skip to main content
10.1145/3544216.3544236acmconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagescommConference Proceedingsconference-collections
research-article
Open access

LiveNet: a low-latency video transport network for large-scale live streaming

Published: 22 August 2022 Publication History
  • Get Citation Alerts
  • Abstract

    Low-latency live streaming has imposed stringent latency requirements on video transport networks. In this paper we report on the design and operation of the Alibaba low-latency video transport network, LiveNet. LiveNet builds on a flat CDN overlay with a centralized controller for global optimization. As part of this, we present our design of the global routing computation and path assignment, as well as our fast data transmission architecture with fine-grained control of video frames. The performance results obtained from three years of operation demonstrate the effectiveness of LiveNet in improving CDN performance and QoE metrics. Compared with our prior state-of-the-art hierarchical CDN deployment, LiveNet halves the CDN delay and ensures 98% of views do not experience stalls and that 95% can start playback within 1 second. We further report our experiences of running LiveNet over the last 3 years.

    Supplementary Material

    PDF File (p812-li-supp.pdf)
    Supplemental material.

    References

    [1]
    Youku lands domestic broadcast rights for 2018 world cup. http://www.ecns.cn/business/2018-05-30/detail-ifyuurnp0995123.shtml, 2018.
    [2]
    2020 global networking trends report. https://www.cisco.com/c/dam/m/en_us/solutions/enterprise-networks/networking-report/files/GLBL-ENG_NB-06_0_NA_RPT_PDF_MOFU-no-NetworkingTrendsReport-NB_rpten018612_5.pdf, 2020.
    [3]
    Top mobile apps & platforms in china 2021. https://www.chinainternetwatch.com/30778/top-mobile-apps/, 2021.
    [4]
    12.12 sale: All you need to know about 1212 sale (double 12). https://cedcommerce.com/blog/all-you-need-to-know-about-double-12/, 2022.
    [5]
    Broadcast live solution for global live streaming - alibaba cloud. https://www.alibabacloud.com/solutions/broadcast-live, 2022.
    [6]
    Key takeaways from the taobao live 2021 livestreaming report. https://chinamktginsights.com/key-takeaways-from-the-taobao-live-2021-livestreaming-report/, 2022.
    [7]
    Taobao live homepage. https://taolive.taobao.com/, 2022.
    [8]
    V. K. Adhikari, Y. Guo, F. Hao, V. Hilt, Z.-L. Zhang, M. Varvello, and M. Steiner. Measurement study of netflix, hulu, and a tale of three cdns. IEEE/ACM Trans. Netw., page 1984--1997, 2015.
    [9]
    K. Andreev, B. M. Maggs, A. Meyerson, and R. K. Sitaraman. Designing overlay multicast networks for streaming. In Proceedings of the fifteenth annual ACM symposium on Parallel algorithms and architectures, pages 149--158, 2003.
    [10]
    Z. Avramova, D. De Vleeschauwer, K. Spaey, S. Wittevrongel, H. Bruneel, and C. Blondia. Comparison of simulcast and scalable video coding in terms of the required capacity in an iptv network. In Packet Video 2007, pages 113--122, 2007.
    [11]
    S. Banerjee, B. Bhattacharjee, and C. Kommareddy. Scalable application layer multicast. In Proceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2002 Conference, page 205--217, 2002.
    [12]
    D. S. Berger, R. K. Sitaraman, and M. Harchol-Balter. AdaptSize: Orchestrating the hot object memory cache in a content delivery network. In 14th USENIX Symposium on Networked Systems Design and Implementation (NSDI 17), pages 483--498, 2017.
    [13]
    G. Carlucci, L. De Cicco, S. Holmer, and S. Mascolo. Analysis and design of the google congestion control for web real-time communication (webrtc). In Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Multimedia Systems, pages 1--12, 2016.
    [14]
    M. Castro, P. Druschel, A.-M. Kermarrec, A. Nandi, A. Rowstron, and A. Singh. Splitstream: High-bandwidth multicast in cooperative environments. In Proceedings of the Nineteenth ACM Symposium on Operating Systems Principles, page 298--313, 2003.
    [15]
