Streaming: How It Works and Various Approaches for Quality Viewing

1. Presented by Amanda Steven Aamir Obaid Streaming

2. OVERVIEW • What is streaming? • How Streaming Works? • Streaming (various approaches) • Different Streaming Methods • Streaming Players & products • Advantages of streaming

3. What is Streaming? Streaming Defined • Transmit audio, video and other multimedia over the Internet or corporate intranets. • Use to deliver almost any type of media – from video, audio and image files to animation sequences and text.

4. How streaming works? When audio or video is streamed, a small buffer space is created on the user's computer, and data starts downloading into it. As soon as the buffer is full (usually just a matter of seconds), the file starts to play. As the file plays, it uses up information in the buffer, but while it is playing, more data is being downloaded. As long as the data can be downloaded as fast as it is used up in playback, the file will play smoothly. • A computer connected to the internet over a local area network (LAN) or a modem. • A web browser with the proper player or plug-in installed. • A plug-ins works in conjunction with the browser to play streaming encoded files in a particular format. Continued…..

5. A web server stores web pages or HTML files. • Streaming media files normally reside on a separate dedicated streaming server. • A media link is clicked on a web page the browser reads the HTML code, and the player/plug-in take over. • The player negotiates with the streaming server and gets the target media file using a path statement. Continued….

6. A few seconds of buffering the media file begins to stream within the player onto screen.

7. Internet, Intranet, WAN How Streaming Media Works Windows NT or UNIX Web Server Stored Video Files (AVI) Stored .ASF Files Windows Media Players Live Content Windows Media Encoder Windows Media Server Tip: PowerPoint 2000 can send an online broadcast directly to a Media Server

8. Streaming (various approaches) • Several different approaches to streaming content on the web such as: audio, audio with slides, motion video, animation, live web casts… • Audio is the simplest media type of stream. • Requires the least amount of time and technical expertise to produce, and is the most reliable of all true streaming formats. Continued…

9. Good for delivering music, recorded interviews and speeches, language comprehension instruction, stories, news report or auditory content that does not require visual representations. • A slight delay of at about 5 seconds or more after a user clicks an audio link. • Provide good quality sound and images with modem connections. • Animation is the movement of text, images and/or shapes within a screen area. Continued…

10. Animation files often use a progressive download method of streaming. • Flash animation can also be converted into true streaming presentations using Real Media or QuickTime. • They can also be combined and synchronized with streaming audio files. • Good web animations often require significant production time and resources. Continued…

11. Live web casts are on-line broadcasts . • Use streaming to deliver the audio, slides or video of a presenter. • Web casts are most suitable for high demand live presentations to large geographically dispersed audiences. • Web cast is a live event and can even be recorded for later viewing for who missed the original webcast. • It is less expensive than satellite broadcasting.

12. Different Streaming Methods • The User Experience • On-Demand: user can start, stop, pause, FF, RR, etc. (VCR) • Broadcast: user can join and leave (TV / Radio) • The Delivery Mechanism • Unicast: user-initiated point-to-point connection to the server • Multicast: point-to-multipoint connection from the server • Myths • Unicast delivery implies on-demand experience • Broadcast experience implies multicast delivery • On-demand experience implies unicast delivery • Fact • Multicast delivery implies broadcast experience

13. Unicast Streaming N Streams across the network Content Server Network N Clients

14. Multicast Streaming One copy across the network Content Server Network N Clients

15. Different Streaming Players • Three major streaming players are RealMedia, QuickTime, and Windows Media. • Streaming has three components that affect people who use your web site: Servers and media files, Media players or plug-ins, Encoding and creation tools. • RealMedia, QuickTime and Windows Media have their own proprietary server and types of media files that they use. Continued…

16. Media player is a plug-in component for web browsers. • Users need the player installed on their computer to view or listen to streaming media designed for that player. • Encoding and file creation relates to the way media files are created for a particular streaming format. • Three streaming has its own proprietary way of encoding media files for playback from streaming server. • Might need access to special software for converting files into the streaming format of your choice.

17. Advantages of Streaming Faster Views over the Internet: Streaming media takes the wait out of hearing audio or viewing video and animation over the internet. Streaming video does not need to be downloaded before it can be viewed. Protection against media piracy: Provides a much higher level of security for original content and can protect content owner’s rights. Continued…

18. Streamed files play over the internet without being downloaded to views’ computers. • Media if fully protected and not susceptible to unauthorized duplication or tampering. • See who’s watching your videos: • Possible to keep track of viewers who see your streaming media. • Provides feature that gives you detailed reports about who is viewing your media, the number of times a file is requested…. http://streaming compared

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