GT-Mconf: Multiconference system for interoperable web and mobile

http://www.inf.ufrgs.br/prav/gtmconf

Summary

• Goals / Results / Strategies

• Current status

• Potencial service for RNP (National Research and Education Network)

Goal 1

Webconference system

Result: Webconference system

Participants list

• Conference held in our public server (http://mconf.inf.ufrgs.br) with 9 participants (7 on desktops and 2 on mobile devices)

Audio conference participants

Video participants (the team)

Presentation

Chat with auto-

translation in 46

languages

Strategy

• Cooperation with the BigBlueButton (BBB) core team

– Opensource system with a lot of features

– Very active team and community

– The best solution among the analyzed options

– The contributions developed by the GT-Mconf team were already integrated in the BBB core

BBB stress test (March 24th, 2011)

• Server: Xeon 3450 quad core 2.66 Ghz with hyperthreading (dedicated server).

BBB stress test (March 24th, 2011) – Overview• Server load:

– 7:48 – 20 voice users and 20 webcams (~30% CPU)

– 7:57 – 40 voice users and 20 webcams (~45% CPU)

– 8:05 – 60 voice users and 20 webcams (~70% CPU)

– 8:08 – 80 voice users and 20 webcams (~90% CPU): Audio starts to degrade

• Bandwidth:

– 1 audio channel: 60 kbit/s

– 60 audio channels: 3,6 Mbit/s

BBB stress test (March 24th, 2011) – Conclusions

• PS: Each server is different (virtual vs dedicated, number of cores, hyperthreading, memory).

• Software: FreeSWITCH 1.0.6; Red5 0.91; BigBlueButton 0.8 using 16khz wide-band speex for audio (encode quality 6).

• With FreeSWITCH is possible to enable load balance using several voice servers

Results (feedbacks)• Some improvements in the video module:

http://groups.google.com/group/bigbluebutton-dev/browse_thread/thread/438ab464ad3c6c8e

Results (feedbacks)• New layout for the video pods:

http://groups.google.com/group/bigbluebutton-dev/browse_thread/thread/a7e0ede3c887b5e8/eafb6f36693f0aac

Goal 2

Mobile integration

Results: Android application

Galaxy Tab with the standard BBB client in the browser

Galaxy S

Galaxy Tab with the native app

Strategy: why have we chosen Android

• 100 million of active Android devices

• 215 service operators, 450.000 developers and 200.000 application

• 310 Android devices in 112 coutries

• 400.000 Android devices are activated each day

http://thenextweb.com/google/2011/05/10/google-io-400000-android-devices-are-activated-every-single-day/?awesm=tnw.to_18CMX&utm_content=api&utm_medium=tnw.to-other&utm_source=direct-tnw.to

Results: How to join a meeting (1-3)

• Choosing a server directly in the app:

Results: How to join a meeting (2-3)

• Browsing the web portal using a mobile device (bigbluebutton://):

Results: How to join a meeting (3-3)

• Using a QR Code (shown in the web portal):

Results: App menu and audio settings

Results: default screen

Galaxy S Galaxy Tab: participants list and chat

Results: Public and private chat

Results: video

Landscape:Fullscreen video

Portrait

Results (feedbacks)• First time the Android client was published:

http://bigbluebutton-blog.blogspot.com/2011/02/bigbluebutton-on-android-phone.html

Results (feedbacks)• Fred Dixon’s (one of the BBB developers) speech at May 2011 about the

integration BigBlueButton integration for Moodle. He mentions our team (http://slidesha.re/ikO7qC)

Results (feedbacks)• First public release of the Android client (

http://bigbluebutton-blog.blogspot.com/2011/05/first-public-release-of-bigbluebutton.html)

Goal 3

Web application to manage the webconferences

Features already implemented in the web application

• BigBlueButton provides webconference rooms, but you still need a system to provide management tasks such as:– User authentication– Permission control– Webconference management

• CRUD (create, read, update, deleat)

– Server management• CRUD

Future features for the web application

• BigBlueButton provides webconference rooms, but you still need a system to provide management tasks such as:– Server management

• Load balancing

– Conference scheduling– Access statistics– Pre-upload of documents– Access to the VODs (audio, video, presentations)

Initial strategy

• Web application to integrate BBB into Global Plaza - Mconf-web

Mconf-web

User rooms

Recent activity

Agenda

Spaces (groups)

• Simplify the registraion• Integrate with Google Talk, Facebook, Twitter, Skype

1 The user access Mconf and chooses how he will be authenticated

2 Mconf gets the user information from the service provider

Integration with IM systems and social networks

Webconference broadcast / invitation

E-mail and internal message invitations already implemented

Mconf can become a federated service

• Simple and standard way to authenticate users• Possible services:

– Webconference: federation users can easily access the webconference

– Access to the recordings: asynchronous access to the service that provides the webconferences’ VOD

Summary

Project status

GT-Mconf strategy

• Red blocks are the features developed by Mconf

Team

Arthur Rauter

Felipe Cecagno

Fernando Bottin

Giancarlo Rampanelli

Leonardo Daronco

Alessandra Leonhardt

Valter Roesler

Strategy: Future developments

• Webconference client using HTML5

• Support to different mobile devices (probably iOS)

• Webconference recording

• Improve the audio/video quality

Potencial service for RNP

• The product can potentialy become a service similar to Adobe Connect, but free.

• Mconf is free, open source, and easily customizable to what RNP and it’s partners need

• Create a domain “mconf.org”???

BBB Worldwide• “What systems should we investigate more?” pool at Terena may/2011

Links

http://www.inf.ufrgs.br/prav/gtmconf Main website (points to all the other links)

http://mconf.inf.ufrgs.br Main serverhttp://mconfweb.inf.ufrgs.br Web application serverhttp://code.google.com/p/mconf/ Android application, wiki and issue tracking

Valter Roesler [roesler@inf.ufrgs.br]

QUESTIONS??