic HTTP caches/proxies can be used and its doesn t require specialized servers at each node. Better scalability and reach as it dynamically adapts to network conditions and video rendering performance. No more guessing on what bitrates are most likely to be accessible to the audience. Every viewer gets the best available experience. Advantages to the Viewer No disconnects, no buffering and stuttering (the viewer has to meet the minimum bitrate/cpu requirements) Seamless bitrate switching. 23

Content Adaptation Gateway

Cloud based Content Adaptation AGteway 3G Carrier Network Content Adaptation Gateway Packet Data Network RNC Content Adaptation Gateway Video Optimization Video Caching Dynamic Rate Adaptation Over the TOP (OTT) Video Improved Throughput Efficiency Multi-user Support Linux / Windows OS TransMUX QoS Operator Deployed Streaming Servers (RTSP/ HTTP) Streaming Client Features: Video Optimization Video Transrating Video Smoothing Video Pacing JIT Video Delivery Video Caching Client Adaptation 25

Content Adaptation Gateway E2E Setup Content Providers Service Providers Operator Network End Devices Broadcast Server IP Multicast IP Router OTT Server Gaming Server VoD Server YouTube Sever IP Unicast HTTP Content Adaptation Gateway HTTP IP over Fibre Network IP Router IP Router Frog s Adaptive Streaming Client Home G/W RNC PC STB Node-B

Content Adaptation Gateway - Features Features Description Benefits Video Optimization Adaptive Video Transrating Optimize video properties like framerate, resolution etc based on client capability and human perception Change the Video Bitrate dynamically according to network conditions. Avoiding client side overheads like Scaling. Increases quality of user experience by reducing stalls (rebuffering). Client Adaptation Content Caching Network Monitoring Video pacing - Just-In-Time Delivery Video Smoothing Gateway detects each device and its video profile using a database of device profiles. Different devices have different profiles - screen sizes, resolutions, CPUs, players, and codecs and levels. Caching reduces upstream operating expenses by storing data in temporary memory for local distribution. Determine optimization parameters based on subscriber, content & network conditions (Operator n/w & client connection). Transmit data as per client buffer size to enable smooth playback. Transmit data as per encoding rate of video. Effective video transmission of variable bitrate video Optimize Bandwidth Caching saves multiple retrievals of the same video from content distributors, which saves bandwidth in the upstream link and minimizes operating expenses. Ensures optimization occurs according to network conditions. Eliminates wasted downloads of entire video in cases where user watches only initial portion. Avoid Bandwidth fluctuations 27

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