IIS Live Smooth Streaming is an extension for Internet Information Services (IIS) 7 that delivers compelling, uninterrupted live video streams that instantly adjust quality (bit rate) to match changing network conditions and client video-processing capabilities.

Live Smooth Streaming enables adaptive streaming of live events to Silverlight-compatible clients. Using HTTP to deliver live events takes advantage of the scale of existing HTTP networks by keeping content close to the user and making full-HD (1080p) a realistic option for Web broadcasts. The additional advantage of using HTTP-based delivery for live events is that the existing HTTP infrastructure also provides much more availability for a live event.

For most popular live Web broadcasts, CDNs and content providers are concerned with how much capacity they can dedicate on their much more resource-constrained streaming network. By using HTTP, they can take advantage of all the resources of their network and do not have to worry about maximizing network capacity and shutting out users from live events.

Installation Notes

This section describes the installation requirements for IIS Live Smooth Streaming.

Requirements

The following prerequisites must be fulfilled to install IIS Live Smooth Streaming:

  • You must use IIS 7 running on one of the following operating systems:

    • Windows Server 2008

    • Windows Server 2008 R2

    • Windows Vista with SP1

    • Windows 7

  • To manage the Live Smooth Streaming feature using the IIS Manager user interface, the IIS Management Console for IIS must be installed.

  • You must be an administrator on the computer. This can be accomplished by logging on to the computer using either the Administrator account or an account with administrative privileges.

Warning
Live Smooth Streaming cannot be installed if the following IIS Media Services Beta software is installed on your computer:

  • IIS Live Smooth Streaming - Beta

  • IIS Smooth Streaming - Beta

When you uninstall the Beta Smooth Streaming software, existing publishing point definition files for live Smooth Streaming presentations and media files and manifests for on-demand Smooth Streaming presentations are retained. However, some program settings may not be retained.

To uninstall the software, in Control Panel > Programs > Programs and Features, under Uninstall or change a program, click the software program name, and then click Uninstall.

Downloading and Installing the Software

IIS Live Smooth Streaming is included in IIS Media Services 3.0, which can be installed by using either Microsoft Web Platform Installer 2.0 (Web PI) or Windows Installer.

Install Using Web PI

  1. Go to the Microsoft Web Platform Installer 2.0 Web Page and click Download It Now to download and run Web Platform Installer 2.0.

  2. In the lower-left corner of the Web Platform Installer 2.0 dialog box, click Options.

  3. In the Change Options dialog box, under Display additional scenarios, make sure that the Media check box is selected, and then click OK.

  4. In the Web Platform Installer 2.0 dialog box, on the Media Platform tab, under Host and Deliver Media Content, click Customize.

  5. Select IIS Media Services 3.0, and then click Install.

Install Using Windows Installer

Two separate downloadable installation packages are available for IIS Media Services 3.0, which includes IIS Live Smooth Streaming. Click one of the following links to download the Windows Installer (.msi) file for your edition of Windows:

To run the Windows Installer file that you downloaded, do the following:

  • Double-click the Windows Installer file that you downloaded, and then complete the Setup wizard.

-or-

  1. Open an elevated Command Prompt window (click Start, click All Programs, click Accessories, right-click Command Prompt, and then click Run as administrator).

  2. In the Administrator: Command Prompt window, navigate the command prompt to the folder where the Windows Installer file is stored.

  3. Type one of the following commands to run the installation: msiexec /I IISMedia32.msi (for the 32-bit edition of the operating system) or msiexec /I IISMedia64.msi (for the 64-bit edition of the operating system).

Note
If you encounter any problems during installation, type one of the following commands in the command prompt to create a log file that contains information about the installation process: msiexec /L IISMedia.log /I IISMedia32.msi (for the 32-bit edition of the operating system) or msiexec /L IISMedia.log /I IISMedia64.msi (for the 64-bit edition of the operating system).

Analyze this log file after a failed installation to help determine the cause of the failure.

