FAQ: Clevercast platform

Terminology

What is Clevercast Enterprise?

Clevercast Enterprise is the name of our platform that allows you to manage live streams and Video on-Demand. It is used for live and VoD streaming with an embedded player.

What is Clevercast Webinar?

Our regular multilingual live and simulive streaming plans expect you to embed Clevercast player into your site or platform. Clevercast Webinar on the other hand, allows you to create a customizable page where your viewers can watch the live stream, with support for registration and interactivity. Clevercast webinar supports multilingual streaming.

What is simulive streaming?

Simulive streaming means that pre-recorded videos are scheduled to be broadcasted as live streams. Viewers experience a regular live stream. They have no way of telling the difference. A simulive stream, like any other live stream, is delivered through the HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) protocol. Simulive streaming supports closed captions and speech translations in multiple languages (if included in your plan).

The general names and menus in Clevercast are described in our platform overview. Terms that are specific to a particular solution can be found in the manual for that solution.

Does Clevercast support multilingual closed captions?

Yes. Both speech-to-text conversion and human subtitling are supported. Closed captions can be translated in real time into any number of languages.

Cloud recording of a live stream

Does Clevercast record single-language live streams?

Yes, your entire broadcast is automatically recorded.

Note: we strongly recommend that you always make a local recording if possible, even if a cloud recording is available.

Does Clevercast record multilingual live streams?

Yes. A live stream is automatically recorded in the cloud. However, we strongly recommend that you always make a local recording if possible (e.g. in case of network issues).

Recording is automatically started when you start an event. When you set the event status to Ended, the recording becomes available under the Live -> Recording menu.

A live stream with multiple audio languages can be downloaded as a single mp4 file containing the video stream and all audio streams (= languages). VLC player, for example, lets you play the different audio languages.

Please note: the outgoing audio streams are recorded. If the floor audio is added to the background of your translated streams via T@H, this will also be audible in the recording.

Multilingual closed captions are also recorded. These can be downloaded separately, as WebVTT files.

What is the maximum duration of a live recording?

By default, the maximum duration of a live recording is set to 24 hours. Clevercast automatically ends a recording 24 hours after you’ve started your event. Contact us if your recording needs to be longer.

Can I convert a live recording to Video on-Demand?

Yes, if your plan includes it. Clevercast lets you publish live recordings to on-demand items. If the live recording contains multiple languages, the will also be available as part of the VoD item.

The on-demand video player can be embedded on your website. Language selection works the same way as for the live stream. Please note that the Video on-Demand video will have a different embed code (and direct link) than the live event.

Can I create multiple VoD items from a single recording, with different start and end points?

Yes, when converting the recording to VoD, Clevercast allows you to select the start and end point of the VoD video. This allows you to create multiple VoD items, each with a different start and end point.

How long does it take before the Video on-Demand is available for viewing?

This depends on the duration of the video to be published. For example, a 2-hour video will take about 40-50 minutes. If you publish multiple videos at the same time, the duration may be longer.

Video on-Demand

Can I upload a single-language Video on-Demand ?

Yes, upload your source video. Clevercast will automatically transcode the video into multiple resolutions for adaptive bitrate streaming and publish them on our global CDN.

Can I create a multilingual VoD item in Clevercast (possibly as the source for simulive streaming)?

Yes. You can do this by first uploading a single language video (video + floor audio), and then adding the speech translations and/or closed captions files to the VoD item.

Analytics

Does Clevercast have live statistics?

Yes, we have both real-time and post-event analytics. They include standard data like number of viewers, concurrent viewers over time, location of viewers, used devices, referrers… but all data refer to the live stream as a whole. There are no per-language statistics.

Are VoD statistics available?

Yes. VoD statistics are mostly the same as live statistics. Again, no per-language statistics are available.

Does Clevercast player support Google analytics?

Not out of the box. But you can use the Player API to handle events and send requests to Google Analytics autonomously.