ann1510 — Announcement

ESA/Hubble now delivers videos and fulldome material faster

from a server near you

26 March 2015

ESA/Hubble offers almost 4000 image and over 1000 videos for the use of the media, researchers and the public.

All of ESA/Hubble’s images and videos are provided free of charge, and most of our internet traffic results from the distribution of videos — everything from video podcasts to large ultra HD and planetarium fulldome videos. Some of the bigger files are a few gigabytes in size, and can be hundreds of gigabytes for fulldome planetarium clips.

Up to now ESA/Hubble has only had one server location — at the European Southern Observatory’s Headquarters in Germany — from where it distributed all content across the globe. However, with a large amount of ESA/Hubble’s public traffic originating from outside Europe, the disadvantage in terms of speed and the ease with which these users could access ESA/Hubble content has been a concern for more than a decade.

The delivery of huge files across the world from a single location results in high latency — or a slow transfer of data — for users furthest from the server, and as many of our videos are designed to be previewed on the screen in real time, accessing such content from a server located so far away means stuttering playback of videos and other unwanted features.

A Content Delivery Network (CDN) was a frequent topic of discussion, but only now, due to changes in the market, the arrival of new CDN providers and the increasing urgency of our situation, have we been in a position to set up a partnership with such a network.

As part of a collaboration, the CDN provider CDN77 has now placed all ESA/Hubble’s videos and images on 27 servers throughout the world. This gives users, particularly those in the Americas, Asia and Australia, much faster access to ESA/Hubble content.

The many servers provide quicker and more convenient access to ESA/Hubble content worldwide for users outside Europe, whether that means downloading planetarium shows, ultra HD videos, and large images or watching podcasts, and users can expect to be able to download and view content up to ten times faster than is currently the case.