Streaming rich media has become an integral part of our daily lives. From watching tutorials on YouTube, Udemy etc. to playing RPGs(Role-Playing Games) on the internet, a major percentage of internet traffic nowadays spends their data on browsing through audio and video contents. With the data speed increasing day by day, media streaming has become the primary way of spreading information to the crowd.

1. METRICS & CHALLENGES FOR TESTING STREAMING
APPLICATIONS IN 2019

2. What Is A Streaming Application?
Remember the time when we used to play Mario, Contra, Pacman, watch shows
and news through TV sets as that was the only source of entertainment through
rich media. Now, with so many mobiles, laptops, desktop and smart TVs stepping
into the picture, we have noticed the shift from offline gaming, news, sports
channels to online gaming such as Fortnite, PUBG and news/sports channels
such as WatchESPN, MUTV and many more.

3. Why Streaming Applications Became A Huge Hit?
Well, we all remember Spielberg’s Back to the Future. Especially that scene from
the future where Marty’s home in 2015 is filled with screens everywhere and
just by voice command he could access any kind of video content.

4. Why Streaming Applications Became A Huge Hit?
Some renowned video streaming
applications:
● YouTube
● Netflix
● Hulu
● WatchESPN
Some renowned gaming streaming
applications are:
● Playstation Now
● GEFORCE Now
● XBOX Game Pass
● Twitch

5. Why Streaming Applications Became A Huge Hit?
Fun Fact: If you are familiar with role-
playing action games, you must have
played or heard about Assassin’s Creed
series and their latest addition to the
anthology, Assassins Creed Odyssey. For
people who don’t have a highly
configured system required to run the
game, Google is creating something that
is going to be a revolution in the world of
gaming.

6. Why Should We Test Streaming Applications?
Well, the performance of any
streaming applications depends on
a lot more than just internet speed
and connectivity. Performing
testing of streaming applications
has become a necessity considering
the number of competitors
increasing day by day.

7. Metrics To Check While Testing A Streaming
ApplicationAfter having gone through the challenges of testing streaming applications, you must
have understood that load testing is the primary testing phase to execute while
testing a video streaming application. Let’s discuss the metrics to consider to ensure
that your app is performing properly without any issues

8. Metrics To Check While Testing A Streaming
ApplicationBuffering Time – In YouTube you may have seen whenever data speed is low, a grey
bar starts filling up before the video is played. This is known as the buffering bucket.
Measuring the buffering time is very important to check how your app is performing
under low network connectivity.

9. Metrics To Check While Testing A Streaming
Application
Bit Rate – Bitrate is a
very important metric
that measures the quality
of your video. It can be
measured by checking the
number of bits
transferred per second.
The bit rate of a video is
directly proportional to
the resolution of the
video.
Lagging Time – Once
buffering is completed, the
video is supposed to play
smoothly if the download
speed of your network
keeps up with the average
bit rate. Often you may have
seen that whenever the
video timeline reaches the
buffering level, the video
comes to a halt
Data Consumed – This
metric includes the data
spent by the user while
using the application or
playing any specific video.
This helps to determine
the demand for streamed
data.

10. Metrics To Check While Testing A Streaming
Application
Lagging Ratio – This is
the ratio of video play
time and buffering time. It
keeps into account the
initial buffering time as
well. The ratio is usually
very low but it never falls
below 1.
Platform Compatibility –
This is a critical metric for
every website or web-app
but is highly significant in
case of a streaming
application. As a streaming
application, you target users
throughout the globe and
making sure that your media
rendering stays intact along
with fast buffer is crucial
Subtitles Synchronization
Subtitles are indispensable
for a streaming web
application or website if you
wish to spread virality of
your media content.
Targeting an audience
throughout the globe, you
need to make sure to keep
them away from accent
specific dilemma.

11. Challenges Of Testing Streaming Applications
Testing a streaming application requires many factors to consider. Apart from device,
browser, and hardware, the tester also has to keep in mind external features like
network speed, internet traffic, etc. Let’s discuss the common challenges which a
tester faces while testing a streaming application.

12. Response Time in Different Network
To work correctly and play a video with very less buffering a time, excellent data
speed is required. It is mandatory to test the impact of the network on the response
time of the application. The ideal procedure is to test the application’s performance
over different network speed.

13. Lack of Devices For Cross Device Testing
End users can use any devices of their choice to play a media from a streaming
application, ranging from a small smartphone to a 4k television. Testing teams often
lack the budget to test their applications across so many devices. However, ensuring
that the resolution of the streaming media and the app’s performance is not impacted
across different devices is important.

14. Issues Occurring Due to End User Interaction
Streaming an application is a process of downloading static assets and displaying
them via the app. For example, when a movie is played, chunks of video data are
downloaded, buffered and displayed. When a video is played for the first time, the
app usually plays it on a default aspect ratio based on the network speed and the
device’s physical memory.

15. Cross Browser Compatibility Testing Of A Streaming Application
Let’s suppose you are testing an application like Netflix on the browser of a desktop.
In case of such browser-based applications, you have to ensure that browser
compatibility testing is properly executed before concluding the testing phase.

16. Is Your Streaming Application Durable Enough To
Entertain Excessive Traffic?
Load testing is very important to check how the app behaves when huge traffic tries
to access a specific video. No matter how perfectly you developed your app, there is a
limit to the traffic it can handle. Even in popular applications, scenarios are quite
common when a video suddenly became viral and huge internet traffic tried to access
it and it just crashed.

17. Is Your Streaming Application Capable Of Handling
Streaming Techniques?
Hope u remembered the earlier days when a video on a site could not be played
because you didn’t have “Flash Player Installed” on your desktop. Thankfully those
days are gone. We have MPEG DASH, Smooth by Microsoft, Adobe’s HDS and
Apple’s HLS. All of these are dynamic streaming technologies allow transferring of
large chunks of data using very little bitrate.

18. Now that we have understood the challenges of testing streaming application, it’s
better if as a tester you keep in mind the different streaming techniques, especially
when a new technology is developed and it replaces the old one. And with the
number of streaming technologies and mediums growing day by day, the job of a
tester will eventually get difficult as more new technologies are bound to bring more
challenges.
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CONCLUSION

19. HAPPY TESTING!!