[whatwg] TimedTracks and MPEG transport streams - tracks can change dynamically

[Silvia Pfeiffer]

On Wed, Dec 15, 2010 at 3:31 AM, Philip Jägenstedt <philipj at opera.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 24 Nov 2010 17:11:02 +0100, Eric Winkelman
> <E.Winkelman at cablelabs.com> wrote:
>
>> I'm investigating how TimedTracks can be used for in-band-data-tracks
>> within MPEG transport streams (used for cable television).
>>
>> In this format, the number and types of in-band-data-tracks can change
>> over time.  So, for example, when the programming switches from a football
>> game to a movie, an alternate language track may appear that wasn't there
>> before.  Later, when the programming changes again, that language track may
>> be removed.
>>
>> It's not clear to me how these changes are exposed by the proposed Media
>> Element events.
>
> The thinking is that you switch between different streams by setting the
> src="" attribute to point to another stream, in which case you'll get an
> emptied event along with another bunch of events. If you have a single
> source where audio/video/text streams appear and disappear, there's not
> really any way to handle it.

I believe "in-band" was the keyword in the request.

I do not know how technically the change of stream composition works
in MPEG, but in Ogg we have to end a current stream and start a new
one to switch compositions. This has been called "sequential
multiplexing" or "chaining". In this case, stream setup information is
repeated, which would probably lead to creating a new steam handler
and possibly a new firing of "loadedmetadata". I am not sure how
chaining is implemented in browsers.

In a live situation you basically don't have a choice and you have to
use chaining when your input streams change. For a canned situation
you can set up all the required tracks from the start and just have
them send data later or stop sending earlier. In the canned document
situation therefore the number of tracks does not change. It's just
that data may not be available for all the time.


>> The "loadedmetadata" event is used to indicate that the TimedTracks are
>> ready, but it appears that it is only fired before playback begins.  Is this
>> event fired again whenever a new track is discovered?  Is there another
>> event that is intended for this situation?

There is an "onload" event on the TimedTrack to indicate that a track
is finished loading. But there is no event to indicate that a new
track is available.


>> Similarly, is there an event that indicates when a track has been removed?
>>  Or is this also handled by the "loadedmetadata" event somehow?

No, there is no "onunload" event on the TimedTracks.


> No, the loadedmetadata event is only fired once per resource, it's not the
> event you're looking for.
>
> As for actual solutions, I think that having loadedmetadata fire again if
> the number or type of streams change would make some sense.
>
> --
> Philip Jägenstedt
> Core Developer
> Opera Software
>

Cheers,
Silvia.