    F. Chen, R. K. Sitaraman, and M. Torres. End-user mapping: Next generation request routing for content delivery. In Proceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2015 Conference, page 167--181, 2015.
    [16]
    Y. Chu, S. Rao, S. Seshan, and H. Zhang. Enabling conferencing applications on the internet using an overlay muilticast architecture. In Proceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2001 Conference, page 55--67, 2001.
    [17]
    J. Dai, Z. Chang, and S.-H. G. Chan. Delay optimization for multi-source multichannel overlay live streaming. In 2015 IEEE international conference on communications (ICC), pages 6959--6964. IEEE, 2015.
    [18]
    M. Dong, T. Meng, D. Zarchy, E. Arslan, Y. Gilad, B. Godfrey, and M. Schapira. PCC vivace: Online-Learning congestion control. In 15th USENIX Symposium on Networked Systems Design and Implementation (NSDI 18), pages 343--356, Renton, WA, Apr. 2018. USENIX Association.
    [19]
    D. Eppstein. Finding the k shortest paths. SIAM Journal on computing, 28(2):652--673, 1998.
    [20]
    A. Flavel, P. Mani, D. Maltz, N. Holt, J. Liu, Y. Chen, and O. Surmachev. Fastroute: A scalable load-aware anycast routing architecture for modern cdns. In 12th {USENIX} Symposium on Networked Systems Design and Implementation ({NSDI} 15), pages 381--394, 2015.
    [21]
    S. Fouladi, J. Emmons, E. Orbay, C. Wu, R. S. Wahby, and K. Winstein. Salsify: Low-Latency network video through tighter integration between a video codec and a transport protocol. In 15th USENIX Symposium on Networked Systems Design and Implementation (NSDI 18), pages 267--282, 2018.
    [22]
    M. J. Freedman. Experiences with coralcdn: A five-year operational view. In NSDI, pages 95--110, 2010.
    [23]
    A. Ganjam, F. Siddiqui, J. Zhan, X. Liu, I. Stoica, J. Jiang, V. Sekar, and H. Zhang. C3: Internet-Scale control plane for video quality optimization. In 12th USENIX Symposium on Networked Systems Design and Implementation (NSDI 15), page 131--144, 2015.
    [24]
    P. Hu, R. Misra, and S. Katti. Dejavu: Enhancing videoconferencing with prior knowledge. In Proceedings of the 20th International Workshop on Mobile Computing Systems and Applications, page 63--68, 2019.
    [25]
    J. Jiang, R. Das, G. Ananthanarayanan, P. A. Chou, V. Padmanabhan, V. Sekar, E. Dominique, M. Goliszewski, D. Kukoleca, R. Vafin, and H. Zhang. Via: Improving internet telephony call quality using predictive relay selection. In Proceedings of the 2016 ACM SIGCOMM Conference, page 286--299, 2016.
    [26]
    J. Jiang, V. Sekar, H. Milner, D. Shepherd, I. Stoica, and H. Zhang. CFA: A practical prediction system for video QoE optimization. In 13th USENIX Symposium on Networked Systems Design and Implementation (NSDI 16), page 137--150, 2016.
    [27]
    S. Kaune, K. Pussep, C. Leng, A. Kovacevic, G. Tyson, and R. Steinmetz. Modelling the internet delay space based on geographical locations. In 2009 17th Euromicro International Conference on Parallel, Distributed and Network-based Processing, pages 301--310. IEEE, 2009.
    [28]
    J. Kim, Y. Jung, H. Yeo, J. Ye, and D. Han. Neural-enhanced live streaming: Improving live video ingest via online learning. In Proceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2020 Conference, page 205--217, 2020.
    [29]
    L. Kontothanassis, R. Sitaraman, J. Wein, D. Hong, R. Kleinberg, B. Mancuso, D. Shaw, and D. Stodolsky. A transport layer for live streaming in a content delivery network. Proceedings of the IEEE, 92(9):1408--1419, 2004.
    [30]
    D. Kostić, A. Rodriguez, J. Albrecht, and A. Vahdat. Bullet: High bandwidth data dissemination using an overlay mesh. In Proceedings of the Nineteenth ACM Symposium on Operating Systems Principles, page 282--297, 2003.
    [31]
    L. Lamport. The part-time parliament. ACM Transactions on Computer Systems 16, 2 (May 1998), 133--169. Also appeared as SRC Research Report 49. This paper was first submitted in 1990, setting a personal record for publication delay that has since been broken by [60]., May 1998. ACM SIGOPS Hall of Fame Award in 2012.
    [32]
    F. Larumbe and A. Mathur. Under the hood: Broadcasting live video to millions. https://engineering.fb.com/2015/12/03/ios/under-the-hood-broadcasting-live-video-to-millions/, 2015.
