MUMBAI: Tektronix, which provides digital content monitoring systems, has added new reporting capabilities to its Sentry digital content monitor which is used by cable television operators to improve the quality of their video services by quickly identifying, diagnosing and repairing video and audio errors that can degrade viewers‘ quality of experience (QoE).
Tektronix GM video product line Eben Jenkins said, "Keeping our industry-leading Sentry on the cutting-edge is an ongoing effort for us and these new reporting features are the latest examples of our commitment to ensuring Sentry meets the needs of video service providers today and tomorrow".
The first new reporting capability integrates Sentry‘s ground-breaking Video and Audio QoE Scoring System with the SCTE 168-6 ‘Recommended Practice for Monitoring Multimedia Distribution Quality,‘ a popular method for reporting program availability.
Integrating SCTE 168-6 support with Sentry‘s capability for detecting video and audio errors that are not always caused by dropped packets (e.g., video freeze, black screen, tiling, macroblocking, compression artifacts, loss of audio channel or audio quality issues) enables video service providers to take advantage of a popular reporting methodology coupled with the ability to identify the widest range of QoE-impacting events.
The second new capability enables video service providers to verify that Closed Captioning content has been included with the programming being delivered, which is a regulatory requirement for U.S. and Canadian cable operators. Sentry is well suited to this application due to its detection capabilities and its ability to monitor hundreds of video streams simultaneously.
Sentry can generate Closed Captioning status reports, which video service providers can use with programmers, satellite network operators and operations staff to determine where the fault lies when closed captioning data is missing.
The new capabilities for Program Availability reporting and Closed Captioning monitoring are both available in release 5.1 of the Sentry operating software, which is currently available at no cost to existing customers with maintenance agreements.
