OTT TV for engineers course description

This course covers OTT TV by primarily looking at the delivery of video streams using HTTP adaptive streaming. Both MPEG DASH and HLS are investigated. Hands on sessions involve using Wireshark to analyse streams as well as crafting segmented content.

What will you learn

• Explain what OTT TV is, and how it works.
• Describe the OTT TV architecture.
• Use Wireshark to analyse and troubleshoot OTT video streams.
• Explain how HTTP adaptive streaming works.
• Evaluate and compare MPEG DASH and HLS.
• Use tools to create OTT TV adaptive streams.

OTT TV for engineers course details

OTT TV for engineers course contents

• What is OTT TV?

Broadcast vs OTT TV. Delivery over the Internet. Video providers vs ISPs. What is HTTP streaming? How is it kept secure? HTTP, not HTTP streaming, streaming protocol vs HTTP streaming, TCP vs UDP, not UDP and RTP for delivery, ABR streaming, standards.
Hands on: Using Wireshark for HTTP streams.

• HTTP protocol stack

The whole stack, IP, TCP, UDP, IPv6, HTTP versions, HTTP packet structure, HTTP example GET and RESPONSE, HTTPv1.1, HTTPv2.0, HTTPv3.0, HTTP vs Flash, HTML 5.
Hands on: Analysing HTTP streams.

• Adaptive bitrate streaming principles

Transcoding - transizing and transrating, bit rate encoding ladder. Video chunks, fragments, segments. Switching streams, manifest files - overview and examples, URLs.
Hands on: Client behaviours on a stream.

• OTT TV streaming architecture

IPTV, OTT, The Internet. content providers, peering and transit, IX, peering arrangements, CDN, CDN servers, CDN providers, nearest servers, HTTP caching, Name resolution, DNS and multiple addresses, GSLB, anycast.
Hands on: Analysing CDN and Internet delivery.

• TCP and HTTP streaming interactions

TCP connections, 3-way handshake, TCP and broadcasts, acknowledgments, sliding window, window size, the problem with TCP and HTTP, persistent and concurrent connections, performance of HTTPv1.1 and HTTPv2.
Hands on: TCP and HTTP.

• MPEG DASH

Overview, stakeholders, architecture, codec agnostic, XML files, media presentation (MPD) XML files, segments, example MPD.
Hands on: MPEG DASH MPD analysis.

• HTTP Live Streaming and others

HLS introduction, HLS overview, playlists, example playlist, Microsoft Smooth Streaming.
Hands on: HLS manifest analysis.

• Tools

Bento4, Apple developer tools for HLS.
Hands on: Creating segmented content.

• Security

TLS/SSL protocol, HTTPS, TCP and TLSv1.2, example TLSv1.2 client and server hello, TCP and TLSv1.3, QUIC timeline, QUIC layers, QUIC connections, QUIC streams, QUIC packets and frames, QUIC headers, QUIC encryption, QUIC acknowledgements, QUIC congestion control, QUIC handshake, content protection.
Hands on: Analysis of TLSv1.2, v1.3 and QUIC.

• Summary

Streaming priorities, IPTV vs OTT, VOD vs live stream, HLS vs MPEG-DASH vs low latency, WebRTC.

Learning path

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