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Table Of Contents
Release Notes for Cisco Internet Streamer
CDS 2.3Caveats Not Caused by CDS Software
Obtaining Documentation and Submitting a Service Request
Release Notes for Cisco Internet Streamer
CDS 2.3
These release notes cover Cisco Internet Streamer CDS Release 2.3.3-b6.
Revised: December 15, 2008, OL-18682-01Contents
The following information is included in these release notes:
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Obtaining Documentation and Submitting a Service Request
System Requirements
The Internet Streamer CDS runs on the CDE100 and CDE200 hardware models. The CDE100 may run as the CDSM, while the CDE200 may run as the Service Router or the Service Engine. See the Cisco Content Delivery Engine CDE100/200/300/400 Hardware Installation Guide for set up and installation procedures for the CDE100 and CDE200.
Limitations and Restrictions
This release contains the following limitations and restrictions:
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Note
The CDS does support clients that are behind a NAT device or firewall that have shared external IP addresses. In other words, there could be a firewall between the CDS network and the client device. However, the NAT device or firewall must support RTP/RTSP.
Important Notes
To maximize the content delivery performance of a CDE200, we recommend you do the following:
1.
Configure interfaces number 3, 4, 5, and 6 (those on the quad-port Gigabit Ethernet Card) into a single port-bonding interface. Use this bonding channel, which provides instantaneous failover between ports, for all client-facing traffic. Use interfaces number 1 and 2 (the two on-board Ethernet ports) for intra-CDS traffic, such as management traffic, and configure these two interfaces either as standby or port-channel mode. Refer to the Cisco Internet Streamer CDS 2.0-2.3 Software Configuration Guide for detailed instruction.
2.
Assuming ether-channel (also known as port-channel) is used between the upstream router/switch and the SE for streaming real-time data, the ether-channel load balance algorithms on the upstream switch/router and the SE should be configured as "Src-ip" and "Destination IP" respectively. Using this configuration ensures session stickiness and general balanced load distribution based on clients' IP addresses. Also, distribute your client IP address space across multiple subnets so that the load balancing algorithm is effective in spreading the traffic among multiple ports.
3.
On the CDE200, execute the following commands once (This tunes the internal TCP configuration for better content delivery performance over HTTP.):
Config# tcp server-satelliteConfig# tcp client-satelliteConfig# write memory4.
The CDE200 performance has been optimized for HTTP and WMT bulk traffic, individually. While it is entirely workable to have mixed HTTP and WMT traffic flowing through a single CDE200 simultaneously, the aggregate performance may not be as optimal as the case where the two traffic types are separate, especially when the traffic volume is high. So, if you have enough client WMT traffic to saturate a full CDE200 capacity, we recommend that you provision a dedicated CDE200 to handle WMT; and likewise for HTTP. In such cases, we do not recommended that you mix the two traffic types on all CDE servers which could result in suboptimal aggregate performance and require more CDE200 servers than usual.
5.
If your deployment must have Streamers handle HTTP and WMT traffic simultaneously, it is best that you configure the Streamer to limit each of its HTTP sessions below a certain bitrate (for example, 1Mbps, 5Mbps, or the typical speed of your client population). This prevents HTTP sessions from running at higher throughput than necessary, and disrupting the concurrent WMT streaming sessions on that Streamer. To turn on this pacing feature, use the HTTP bitrate field in the CDSM Delivery Service GUI page.
Please be aware of the side effects of using the following commands for Movie Streamer:
Config# movie-streamer advanced client idle-timeout <30-1800>Config# movie-streamer advanced client rtp-timeout <30-1800>These commands are only intended for performance testing when using certain testing tools that do not have full support of the RTCP receiver report. Setting these timeouts to high values causes inefficient tear down of client connections when the streaming sessions have ended.
For typical deployments, it is preferable to leave these parameters set to their defaults.
6.
Open Caveats
This release contains the following open caveats:
Flash Media Streaming
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Symptom:
A low-rate memory leak exists for Flash Media Streaming live streaming when clients connect and disconnect. It is currently under investigation by both Adobe and Cisco. The memory leak eventually results in a process restart.
Workaround:
Flash Media Streaming live streaming can be recovered using next-click failover or simply retry from the client player.
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Symptom:
Due to the memory leak issue, which is under investigation by Adobe and Cisco, the FMS core process will fail over to a new FMS core process after 24 hours. All new request will go to a new FMS core process. The old FMS core process will continue to serve the existing clients until all clients have disconnected, at which point the process will end releasing all memory.
