Track core playback on iOS

Initial tracking setup

Identify when the user triggers the intention of playback (the user clicks play and/or autoplay is on) and create a MediaObject instance.

createMediaObjectWithName API

StreamType constants:

MediaType constants:

The general format for creating the MediaObject:

ADBMediaObject *mediaObject =
  [ADBMediaHeartbeat createMediaObjectWithName:<MEDIA_NAME>
                                       mediaId:<MEDIA_ID>
                                        length:<MEDIA_LENGTH>
                                    streamType:<STREAM_TYPE>
                                     mediaType: <MEDIA_TYPE>];

Attach video metadata

Optionally attach standard and/or custom video metadata objects to the video tracking session through context data variables.

• Standard video metadata

  • Implement standard metadata on iOS

  • Video metadata keys
    iOS metadata keys

  • See the comprehensive list of video metadata here: Audio and video parameters

  NOTE

  Attaching the standard video metadata object to the media object is optional.

• Custom metadata

  Create a variable object for the custom variables and populate with the data for this video. For example:

  NSMutableDictionary *videoMetadata = [[NSMutableDictionary alloc] init];
  [videoMetadata setObject:@"false" forKey:@"isUserLoggedIn"];
  [videoMetadata setObject:@"Sample TV station" forKey:@"tvStation"];
  

Track the intention to start playback

To begin tracking a media session, call trackSessionStart on the Media Heartbeat instance.

TIP

The second value is the custom video metadata object name that you created in step 2.

- (void)onMainVideoLoaded:(NSNotification *)notification {
//    [_mediaHeartbeat trackSessionStart:mediaObject data:nil];
    [_mediaHeartbeat trackSessionStart:mediaObject data:videoMetadata];
}

IMPORTANT

trackSessionStart tracks the user intention of playback, not the beginning of the playback. This API is used to load the video data/metadata and to estimate the time-to-start QoS metric (the time duration between trackSessionStart and trackPlay).

NOTE

If you are not using custom video metadata, simply send an empty object for the data argument in trackSessionStart, as shown in the commented out line in the iOS example above.

Track the actual start of playback

Identify the event from the video player for the beginning of the video playback, where the first frame of the video is rendered on the screen, and call trackPlay:

- (void)onVideoPlay:(NSNotification *)notification {
    [_mediaHeartbeat trackPlay];
}

Track the completion of playback

Identify the event from the video player for the completion of the video playback, where the user has watched the content until the end, and call trackComplete:

- (void)onVideoComplete:(NSNotification *)notification {
    [_mediaHeartbeat trackComplete];
}

Track the end of the session

Identify the event from the video player for the unloading/closing of the video playback, where the user closes the video and/or the video is completed and has been unloaded, and call trackSessionEnd:

- void)onMainVideoUnloaded:(NSNotification *)notification {
    [_mediaHeartbeat trackSessionEnd];
}

IMPORTANT

trackSessionEnd marks the end of a video tracking session. If the session was successfully watched to completion, where the user watched the content until the end, ensure that trackComplete is called before trackSessionEnd. Any other track* API call is ignored after trackSessionEnd, except for trackSessionStart for a new video tracking session.

Track all possible pause scenarios

Identify the event from the video player for video pause and call trackPause:

- (void)onVideoPause:(NSNotification *)notification {
    [_mediaHeartbeat trackPause];
}

Pause Scenarios

Identify any scenario in which the Video Player will pause and make sure that trackPause is properly called. The following scenarios all require that your app call trackPause():

• The user explicitly hits pause in the app.
• The player puts itself into the Pause state.
• (Mobile Apps) - The user puts the application into the background, but you want the app to keep the session open.
• (Mobile Apps) - Any type of system interrupt occurs that causes an application to be backgrounded. For example, the user receives a call, or a pop up from another application occurs, but you want the application to keep the session alive to give the user the opportunity to resume the video from the point of interruption.

Identify the event from the player for video play and/or video resume from pause and call trackPlay:

- (void)onVideoPlay:(NSNotification *)notification {
    [_mediaHeartbeat trackPlay];
}

TIP

This may be the same event source that was used in Step 4. Ensure that each trackPause() API call is paired with a following trackPlay() API call when the video playback resumes.