European Perspectives

A demonstration of complete workflow used for capturing and processing lecture recordings for both live broadcasting and archiving. This work relies on the Distributed Encoding Environment (DEE) we have developed based on Grid computing infrastructure and Internet Backplane Protocol (IBP) storage infrastructure for distributed video transcoding. We will discuss advantages and disadvantages of the DEE and its integration with IBP. Ideas for future integration with university information systems and e-learning systems will be discussed as well.

Petr Holub is a PhD student at Faculty of Informatics and an analyst and programmer at Institute of Computer Science both at Masaryk University. He is also involved in CESNET projects concerned with Grids, multimedia and high-speed networking. His research interests include: Grid computing (esp. monitoring, information services, and management), high-speed networks and suitable protocols, user-empowered overlay active networks, and collaborative environments.

In October 2005 the Computing Center of Max-Planck Society in cooperation with the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine research and the German R&D network, launched a traffic prioritization project, in order to find out whether traffic prioritization can overcome current quality of service issues in H.323 videoconferencing. This presentation will explain the project, the measurement technique and the outcome.

Videoconference is playing a key role in educational institutions in making national and international activities more efficient. Since e-learning and long distance teaching technologies are important in education, FCCN (Foundation for National Scientific Computing) developed the project "Estudios". The aim of the project is to promote videoconference and streaming of audio and video content, as well as experimentation, by installing rooms called "Estudios" in several Portuguese universities. The presentation provides an overview of this project and the technologies used in those rooms.

Nuno Gonçalves received his degree from Lisbon University in 2000 and joined FCCN soon after, developing several relational database management systems and web applications. In 2002 he joined the Multimedia Work Group and has been developing streaming architectures, web applications and several videoconference activities. Currently he is working on "Estúdios," a videoconference project whose goal is to build six studios in six Portuguese universities to promote the use of videoconference and streaming technologies in the Portuguese Academic Network (RCTS).