    [33]
    X. Liu, F. Dobrian, H. Milner, J. Jiang, V. Sekar, I. Stoica, and H. Zhang. A case for a coordinated internet video control plane. In Proceedings of the 2012 ACM SIGCOMM Conference, page 359--370, 2012.
    [34]
    B. M. Maggs and R. K. Sitaraman. Algorithmic nuggets in content delivery. SIGCOMM Comput. Commun. Rev., 45(3):52--66, jul 2015.
    [35]
    M. K. Mukerjee, D. Naylor, J. Jiang, D. Han, S. Seshan, and H. Zhang. Practical, real-time centralized control for cdn-based live video delivery. In Proceedings of the 2015 ACM SIGCOMM Conference, page 311--324, 2015.
    [36]
    A. Raman, G. Tyson, and N. Sastry. Facebook (a) live? are live social broadcasts really broad casts? In Proceedings of the 2018 world wide web conference, pages 1491--1500, 2018.
    [37]
    R. K. Sitaraman, M. Kasbekar, W. Lichtenstein, and M. Jain. Overlay networks: An akamai perspective. Advanced Content Delivery, Streaming, and Cloud Services, 51(4):305--328, 2014.
    [38]
    Z. Song, D. S. Berger, K. Li, and W. Lloyd. Learning relaxed belady for content distribution network caching. In 17th USENIX Symposium on Networked Systems Design and Implementation (NSDI 20), pages 529--544, 2020.
    [39]
    A. Sundarrajan, M. Kasbekar, R. K. Sitaraman, and S. Shukla. Midgress-aware traffic provisioning for content delivery. In 2020 USENIX Annual Technical Conference (USENIX ATC 20), pages 543--557, 2020.
    [40]
    A. Valadarsky, M. Schapira, D. Shahaf, and A. Tamar. Learning to route. In Proceedings of the 16th ACM Workshop on Hot Topics in Networks, page 185--191, 2017.
    [41]
    B. Wang, X. Zhang, G. Wang, H. Zheng, and B. Y. Zhao. Anatomy of a personalized livestreaming system. In Proceedings of the 2016 Internet Measurement Conference, page 485--498, 2016.
    [42]
    Wikipedia contributors. Group of pictures --- Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 2021. [Online; accessed 24-January-2022].
    [43]
    Y. Xu, C. Yu, J. Li, and Y. Liu. Video telephony for end-consumers: Measurement study of google+, ichat, and skype. In Proceedings of the 2012 Internet Measurement Conference, page 371--384, 2012.
    [44]
    H. Yin, X. Liu, T. Zhan, V. Sekar, F. Qiu, C. Lin, H. Zhang, and B. Li. Design and deployment of a hybrid cdn-p2p system for live video streaming: Experiences with livesky. In Proceedings of the 17th ACM International Conference on Multimedia, page 25--34, 2009.
    [45]
    H. Zhang, A. Zhou, J. Lu, R. Ma, Y. Hu, C. Li, X. Zhang, H. Ma, and X. Chen. OnRL: Improving Mobile Video Telephony via Online Reinforcement Learning. 2020.
    [46]
    X. Zhang, T. Sen, Z. Zhang, T. April, B. Chandrasekaran, D. Choffnes, B. M. Maggs, H. Shen, R. K. Sitaraman, and X. Yang. Anyopt: Predicting and optimizing ip anycast performance. In Proceedings of the 2021 ACM SIGCOMM 2021 Conference, SIGCOMM '21, page 447--462, New York, NY, USA, 2021. Association for Computing Machinery.
    [47]
    M. Zhao, P. Aditya, A. Chen, Y. Lin, A. Haeberlen, P. Druschel, B. Maggs, B. Wishon, and M. Ponec. Peer-assisted content distribution in akamai netsession. In Proceedings of the 2013 Conference on Internet Measurement Conference, IMC '13, page 31--42, New York, NY, USA, 2013. Association for Computing Machinery.
    [48]
    Z. Zheng, Y. Ma, Y. Liu, F. Yang, Z. Li, Y. Zhang, J. Zhang, W. Shi, W. Chen, D. Li, Q. An, H. Hong, H. H. Liu, and M. Zhang. Xlink: Qoe-driven multi-path quic transport in large-scale video services. In Proceedings of the 2021 ACM SIGCOMM 2021 Conference, SIGCOMM '21, page 418--432, New York, NY, USA, 2021. Association for Computing Machinery.
    [49]
    A. Zhou, H. Zhang, G. Su, L. Wu, R. Ma, Z. Meng, X. Zhang, X. Xie, H. Ma, and X. Chen. Learning to coordinate video codec with transport protocol for mobile video telephony. In The 25th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking, 2019.
    [50]
    H. Zhu, V. Gupta, S. S. Ahuja, Y. Tian, Y. Zhang, and X. Jin. Network planning with deep reinforcement learning. In Proceedings of the 2021 ACM SIGCOMM 2021 Conference, page 258--271, 2021.

