Toward Robust Live Streaming over LEO Satellite Constellations: Measurement, Analysis, and Handover-Aware Adaptation
Abstract: Live streaming has experienced significant growth recently. Yet this rise in popularity contrasts with the reality that a substantial segment of the global population still lacks Internet access. The emergence of Low Earth orbit Satellite Networks (LSNs), such as SpaceX's Starlink and Amazon's Project Kuiper, presents a promising solution to this issue. Nevertheless, our measurement study reveals that existing live streaming platforms may not be able to deliver a smooth viewing experience on LSNs due to frequent satellite handovers, leading to frequent rebuffering events. Current state-of-the-art learning-based Adaptive Bitrate (ABR) algorithms, even when trained on satellite network traces, fail to manage the abrupt network variations associated with these handovers effectively. To address these challenges, for the first time, we introduce Satellite-Aware Rate Adaptation (SARA), a versatile and lightweight middleware that can be seamlessly integrated with various ABR algorithms to enhance the performance of live streaming over LSNs. SARA intelligently modulates video playback speed and furnishes ABR algorithms with key insights derived from the distinctive network characteristics of LSNs, thereby aiding ABR algorithms in making informed bitrate selections and effectively minimizing rebuffering events that occur during satellite handovers. Our extensive evaluation shows that SARA can effectively reduce the rebuffering time by an average of 39.41\% and slightly improve latency by 0.65\% while only introducing an overall loss in bitrate by 0.13\%.
Primary Subject Area: [Experience] Multimedia Applications
Secondary Subject Area: [Systems] Systems and Middleware, [Experience] Interactions and Quality of Experience
Relevance To Conference: This work significantly contributes to multimedia/multimodal processing by enhancing the quality and resilience of live streaming services over Low Earth orbit Satellite Networks (LSNs), a frontier for broadening internet accessibility. By introducing the Satellite Aware Rate Adaptation (SARA) middleware, this research improves the adaptability of Adaptive Bitrate (ABR) streaming algorithms to the highly dynamic network conditions prevalent in LSNs. SARA dynamically adjusts the streaming bitrate in response to the frequent and abrupt changes in network quality caused by satellite handovers, thereby ensuring continuous and high-quality multimedia delivery.
The integration of SARA with existing ABR algorithms enables a more nuanced response to satellite-specific disruptions, substantially reducing video rebuffering events and enhancing the overall Quality of Experience for users. This approach not only supports smoother video playback but also maintains higher video quality under fluctuating network conditions. Overall, the development of SARA showcases how multimedia processing can be optimized through tailored network-aware enhancements, making high-quality live streaming accessible even in regions without traditional internet infrastructure.
Submission Number: 1617
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