Re: [PATCH spice-server 00/28] adaptive video streaming

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Hi,
On 03/03/2013 07:50 AM, Andrew Cathrow wrote:


----- Original Message -----
From: "Yonit Halperin" <yhalperi@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: spice-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Tuesday, February 26, 2013 1:03:46 PM
Subject:  [PATCH spice-server 00/28] adaptive video streaming

Hi,

The following patch series introduces adaptive video streaming to
spice.

Until now, the mjpeg quality was constant (70), and the frame rate
was modified
according to the rate of frame drops in the server side (a drop
occurs when a new frame reaches the server while
an older frame is still queued in the pipe). In the client side, the
video playback is synchronized according
to the audio playback (each audio and video frame holds an mm-time
field). The jitter-buffer size in the client
was constant as well - 100 ms. When video frames arrive late to the
client (i.e., when the audio playback is ahead of them),
they are dropped.

The adaptive video streaming is implemented by the following
heuristic:
Given a bit rate, we calculate the best combination of mjpeg quality
and frame rate (henceforth, the stream parameters) for this
bit rate. In order to decide this combination, we evaluate the
encoding size for different jpeg
qualities by applying them on successive frames.
Every new stream is assigned with an initial bit rate. The bit rate
is re-estimated and
modified during the stream life time. The bit-rate is modified based
on:
1) periodic reports from the client:
    The client reports includes information about drops and the
    playback latency.
    In response to drops, or too short playback latency, we decrease
    the bit rate.
    In response to reports that suggest that the client playback is
    stable with the
    current configuration, we try to increase the bit-rate.
2) server drops: the bit-rate is decreased when server drops occur.

Each time the bit rate changes, the stream parameters are
re-evaluated.
In addition, we monitor the frames' encoding size, and when there is
a change
that may allow improving the stream parameters, or alternatively,
requires decreasing the
quality, we again re-evaluate them.


What kind of metrics do we expose - how can I get the bitrate back on the client and/or server?

The server side estimates the latency, and an optimal bit rate for the video playback, which is dynamically modified throughout the playback. This measurements are kept on the server (they are documented in the log file if you run with the highest debug level).

Other changes:
--------------

Besides the client reports, I also added to the protocol a message
that controls the
audio playback latency, for allowing better synchronization of the
audio and video playback buffering.

The roundtrip time is used for estimating the required playback
delay. In order to get a more accurate estimation
of the roundtrip time I also added an option to measure it
periodically instead of just on startup, and
take the minimum measurement as estimation.

Results
-------
I compared the video quality of the current spice master, and of the
new spice, under different network setups.
Spice master was a bit modified for making the comparison more fair:
I increased the audio jitter buffer to 200ms (instead of 100),
and also included the patch "red_worker: stream agent - fix
miscounting of frames".
The network setup was emulated using tc.

You can find the tests details and the results in a following email.

For 5Mpbs and 60ms roundtrip (Test1), in spice-master, more than 70%
of the frames that are sent to the client are being dropped, and the
video
is unwatchable. With new spice, while the average frame rate is about
the same, only about 2% of the frames are being dropped by the
client.
For 2.5Mbps and 60ms (Test2), as expected, things gets worse for
spice-master, and the drops rate reaches 90%. For the new spice, it
is less then 20%, and
the video is watchable.

I also tested a setup of 10Mbps with high latency (170ms, Test3). The
latency affects the initial bit rate estimation in spice (probably
due to the tcp acks overhead).
Thus, the stream is started with a bit-rate estimation of less then
1.25Mbps. The adaptive video heuristic gradually converges to a
higher bit rate (the column "end-bit-rate"), and
the next video stream will be started with the improved bit rate
estimation.
In Test5 I tested a real environment with a network setup similar to
Test3. However, the test are not comparable because in Test5 setup
(different server and guest),
the basic frame rate (i.e., from the guest to the server) is much
smaller (still need to investigate why).

