Audio description track is always set as the default audio track

Anonymous
2023-06-06T23:05:10.67+00:00

When using dynamic packaging, the HLS stream isn't returning the audio tracks correctly if there are 2 present.

e.g. via the Azure Portal:

  • upload and encode a mp4 video (output is audio track and video tracks)
  • add an audio description track so there are now 2 audio tracks
  • edit the manifest .ism to adjust the track name for the video audio track and set the audio track to not be the default track

Use videoJS or Azure media player to play the video (HLS or DASH), and there are 2 main issues:

  1. HLS and DASH ignore the display name for the video audio track. (e.g. it should be 'English' not 'aac_eng_2_128038_2_1'
  2. HLS switches the order of the audio tracks, and sets the descriptive audio as the default track 'DEFAULT=YES'
#EXTM3U
#EXT-X-VERSION:7

#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio",NAME="aac_eng_2_128038_2_1",LANGUAGE="eng",CHANNELS="2",URI="QualityLevels(128038)/Manifest(aac_eng_2_128038_2_1,format=m3u8-cmaf)"

#EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio",NAME="English (Audio Description)",LANGUAGE="eng",DEFAULT=YES,AUTOSELECT=YES,CHARACTERISTICS="public.accessibility.describes-video",CHANNELS="2",URI="QualityLevels(317324)/Manifest(audio_eng_adl,format=m3u8-cmaf)"**
Azure Media Services
Azure Media Services
A group of Azure services that includes encoding, format conversion, on-demand streaming, content protection, and live streaming services.
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  1. ajkuma 24,396 Reputation points Microsoft Employee
    2023-06-09T06:41:20.4533333+00:00

    Thanks for the follow-up and update.

    It seems like you are trying to change the order of the audio elements in the .ism file, but it is not making any difference. You mentioned that you have not edited the english.ismc file so far. The english.ismc file is the client manifest file that contains the info about the media files and their bitrates.

    Yes, when you create a streaming locator for the asset, you may use the playback URL provided for HLS or DASH, and you don't have control over the output (EXT-X-MEDIA) tags. The URL you provided looks like this for HLS: https://[name].streaming.media.azure.net/[guid]/english.ism/manifest(format=m3u8-cmaf).

    Just to isolate, you may try editing the english.ismc file for changing the order of the audio elements. As you mentioned, you may try creating a new streaming locator and see if it makes any difference.

    Kindly let us know, if the issue persists, I'll follow-up further with you offline.

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