Last updated on April 30, 2014

Introduction to Play

Important

The Play extension is only supported on Cisco Edge 340.

Play is an Appspace extension that allows users to create, manage and playback IPTV applications. Users are able to manage their Play applications and contents through Appspace and display them on the Cisco Edge 340 digital media player.

Content

Content is the most crucial component of any Play application. Content can be divided into channels and on demand, which will be covered briefly below.

Channels

../../_images/00a.png

Channels are live video feeds that are encoded and delivered in the form of IP streams. Streaming format support for channels is device dependent. Users are required to define and configure channels with the IP stream together with its associated EPG data, logo and channel display name, which will be covered in the later sections.

High Level Specifications:

  • UDP/HTTP/RDP unicast or multicast
  • Support for XMLTV EPG data format or CSV file
  • Support for authenticated FTP and HTTP EPG data retrieval
  • Standard image formats supported include JPG and PNG (For Channel Logo)

On Demand

../../_images/00b.png

On demand content refers to content that resides in the Appspace Library or various external sources. Users are required to define and configure on demand folders containing on demand contents together with its associated folder icon and folder name.

High Level Specifications:

  • Support for videos, images and external content
  • Standard video formats supported include H.264, MPEG-4, WMV 3/ VC-1
  • Standard image formats supported include JPG and PNG (For Channel Logo)

Subscriptions

../../_images/00c.png

The next building block of any Play application is its subscriptions. Subscriptions are combinations of specific channels and on demand content that can be quickly provisioned to a subscriber’s account. The Play application will be configured to view a specific subscription or a combination of multiple subscriptions for more viewable content.

High Level Specifications:

  • Subscriptions can be applied at the device and/or application level
  • Support for channel and on demand content listings

Application Themes

../../_images/00d.png

The Play application’s theme acts as the interface between the user and the predefined content packaged into subscriptions. Designers are able to create customized themes that can be applied across different devices to drive unique user experiences.

High Level Specifications:

  • Supports HTML5/CSS and WebGL presentation
  • Video presentation layer utilises the VLC engine
  • Default theme targets the Cisco Edge 340 as the playback device
  • Universal support for IR remote control scan code mappings

Devices

../../_images/00e.png

The final building block of any Play application is the end-point device. Through the Play extension, administrators are able to manage and monitor all Play devices. The Appspace Play application is currently only supported on the Cisco Edge 340 digital media player.