How Net Solutions helped Present Communications Ltd. build a

Live Event Broadcasting Video Platform

Client

Present Communications

Industry

Media, Publishing & Entertainment

Technologies

JavaScript

JAVA

MySQL

AWS

Live Webcasting Video
Streaming Platform

Present Communications provides audio-visuals, video conferencing equipments, webcasting, video productions, and other technical services to the live event industry.

The platform was also expected to allow presenters to play a slideshow along with the webcast. They wanted the users to be able to share their queries about the event, and participate in online polls conducted during the live webcast.

The Problem

Present Communications Ltd. wanted to create a digital platform to streamline an event flow.

While Wowza was used for broadcasting events, other processes such as event invites, sharing event details, and event creation were done manually. Therefore, Present Communications Ltd. wanted a digital platform, where all the processes would fall under a single platform for users around the globe – creating an event, streaming live or on-demand videos.

With digitization, companies will also be able to increase their reach and drive customer engagement with customized interaction. Further, the platform would fulfill the following high-level objectives:

  • With customized user access, the user will be able to access this platform through geo-location, domain, or email address. Through customized interaction, companies can increase their reach and drive engagement.
  • Event creation, and broadcasting, via live Q&A’s, polling, and inviting users.
  • Using iFrame, companies can embed live video on their website and measure its success through integrated tracking.
  • Being a SAAS-based white-labelled platform, it allows resellers to organize events for their clients.
  • Companies can build their own platform and customize it for a consistent user experience.
  • High-level security, where data is stored behind multiple firewalls on SSL secure servers.
  • Analytics, to measure reach and engagement thus improving ROI.
  • Synchronized slides that save your content for live and on-demand viewing for a consistent experience.
  • All content is automatically saved and archived.
  • Available on all devices: PCs, laptops, IPhones, Android, etc., in real-time.

The Solution

Our client wanted to use a third-party video streaming platform to take care of the webcasting solution.

Our team could foresee some initial challenges with this request. One issue was to determine whether the third-party platform would be able to provide automated app creation, with the web services. Our team anticipated issues related to IPs and assessed the need to find out what kind of browser issues would possibly occur. Another challenge was to find a video player that could offer adaptive bit-rate streaming. Since there were no specific requirements given to us by the client, our team had to work on refining the scope for the application as well.

The Solution

Ideation

The product owner team took the baton of ideating the requirements with the client via regular documented brainstorming sessions. The requirements were then converted into a visual representation via wireframes which represented the probable user flow on the platform. We then assigned relative priorities to the features in order to identify the Minimum Viable Product ( MVP ) and kept the ‘extra’ features out of the first release. This helped us keep the costs down and ensure greater value.

  • The team narrowed down to an MVP that was confined to the following scope for the admin:
  • Adding companies and events
  • Managing their events by adding images and presentations to be displayed along with the webcast
  • Inviting members to sign up and view the event live
  • Recording live events to be viewed later
  • Allowing viewers to ask questions during the live webcast
  • Enabling viewers to participate in the online polls conducted by the organizer during the live webcast

Technology Stack

Based on the final requirements, the technology panel identified the most suitable technology stack for the application, to work in cadence with the third-party integrations involved in the platform solution.

  • Front End: JSP, JavaScript, JQuery
  • Back End: JAVA8, Spring Boot, Spring Data JPA
  • Streaming Service: Wowza streaming engine 4.6.0
  • Database: MySQL
  • Third Party API: Send grid Hosting: Amazon EC2 service

Wowza was shortlisted as the third-party video streaming solution to be integrated with the platform. The team was able to make some custom changes to the Wowza APIs in order to achieve authentication on Wowza Rest APIs.

JW Player was finalized as the video player with a premium subscription so that the platform could handle adaptive bit-rate streaming. The team was able to custom code to put logics in place so that the player played RTMP Stream as primary, and HLS as secondary, in case flash was detected on the browser.

The Result

Scalable Platform

This will help in the end-to-end event management and automation of the complete flow.
Build a Future Blueprint

Implement Womza’s ultra-low latency to move the platform to the next level. This new platform streams worldwide within two seconds or less, end-to-end latency. Further, it automatically scales up in large events or during peak viewing hours thus offering greater elasticity and intelligent load balancing, to accommodate your viewers.

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