Downloading and Installing the Sample Content

To demonstrate the end-to-end Live Smooth Streaming experience, sample content is available for installation. This sample content includes:

  • An encoder that sources from on-demand Smooth Streaming video files (files with .ismv file name extensions) to generate simulated Live Smooth Streaming output for testing purposes.

  • A sample client that renders the live stream from the Web server with the Live Smooth Streaming feature installed.

For more information about how to install the sample content and configure IIS Live Smooth Streaming to test the end-to-end experience, see Live Smooth Streaming for IIS 7.0 - Getting Started.

Uninstalling

To remove the Live Smooth Streaming feature, in Control Panel > Programs > Programs and Features, under Uninstall or change a program, click IIS Media Services 3.0, and then click Change.

To remove all of the IIS Media Services 3.0 features, including Live Smooth Streaming, in Control Panel > Programs > Programs and Features, under Uninstall or change a program, click IIS Media Services 3.0, and then click Uninstall.

Known Issues

This section describes the known issues for IIS Live Smooth Streaming.

  • Adding Web site handler mappings for live streams. When you install the Live Smooth Streaming feature, handlers that process requests for publishing point definition files (files with .isml file name extensions) may not be configured for a Web site if the site settings have been changed from default values. The Web site may not have acquired the handler for .isml files and Live Smooth Streaming may not work. If you have previously edited a Web site, after installing IIS Live Smooth Streaming, ensure that a handler is installed for .isml files by doing the following:



    1. In the Connections pane, click the Web site or directory that you want to use for Live Smooth Streaming, and then double-click Handler Mappings in the Home page.

    2. If the LiveStreamingHandler handler mapping is not displayed on the Handler Mappings feature page, in the Actions pane, click Revert to Inherited.



  • Distributing live streams using Application Request Routing. If you use Application Request Routing (ARR) for disk-based caching of live Smooth Streams or as an edge cache in CDN/ECN environments, and ARR forwards a request for live streams from a publishing point on a remote Live Smooth Streaming server to a publishing point on the local Live Smooth Streaming server, the request may fail if the ASP.NET session state is enabled on the local Web site or directory that contains the publishing point. The ASP.NET session state should be disabled to ensure proper distribution of live streams. To do this, do the following:



    1. In IIS Manager, click the Web site or directory with the publishing point in the Connections pane.

    2. In the Web site or directory Home page, in the ASP.NET category, double-click the Session State icon.

    3. In the Session State feature page, in the Session State Mode Settings area, select Not enabled.



    Note
    Turning off ASP.NET session state disables it for all local Web site or directory features and applications that are using it. If you are also the Web Playlists feature in IIS Media Services 3.0 on the local Web site or directory and you configured Web Playlists to use ASP.NET session state persistence to store user session variables, be sure to change the Session persistence type in Web Playlists to InMemory to store user session data in the Web server worker process memory. For more information, see IIS Media Services Help.

  • Archiving segmented presentations. Archiving live streams to multiple on-demand Smooth Streaming presentations (or segments), may not work correctly if you specify a segment length of less than 5 minutes. To ensure archiving of segmented presentations works correctly, enter a value of 5 or greater in the Segment length box.



  • Viewing publishing point status. You can view the status of a publishing point's connection to a live source, such as an encoder or a publishing point on another Live Smooth Streaming server, in the State column on the Live Smooth Streaming Publishing Points page. When you start a publishing point, the State changes to Starting, which means that it is enabled. When the live source begins delivering live streams to the publishing point, the State changes to Started; however, the state change is not visible unless you refresh Web site or directory that contains the publishing point.



Product Support

You can obtain support for Live Smooth Streaming in IIS Media Services 3.0 by using the following resources:

Self Support

Microsoft Support

To obtain support from Microsoft, go to Microsoft Help and Support.

For More Information

To keep up-to-date with the latest Live Smooth Streaming feature news and developments, go to the Live Smooth Streaming Home page.

IIS Media Services 3.0 includes other features, such as Smooth Streaming, Web Playlists, and Bit Rate Throttling that will help you better serve digital media content to your users. For more information about the features in IIS Media Services 3.0, see IIS Media Services.