In Test4 (20Mbps; <1 ms roundtrip), I evaluated and unlimited setup,
i.e., a setup which will allow the best frame rate and jpeg-quality
for the stream.
With new spice, the capacity of the channel is exploited efficiently.
With spice-master, the condition for dropping frames according to
the defined fps is too strict,
and the observed frame rate is smaller then the maximum possible.

Video streaming short-term TODO:
----------------
- Implement playback-latency adjustments for spice-gtk gstreamer
front-end.
- Add vp8 encoding
- Solve some problems we have with video identification.
- Try to achieve faster convergence to the "right" bit-rate when we
start with a wrong estimation.

long-term TODO:
---------------
video pass-through

Regards,
Yonit.

Yonit Halperin (28):
   red_worker: stream agent - fix miscounting of frames
   server/red_worker: streams: moving mjpeg_encoder from Stream to
     StreamAgent
   mjpeg_encoder: configure mjpeg quality and frame rate according to
   a
     given bit rate
   mjpeg_encoder: re-configure stream parameters when the frame's
     encoding size changes
   mjpeg_encoder: adjust the stream bit rate based on periodic client
     feedback
   mjpeg_encoder: modify stream bit rate based on server side pipe
     congestion
   mjpeg_encoder: update the client with estimations for the required
     playback latency
   mjpeg_encoder: move the control over frame drops to mjpeg_encoder
   mjpeg_encoder: keep the average observed fps similar to the defined
     fps
   mjpeg_encoder: add stream warmup time, in which we avoid server and
     client drops
   server: spice_timer_queue
   server/red_worker: assign timer callbacks to worker_core, using
     spice_timer_queue
   red_channel: monitor connection latency using MSG_PING
   red_worker: stream - update periodically the input frame rate
   server/red_worker: enable latency monitoring in the display channel
   red_worker: start using mjpeg_encoder rate control capabilities
   red_worker: support SPICE_MSGC_DISPLAY_STREAM_REPORT
   red_worker: notify mjpeg_encoder on server frame drops
   red_worker: ignoring video frame drops that are not due to pipe
     congestion
   dispatcher.h: fix - s/#define MAIN_DISPATCHER_H/#define
   DISPATCHER_H
   snd_worker: support sending SPICE_MSG_PLAYBACK_LATENCY
   reds: support mm_time latency adjustments
   red_worker: video streams - adjust client playback latency
   server/red_worker.c: use the bit rate of old streams as a start
   point
     for new streams
   server/red_worker: add an option to supply the bandwidth via env
   var
   collect and print video stream statistics
   red_worker: increase the interval limit for stream frames
   red_worker: assign mm_time to vga frames

  server/Makefile.am         |   2 +
  server/dispatcher.h        |   6 +-
  server/inputs_channel.c    |   1 +
  server/main_channel.c      |   7 +-
  server/main_channel.h      |   1 +
  server/main_dispatcher.c   |  32 ++
  server/main_dispatcher.h   |   2 +
  server/mjpeg_encoder.c     | 981
  ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++-
  server/mjpeg_encoder.h     |  70 +++-
  server/red_channel.c       | 228 +++++++++++
  server/red_channel.h       |  18 +
  server/red_dispatcher.c    |   1 +
  server/red_worker.c        | 514 +++++++++++++++++++-----
  server/reds-private.h      |   2 +
  server/reds.c              |  28 +-
  server/reds.h              |   2 +
  server/smartcard.c         |   1 +
  server/snd_worker.c        |  45 +++
  server/snd_worker.h        |   2 +
  server/spice_timer_queue.c | 268 +++++++++++++
  server/spice_timer_queue.h |  43 ++
  server/spicevmc.c          |   1 +
  spice-common               |   2 +-
  23 files changed, 2148 insertions(+), 109 deletions(-)
  create mode 100644 server/spice_timer_queue.c
  create mode 100644 server/spice_timer_queue.h

--
1.8.1

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http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/spice-devel


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