Presenters – Jeff Davis and Andy Tumas from Panopto
Project: Video Streaming Service
Use cases
Student presentations, screen and lecture capture, academic assignment, videos from Communications to promote Middlebury, Athletics events, live streams
Accounts & Access
1) How are accounts created when we have SSO? Are accounts pre-created in bulk, are they created when a user signs in, some other else model?
- We can discuss in more detail, but since Middlebury uses Canvas ( Moodle as well?), if possible, it makes sense to provision access control from Canvas.
2) Can your solution restrict access to content based on Groups in Active Directory or LDAP?
3) How are personal or shared quotas handled?
- Panopto does not enforce a limit on storage so there should be no need to apply quotas.
4) Can we programmatically provision shared-spaces with a quota?
- Panopto does not enforce a limit on storage so there should be no need to apply quotas.
5) Does this application or service PROCESS, STORE, or TRANSMIT any REGULATED DATA?
- No. However, we would have liked to clarified a bit more with a text box. Panopto only stores a user’s first name, last name, e-mail address (Directory Information) and is not considered PII.
- If adopted, Panopto would need to integrate with both Moodle and Canvas for one year.
- Supports CAS, AD, and SAML 2.0
- A brief look at their API documentation suggests that we should be able to provision accounts and course-groups on request via the Course Hub as we do with Canvas, Moodle, SANSSpace, etc.
- Either CAS or SAML 2.0 (ADFS) for SSO authentication in combination with this provisioning via their API.
Storage
1) Is it possible to have a hybrid solution where some content is served from your cloud solution but you have a locally hosted content on our campus for other data? How does that change pricing?
- Panopto does not offer a hybrid solution, either hosted or cloud based or we Panopto can be deployed on-premise. However, when we host, there are no storage charges, so hoping this helps with the discussion.
2) What are the maximum file-size/length/quality limits for upload? Can multi-hour videos be ingested?
- There are no size limits, and yes, multi-hour videos can be uploaded.
3) Can individuals have their own space?
- Panopto is managed through a folder structure, and yes, Faculty, Staff, and Students can have their own folders.
4) Is there the concept of quotas? Can we programmatically create shared spaces with specific quota? E.g. Create 12 shared spaces with each having 10GB of quota?
- No concept of quotas since storage is unlimited.
Accessibility
1) Does your solution support closed-captioning files?
- Yes, we provide Closed Captioning as a Service, or Middlebury can partner with one of 3 integrated partners, including: 3Play Media, Automatic Sync Technologies, and Cielo 24.
2) Can it create closed-captioning files?
- When one of the services mentioned above is utilized, Panopto provides the ability to download the caption files that have been generated
3) What other accessibility features does it have?
- Panopto’s student-facing interfaces (viewer, embedded viewer and folders, session list view) Support 508 and WCAG 2.0 accessibility. Panopto provides keyboard navigation and compatibility with NVDA, JAWS, and Voiceover screen readers. 508 compliant captioning also supported.
- Search occurs within a recording and across multiple recordings.
- Search will include captioning and transcriptions of audio, character recognition in video, and notes (See answer to “What kind of metadata does your platform support?” below.
- Text must be present in video for a while to be recognized.
- Captioning uses speech recognition
- Captioning displayed on side of video, working to overly captioning on video playback.
- Captioning in English, only.
- Can ingest captioning files.
- Uses adaptive streaming, will adjust the quality based on connection speed of viewer.
Canvas/Moodle/Wordpress
1) Does integration with Moodle & Canvas cost extra?
- No, the cost of Panopto includes support and integrations.
2) Can you describe the integration process for Moodle and Canvas?
- Panopto supports the majority of higher education LMS platforms, including a feature rich integrations with Canvas and Moodle. Both integrations includes SSO, ability to provision access control, controlled publishing to Canvas or Moodle, and rolling course synchronization for enrolled students. Please see links to integration overview videos below:
3) Do you have an API that we can use to pull lists of videos to which a user has access to provide browsing interface from within our web applications (Moodle, WordPress, Drupal, etc)?
- Yes, API Documentation. This may also be accomplished through a embedded playlist.
- Users may use Moodle or Canvas to access Panopto, or they may access Panopto directly.
- Faculty and students may add Panopto videos/presentations via a button in the WYSIWYG editor.
- Uses embedded iFrame.
Content Management
1) How does asset management work in your platform?
- Panopto organizes recordings into a Parent/Child Folder structure. Recordings are uploaded to folders. User roles, individual accounts, or groups will have access to these folders and, in turn, access to the recordings within those folders.
2) Can lots of people manage a particular group of videos?
- Yes, there is no limit here.
3) What is the process for a professor to upload a video on your system and embed it in the LMS?
- If created with the Panopto client, the professor would simply choose the Folder that is associated with their LMS course. The Canvas/Moodle integrations will embed the recording in a list view automatically. If created elsewhere and uploaded to Panopto, the professor would simply upload to the associated Folder. Panopto can also provide embed codes for individual recordings.
- Video can be captured from multiple devices: Windows, Mac and mobile devices.
- Video and slides from multiple devices can be captured and synced for playback.
- All streams recorded, viewer may choose which stream they view.
- Titles of slides (powerpoint or Keynote) become a timestamped table of contents that can be clicked to bring viewer to a point in the timeline.
- Slides presented as jpg thumbnails to move to point in timeline.
- Notes can be added to a table of contents
- May be public or private
- Many students can contribute notes to same video
- Student notes can be marked private globally
- Synced videos may be presented as picture-in-picture
- Presentations may be embedded in other web sites.
- A Dropbox folder is available for student assignments, only faculty and student may see content.
- Homepage of Panopto can be curated or display most popular, recently added, etc.
Other
1) Is there a browseable view (a “library”) where users can search across all files available to them?
- Yes, Panopto provides a searchable library portal.
2) How are videos served/streamed? Is HTML5 video markup supported or is a plugin (Flash, Silverlight, etc) required for playback?
- Adaptive playback with HTML5 support. The viewer will default to use Flash if available. If not, it will play in HTML5.
3) How do you support live event streaming?
- Any recording can be live streamed by using the Panopto client for Windows or Mac.
- Url can be set in advance
4) What are your value added services, if any?
- Panopto offers Emerald Support, which includes 365 x 24 x 7 end user support, as well as one(1) day on-site training.
5) What kind of metadata does your platform support?
- Panopto indexes video in a number of ways: Contents (automated contents generated PowerPoint and Keynote slides), Slide text (fully searchable), Notes, Discussion, Captioning, Smart Search (OCR and ASR). Contents although automated, can be edited. The Panopto Editor provides for manual entry of metadata/tags/topics at any time stamp in the video timeline.
6) What options are available for content creation and interactivity?
- During a live webcast viewers can interact through a discussion panel which is similar to a chat window. They can ask questions to the presenter. After a recording is completed, Panopto allows for 3rd party web sites to be embedded in its Viewer as a secondary source. This allows you to use your existing polling/quizzing tools within Panopto.
7) Unicode support?
- Yes.
- Does not support right-to-left text.
- Exit strategy – all content is obtainable (video, presentations, captioning, notes, etc.) Presentation+video playback experience cannot be captured unless saved as an .mp4 (separately or picture-in-picture).
- Still some questions on editing, usability, scalability, collection management.
- More project documentation available in the Streaming Video Project folder – https://drive.google.com/a/middlebury.edu/folderview?id=0B_yW_eeeL6uTN3ZTV01DWEN6YXc&usp=sharing