Sentry is part of the Tektronix video quality and service assurance solution for monitoring TV Everywhere and multiscreen services. This year, Sentry ABR was updated to offer decryption and decode functionality. Tektronix says this capability is important due to the increased amount of content delivered via adaptive bitrate (ABR) streaming and the need to understand the customer experience.
Decryption and decode gives operators the ability to evaluate the viewing experience for QoE issues such as tiling, blocking, and audio loudness and for perceptual video quality issues like over-compression artifacts. After transcoding in a typical ABR workflow, a video stream is fragmented into fixed time duration fragments and encrypted. Then digital rights management (DRM) is applied. Sentry ABR can view encrypted content to provide deep packet inspection for QoE measurement, monitoring and analysis.
The company also notes that Sentry ABR is scalable. Operators can purchase a low-cost solution as they begin ABR deployments and purchase software upgrades as required.