    Cited By

    View all
    • (2024)Venus: Enhancing QoE of Crowdsourced Live Video Streaming by Exploiting Multiflow Viewer AssistanceProceedings of the 30th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking10.1145/3636534.3649354(170-184)Online publication date: 29-May-2024
    • (2023)Demystifying the QoS and QoE of Edge-hosted Video Streaming Applications in the Wild with SNESetProceedings of the ACM on Management of Data10.1145/36267231:4(1-29)Online publication date: 12-Dec-2023
    • (2023)Switchboard: Efficient Resource Management for Conferencing ServicesProceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2023 Conference10.1145/3603269.3604879(1000-1011)Online publication date: 10-Sep-2023
    • Show More Cited By

    Index Terms

    1. LiveNet: a low-latency video transport network for large-scale live streaming

        Recommendations

        Comments

        Information & Contributors

        Information

        Published In

        cover image ACM Conferences
        SIGCOMM '22: Proceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2022 Conference
        August 2022
        858 pages
        ISBN:9781450394208
        DOI:10.1145/3544216
        This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution International 4.0 License.

        Sponsors

        Publisher

        Association for Computing Machinery

        New York, NY, United States

        Publication History

        Published: 22 August 2022

        Check for updates

        Author Tags

        1. CDN
        2. live streaming
        3. low latency transmission

        Qualifiers

        • Research-article

        Funding Sources

        • Beijing Natural Science Foundation
        • National Key R&D Program of China
        • Natural Science Foundation of China

        Conference

        SIGCOMM '22
        Sponsor:
        SIGCOMM '22: ACM SIGCOMM 2022 Conference
        August 22 - 26, 2022
        Amsterdam, Netherlands

        Acceptance Rates

        Overall Acceptance Rate 554 of 3,547 submissions, 16%

        Contributors

        Other Metrics

        Bibliometrics & Citations

        Bibliometrics

        Article Metrics

        • Downloads (Last 12 months)1,472
        • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)137

        Other Metrics

        Citations

        Cited By

        View all
        • (2024)Venus: Enhancing QoE of Crowdsourced Live Video Streaming by Exploiting Multiflow Viewer AssistanceProceedings of the 30th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking10.1145/3636534.3649354(170-184)Online publication date: 29-May-2024
        • (2023)Demystifying the QoS and QoE of Edge-hosted Video Streaming Applications in the Wild with SNESetProceedings of the ACM on Management of Data10.1145/36267231:4(1-29)Online publication date: 12-Dec-2023
        • (2023)Switchboard: Efficient Resource Management for Conferencing ServicesProceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2023 Conference10.1145/3603269.3604879(1000-1011)Online publication date: 10-Sep-2023
        • (2023)CellFusion: Multipath Vehicle-to-Cloud Video Streaming with Network Coding in the WildProceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2023 Conference10.1145/3603269.3604832(668-683)Online publication date: 10-Sep-2023
        • (2023)PacketGame: Multi-Stream Packet Gating for Concurrent Video Inference at ScaleProceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2023 Conference10.1145/3603269.3604825(724-737)Online publication date: 10-Sep-2023
        • (2023)Converge: QoE-driven Multipath Video Conferencing over WebRTCProceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2023 Conference10.1145/3603269.3604822(637-653)Online publication date: 10-Sep-2023
        • (2023)An Innovative Resource-based Dynamic Scheduling Video Computing and Network Convergence System2023 International Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing (IWCMC)10.1109/IWCMC58020.2023.10182677(174-181)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2023
        • (2022)Management in Management: Utilization of the Digital Key for Alibaba CloudBCP Business & Management10.54691/bcpbm.v34i.307934(649-656)Online publication date: 14-Dec-2022

        View Options

        View options

        PDF

        View or Download as a PDF file.

        PDF

        eReader

        View online with eReader.

        eReader

        Get Access

        Login options

        Media

        Figures

        Other

        Tables

        Share

        Share

        Share this Publication link

        Share on social media