What is Internet Streaming and how does it work?

We've streamed content over the Internet for a long time, to the point where for many people, the Internet is synonymous with streaming video services like Netflix and Youtube. But do you really understand what streaming is and how does it work? This article will give you the answer.

Streaming is the process of "transmitting and transmitting" each bit of data one by one

According to the common understanding of the majority of previous users (and today), if you want to watch a video or listen to a song on your computer, you first need to download it into a complete file. from the Internet. No other way. With this concept, you might be wondering when looking at apps like Netflix and Spotify and wondering "How do people think of ways to download video and music files instantly?" Obviously, that is the main problem that we all wonder. When you stream multimedia files, they are not downloaded completely immediately; which sites / applications will download each part of that file in real time.

The term streaming itself has shown all this mode of data transfer.

The term "streaming" itself shows off this method of data transfer. Information is transferred to your computer on a continuous and regular "line" (stream in English means "lines" (water flow, data stream). To put it in a straightforward way, if you consider downloading movies like you buy a bottled water, the movie stream is like using a tap to fill an empty water bottle, little by little.

You can also compare movie streaming like watching old VHS tapes . When you run a VHS tape cassette, every second image and sound data is scanned, piece by piece, by the reader. The data that the scanner reader will display on the screen in real time, means that any factor that interferes with that data scan will also interrupt or stop your viewing experience.

When you stream a movie or a song, your computer will download and decode small segments of multimedia files in real time. If you have a very fast Internet connection, it is possible that the computer will finish downloading the entire file before you finish watching the movie or enjoy the song. This explains why in some cases you are streaming but lose your Internet connection, but you can still enjoy all the multimedia content (because the device has finished downloading the entire file from before). That means that the stream content will not be saved to permanent memory on your computer (although some services like Spotify can save some temporary files (cache) and computers to help you. Can listen to the song faster in the future).

Businesses have put a lot of effort into improving the speed of data streams

Streaming images and sounds over the Internet is not something new; just that, full and convenient stream experiences have only recently appeared. Watching a video or listening to a song directly from a website, one bit at a time was once considered a time-consuming task and caused unnecessary discomfort. At that time when the stream, video or music file was constantly running, it stopped, ran and stopped continuously, and you could take several minutes waiting for the preloaded file to buffer (and in In some cases, the buffer process is not possible.

Even so, the data stream process today has hardly changed. The files are still downloaded in bits of data in real time, as you watch. Only network infrastructure has changed, and YouTube and Netflix businesses have put a lot of effort (and money) to build such infrastructure.

Streaming images and sounds over the Internet is not something new.

YouTube and Netflix used to use only one or two servers to store content, and this was obviously not good. Users who live far away from the server location geographically will experience severe lag when streaming data, and during high traffic days (such as Saturday night, on day). On leave, when there are multiple viewers at the same time, the servers will stream data "slow as crawling". Companies have solved this problem by building a Content Delivery Network (Content Delivery Network, often abbreviated as CDN), to store and deliver content. CDN is a network of servers set up dense across the globe, storing identical content. This helps to reduce lag phenomenon, while avoiding servers running in heavily populated areas.

Of course, a strong CDN will also be useless if users use slow Internet connections. This issue has been resolved over time and in many ways. Internet service providers (ISPs) are always competing to provide faster, more robust Internet access for customers, and technological advances such as the global Google Fiber project and the transmission lines. Home Internet based on 5G platform will soon be deployed.

However, some content stream services and Internet service providers (ISPs) recognize the risk that, despite the growth of home Internet connection and the dense network of CDNs, when Increasing global Internet traffic can still cause lag when streaming. Not to mention, large stream services like Netflix use more than 15% of global Internet bandwidth. Remember, when so many Internet users streamed the latest season of the Stranger Things series, how slow was the world's Internet speed.

To solve this problem, stream services decided to provide Open Connect Appliances (abbreviated as OCA, translating as Open Connected Device Project) to Internet service providers (ISPs). . These OCA devices are essentially large capacity hard drives filled with popular movies, songs and other stream content, which will help ISPs not divert the user's Internet traffic. Netflix or Hulu servers. This not only helps to speed up the stream but also saves the entire Internet system in the world slowed down by Netflix's "hegemony" .

Stream directly (Live Streaming) and risks

Through live video streaming built-in on Live Facebook or Twitch platforms, the information you receive on your smart computer or device is happening in real time. (or as close to real time as possible). So, like what you can imagine, a live streaming streamer needs to be able to upload their content at high speed, and likewise, your device must be able to The ability to download such content at a fast speed.

The decisive factor lies in the quality of the Internet connection of the live stream.

When the live stream streams a video, every millisecond the image (along with the accompanying sound) will be split into extremely small files. These files are compressed and sorted by an encoder, then transmitted over the Internet, and then your computer will download them bit by bit. After that, the computer will merge them into a viewable video, thereby minimizing lag phenomenon between viewers and source.

Popular live streaming services like Twitch and Youtube set up server networks spread across the globe to minimize jerks and improve video stream quality. But the deciding factor is still the quality of the Internet connection of the live stream. As you can see, live live streams cannot rely on passive transmission technologies like the OCA. Fortunately, the development of high-speed home Internet service packages, such as Google Fiber, helped make live stream a reality. In the coming time, the deployment of 5G network technology will also help improve the quality of users' live stream.

The future of streaming is video games

The idea of ​​playing video games on a browser is not a new idea. A large amount of content on the Internet is small-scale video games, such as popular games that operate on Facebook platforms like Farmville and Candy Crush. However, companies are working hard to bring browser gaming to new heights by providing game streaming services for high-definition video games or large computing resources.

Here, we are not talking about Farm Simulator live streaming services on Twitch, we are talking about playing video games remotely, for users who cannot afford expensive, private consoles. or a well-configured computer worth $ 1,000. With the game streaming service, there will be a server located away from your home that will handle the computational and graphic tasks of heavy video games. Services such as Google's Project Stream or Nvidia's GEFORCE NOW offer the promise that even your most expensive $ 100 computer will be able to play the heaviest video games, with beautiful graphics Best. This will help users save a huge amount of money, while helping erase barriers from hardware of game enthusiasts.

Of course, it would be much more difficult to stream a video game to a user's computer than to stream a movie. In this case, the user is not just downloading a static file sequentially; We are also directly intervening and interacting with that file in real time. If there is any lag between the user-entered command and the images that appear on the screen, the game can be considered as unplayable. You can look at video calling applications like Skype and Facetime as early versions of the game stream, because they require a high-speed network connection in both directions. However, streaming the game will require everything to be smoother.

At this point, services that stream heavy games that require a lot of computer resources are still not really popular and stable, so companies are still very tight about these projects and don't share much. about the "trade secrets" they are developing. However, we can say that these companies are "following" Netflix. Some companies like Nvidia have begun building CDN server networks filled with terribly powerful graphics cards, and Google is also seeking to connect OCA devices filled with video games with services. Google Fiber's high-speed family Internet. All of these moves show that stream game will be the next step after streaming multimedia content technology.