This FMS core process failover feature disables an SE being used as a Flash Media Server Content Origin server.
Workaround:
Republish the stream from the Flash Media Encoder.
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Symptom:
The statistics displaying current live and VOD connections may fluctuate during stress testing. It does not have any adverse effect on the stream quality or transaction logs. These are just informational statistics and their inaccuracies have no operational or performance impact.
Workaround:
Retry the show command after a short interval of time.
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Symptom:
The Flash Media Streaming statistics that display the current live connections do not get updated after the statistics have been cleared. More detailed information and statistics on active live streams are not affected by this issue. The current live connections counters show a value of zero until the Flash Media Server statistics fluctuation subsides.
Adobe TAM reference number for this issue is Cisco 180197164
Workaround:
Retry displaying the Flash Media Streaming statistics after a short interval of time.
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Symptom:
Flash Media Streaming edge process memory in the Flash Media Server grows unbounded when a significant load of RTMPT video traffic is used. This occurs because the Flash Media Server requires additional internal buffers for HTTP tunneling.
Adobe TAM reference number for this issue is Cisco Adobe 180369081
Workaround:
In order to prevent an ungraceful disruption of RTMPT streams, new RTMPT requests are rejected after the process memory reaches the 2.5 GB limit. In addition, if the memory does not decrease after an hour, the Flash Media Streaming edge process is restarted. This may result in disruption of any RTMPT session that is longer than an hour of duration. No user intervention is required, and appropriate CDSM alarms and logs are updated to reflect this activity.
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Symptom:
For Flash Media Streaming live streams, the origin server or upstream connection is not released when the client stops playback but does not issue a disconnect. This is the case when playback has completed but the .swf file did not issue a disconnect. The Flash Media Server disconnects clients when they have been idle for more than three minutes.
Workaround:
When the client closes the browser, the Flash Media player is unloaded. Another workaround is to include timeout thresholds in the .swf file to disconnect connection after playback is complete.
Web Engine
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Symptom:
Files get partially cached on the Service Engine and are not cache filled. However, the client is served by using progressive download.
Condition:
Request for a .wmv file is sent from a browser and Windows Media Streaming is disabled on the Service Engine.
Workaround:
a.
b.
c.
Movie Streamer
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Symptom:
When a Movie Streamer live multicast program configures the multicast URL as http://RFQDN/some_name, the client receives a 404 not found response. The Web Engine error log shows has a cache miss entry for this event.
Conditions:
This happens when a multicast URL is configured as http://RFQDN/some_name.
Workaround:
Use http://OFQDN/some_name as the multicast URL, where OFQDN is the fully qualified domain name of the content origin server.
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Symptoms:
When a large number of live programs are streaming while there is mixed traffic being streamed and downloaded, after approximately ten hours the stream-scheduler core dumps on the Service Engine.
Conditions:
In order for this to occur, you need to set up a large number of live programs (100 in our case) concurrently, and run it for several hours.
Workaround:
None. Stream-scheduler module recovers itself and continues running.
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Symptom:
When a live program name is changed for an existing program, the CDS may fail to modify the program parameters and a client may fail to request this program using the correct Unicast Reference URL. Clients attempting to open a unicast SDP URL for a live program that has had a name change, receive the RTSP 415 error code, "Unsupported Media Type."
Workaround:
Using the CDSM, go to Services > Live Video > Live Programs and edit the live program that has the program name change. From the left-panel menu, choose Live Streaming, and when the Live Streaming page is displayed, click Submit. This will updated the Unicast Reference URL with the new program name.
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Symptom:
Adding or deleting Service Engines to or from a live delivery service while a live program is ongoing, causes system resource leaks and may cause system instability over time.
Workaround:
Stop the live program before changing the program itself or changing any Service Engine assignments for the live delivery service.
Windows Media Streaming
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Symptom:
Multiple stale outgoing sessions are displayed for the show statistics wmt streamstat command.
Conditions:
When an SSPL broadcast publishing point is stopped and a managed live Windows Media Streaming program is scheduled.
Workaround:
Stale sessions are removed periodically and do not impact streaming. Alternatively, you can enable the SSPL broadcast publishing point source.
