PWI Stream monitor Addon for Wowza Streaming Engine

The extension module allows you to make sure your video stream is of high quality. The module continuously checks the incoming stream. It switches the input to the secondary (failover) stream if the primary stream interrupts or fails. Here, the secondary stream can be a live stream or a video file.

The module also plays a bumper video until a live stream starts. You can use the module for IP cam stream startups initiated by a video player on demand.

Main scenarios

Loop video as a bumper before you publish a live stream

• Play advertisement rolls before a live event

Loop video as a filler if a live stream interrupts

• Inform viewers that the stream is temporarily down and keep their players connected to the server. The module prevents a new stream key creation when you publish a live stream to social networks after source stream interruption.

Switch to ingest from the secondary source if the primary one failed

• Switch the input from primary stream to corresponding failover stream. If both primary and failover streams are down, a bumper video starts to play in the loop. When the source stream quality restores, the module switches the output back to the primary stream. This failover capability is helpful for a single server deployment since Wowza only supports failover within Wowza’s Edge configuration.
• Your primary and secondary (failover) streams may be encoded the same way, that is, to be aligned time codes. In this case, you can use instant and frame accurate switching between primary and secondary streams. The module changes the source instantly. There is no 12sec delay as with Wowza’s Edge failover feature.

Pull IP cam stream on playback request from HLS or WebRTC player

• To start IP cam streams on HLS player's request. HLS protocol requires the stream to be published on the Wowza server before the HLS player requests to play the stream. But it’s inefficient to keep Wowza pulling the streams from many IP cameras all the time, if you don’t require 24/7 recording or have a limited number of concurrent viewers. With this module, you can play streams from 1000s of security IP cameras. The network won’t be overwhelmed. The server’s resources won’t be overloaded.

Main features

• Easy to install. You copy the .jar file to your hard disk drive and add a property in Wowza Manager.
• No configuration needed for the LOS (loss of signal) scenario. It’s done with the EBU test card by default.
• Supports all Wowza versions.