WebRTC Quality Control in Contextual Communication Systems

Audio and video communication is a universal task with a long history of technologies. Recent examples of these technologies include Skype video calling, Apple’s FaceTime, and Google Hangouts. Today, these services offer everyday users the ability to have an interactive conference with both audio and video streams. However, many of these solutions depend on extra plugins or applications installing on the user’s personal computer or mobile device. Some of them also are subject to licensing, introducing a huge barrier for developers and restraining new companies from entering this area. The aim of Web Real-Time Communications (WebRTC) is to provide direct access to multimedia streams in the browser, thus making it possible to create rich media applications using web technology without the need for plugins or developers needing to pay technology license fees. Ericsson develops solutions for communication targeting professional and business users. With the increasing possibilities to gather data (via cloud-based applications) about the quality experienced by users in their video conferences, new demands are placed on the infrastructure to handle this data. Additionally, there is a question of how the stats should be utilized to automatically control the quality of service (QoS) in WebRTC communication systems. The thesis project deployed a WebRTC quality control service with methods of data processing and modeling to assess the perceived video quality of the ongoing session, and in further produce appropriate actions to remedy poor quality. Lastly, the WebRTC quality control service was tested on the Ericsson contextual test platform as an evaluation.

Keywords: WebRTC communication system, QoS assessment, Quality control, Data Analysis, Modeling