CDSM
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Symptom:
In some rare instances, when the system is in a stress test, a java core file is generated. The CDSM GUI restarts in less than 30 seconds and alarm is generated stating a core file is generated.
Workaround:
None. The issue does not impact the functionality of the CDSM GUI.
Caveats Not Caused by CDS Software
This release contains the following open caveats that are not cause by the CDS software:
Windows Media Streaming
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Symptom:
When using a file as the type of source for a live publishing point in Windows Media Server 2008 Standard, after starting multiple streaming requests from that publishing point, when the first stream reaches the end of the source file the second and subsequent streams fail with an error message at the same time. If Windows Media Server 2008 Standard is used as the origin server for a delivery service in CDS-IS, the second and subsequent streams will not fail, but will repeatedly loop the last segment of the stream.
Workaround:
Publishing points can be created using other source types (for example, playlists) rather than a file as the source type with the Windows Media Server 2008 Standard. The symptom described above is not seen with windows Media Server 2008 Enterprise used as the origin server.
Resolved Caveats
The following caveats have been resolved since Cisco Internet Streamer CDS Release 2.3.1 Not all the resolved issues are mentioned here. The following list highlights associated with customer deployment scenarios.
CDSM
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Symptom:
From the Replication Status page, in the Devices Assigned to Delivery Service section, content items retrieved using the Get drop-down list, along with the Content Items Using field, are not retrieved the Service Engine in the delivery service.
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Symptom:
The Replication Status summary for the Service Engines that are not acting as the Content Acquirer are incorrect.
Flash Media Streaming
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Symptom: When a Flash Media player makes a request using a relative URL for a live stream, the FMS core dumps.
Web Engine
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Symptom:
The Service Engine blocks all request to a particular domain. This happens when there is a rule configured on the Service Engine that allows a particular domain. That is, the pattern for the rule is set for a domain, and the action is allowed for that domain. Instead of using the domain name for the pattern-list, use url-regex providing the following pattern http://<domain name>/
Service Engine
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Symptom:
Alarms are not generated when interface was shut down.
Upgrading to Release 2.3.3
In order to upgrade to Release 2.3.3 from Release 2.2, the following changes between Release 2.2 and Release 2.3.3 need to be considered:
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In Release 2.3.3, Network Interface Card (NIC) failure detection and alarm reporting was added. When a Release 2.3.3 system boots without a network cable connected to an Ethernet interface or the interface is not configured, a minor alarm is tripped for each instance. The alarm is deactivated once a cable is connected and the interface is configured and brought up. Following is an example of the NIC alarms displayed.
Minor Alarms:-------------Alarm ID Module/Submodule Instance-------------------- -------------------- -------------------------1 shutdown nic GigabitEthernet 1/02 shutdown nic GigabitEthernet 2/03 shutdown nic GigabitEthernet 3/04 shutdown nic GigabitEthernet 4/05 shutdown nic GigabitEthernet 5/06 shutdown nic GigabitEthernet 6/0
Note
Documentation Updates
The following documents have been updated for this release:
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The following documents have been added for this release:
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Related Documentation
Refer to the following documents for additional information about the Cisco Internet Streamer CDS 2.0-2.3:
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http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/video/cds/cde/installation/guide/CDE_Install_Book.html
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http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/video/cds/cda/is/2_0/configuration/guide/is_cds20_22-cfguide.html
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http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/video/cds/cda/is/2_0/quick/guide/ISCDSQuickStart.html
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http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/video/cds/cda/is/2_0/developer/guide/cds20_22apiguide.html
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http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps7127/products_documentation_roadmaps_list.html
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http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/video/cds/cde/regulatory/compliance/CDE_RCSI.html
The entire CDS software documentation suite is available on Cisco.com at:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps7127/tsd_products_support_series_home.html
The entire CDS hardware documentation suite is available on Cisco.com at:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps7126/tsd_products_support_series_home.html
Obtaining Documentation and Submitting a Service Request
For information on obtaining documentation, submitting a service request, and gathering additional information, see the monthly What's New in Cisco Product Documentation, which also lists all new and revised Cisco technical documentation, at:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/general/whatsnew/whatsnew.html
Subscribe to the What's New in Cisco Product Documentation as a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feed and set content to be delivered directly to your desktop using a reader application. The RSS feeds are a free service and Cisco currently supports RSS version 2.0.
This document is to be used in conjunction with the documents listed in the "Related Documentation" section.
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