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How to Use Live DVR and Archiving

Important: The maximum recording window for Live DVR is 8 hours. This is a rolling window, meaning if your event goes for over 8 hours, the recording of the start of the event will be lost.

1. Introduction

StreamShark's Live DVR & Archiving feature archives the contents of a live event (creating a real time DVR buffer during your stream), allowing you to deliver an archive instantly after a live event from the same Event embed code. You can use this feature to do the following:

  • “Top” and “Tail” your event so you have a frame perfect copy of only the important content - not the testing and post event stages.
  • Clip unlimited highlights from your live event to showcase important parts of your event.
  • Clip and share highlights while your events are still live - perfect for long events or sessions
  • Allow users joining an event mid-stream to rewind to the beginning of the stream (Live Rewind)

Note: We strongly recommend keeping a local archive in addition to the DVR recording.

2. Creating a DVR enabled event

Create a new Standard event. Select your preferred ingest(s) and set the Live DVR & Archiving option to On.

StreamShark-Standard-Event-DVR_copy.png

Once you have configured the event to your satisfaction, click on Create, then once it’s in the READY state click on the Event. You will note the main stream name has _dvr_main appended to it signifying it is DVR enabled.

StreamShark_-_DVR_-_Event_-_Overview-v2.png
Our hardware integrations are DVR aware so if you link a Hardware Encoder to this Event, it will correctly push to the DVR enabled Main Stream Name - no further configuration required.

From 29th March 2020, 08:00 UTC onwards, if you are using a software encoder (or manually configuring a hardware encoder) copy across the Primary Server URL and Main Stream Name. You don't need to use a separate username and password as that's replaced by inline authentication within the ‘stream name’ field. Your Publishing Urls section will be similar to the screenshot shown below: 

after.png

Start publishing your main stream as usual and the DVR buffer will start recording automatically.

3. Managing the DVR Workflow

Click on the Workflow tab to manage your full event lifecycle. Events start in the Pre stage during testing/leadup, then should be moved to the Main stage during your event and then the Post stage at event completion.

  1. Your event will start in the Pre Event stage by default, with a default Image slate. You can override this with your own image, VoD or external source.
  2. When your event is about to go live, you can switch to the Main Event stage. Please note the following advice:
    1. When switching to the Main Event stage by clicking the appropriate button on the Workflow Switcher, the time of your click will mark the start point of the Live Rewind buffer on the Live player. We recommend switching approximately 30-60 seconds before your event starts. This can be fine tuned after your event to perform a more accurate cut for the Archive replay.
    2. You cannot switch to the Main Event stage unless an active stream is detected, signified by the green circle on this stage.

StreamShark_-_DVR_-_Event_-_Workflow.png

4. Creating DVR archives

To create your first archive, click on the Archives tab and click on +Add New Archive. You can do this while an event is still live and share these Live Highlights with viewers.

StreamShark-DVR-Archive.png

You can create your archive with the following parameters:

  1. Set an archive name
  2. Use the left red marker to set the Start Time.
  3. Use the right red marker to set the End Time.
  4. The Duration will be automatically estimated based on the Start and End time.
  5. Click Create to create the clipped archive.

The Archives tab can then be used to view and download your list of archives.

  1. Click on the link button to get a player link that directly views the clipped archive
  2. Click on the eye button to preview your clipped archive
  3. Click on the cloud download button to generate an MP4 from our secure cloud storage facility for later download.

StreamShark-DVR-Archive-List.png

When the Download icon is spinning, the archive is being generated. When it is green, it is ready to download from our secure cloud storage as shown below. You can download the file and upload it to our VOD platform to make it available on demand.

StreamShark-DVR-Archive-List-spinny-cloud.png

 

You can also edit your Event Settings to set a specific Archive as the active content source. In the example below the archive named full-archive-top-tail is selected as the content source for the Post Event. Don't forget to click Update at the bottom of the screen.

Then you can use the Workflow Switcher to preview the Post Settings and when you're happy you can switch the Active Source to Post Event to set this as the default view of this Event. Now any user who may have missed an existing event, or wants to re-watch it, can view the desired archive of this event from the existing link.

 Screen_Shot_2018-07-20_at_11.02.25_AM.png

5. Caveats

  • Converted archives will convert the archive to MP4. You must click the green cloud button to download the archive.
  • When you delete an Event (either manually or if the event has a Scheduled Deletion), the corresponding archives will be deleted.
  • We strongly recommend users also record the live event locally rather than only relying only on the DVR recording.
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