OREANDA-NEWS. November 11, 2014.
On the other side of the screen
Today a viewer is experienced. It is not enough for him just to come home, to place himself in a chair at the TV and to watch his or her favorite program. He wants something more: interactive services, more channels in order to flip through the channels. This year the national telecommunications operator RUE Beltelecom has chosen a supplier of equipment for OTT (Over the Top) technology.

The company promises to start the usage of television services with Smart-TV function by the end of this year. In fact TV will become something greater. Subscribers will have an opportunity to view TV channels on a user adaptor, a PC, a phone, a tablet. Moreover, it will be possible not just to watch TV programs, but also use other services - "video on demand", "delayed review" and many others.

It's hard to imagine, but just in the last decade we had revolution which took place in television, and even several technologies managed to change one another. What were they? Let's try to recall.

Analogy with analogues
About 15 years ago, viewers were watching just a few channels. Network bandwidth simply did not allow increasing the number of channels. In the early 2000s new Belarusian television companies STV, Vtoroy Nacionalny Kanal were very interested in expanding their channels broadcasting and attraction of larger audience.

This led to the development of plan on installation of new analog radio-television transmitters, which required new organization of ways for the delivery of TV signal. By this time Beltelecom already had a developed network of fiber-optic communication lines (fiber optic lines). So a natural question what is the next step - to expand and upgrade the existing microwave links or to switch to a new way of delivering TV signals using fiber optic links – was easily solved.

The general scheme of constructing distribution networks of broadcasted programs with connection between  transmitters and two points of primary network as part of a SDH-ring structures creation at the backbone and intrazone level.

In 2004 Beltelecom carried it out on two new transmitters - in Svisloch and Grodno, and in 2005 - in Pinsk, Drogichina, Braslav Ushachi, Obuhovo, Slonim, and dozens of other population centers. In order to deliver the television signal from the studio to analog transmitters the most known signal compression format MPEG-2 was chosen. But it is necessary to say while switching from analog radio relay lines to "fiber" the basis for the creation of terrestrial digital broadcasting was made.

Switching to digital broadcasting
In 2005, Giprosvyaz Ltd. began the development of the project on the concept of the program aimed at the development of DVB standard digital TV broadcasting. As a result a state program called "Implementation of digital television and radio broadcasting until 2015" was developed, which foreseen the construction of fiber optic lines on all existing radio and television transmitting stations and upgrading  of transceiver equipment of DVB-T standard.
 
In 2007 the operation of a digital transmitter that broadcasts digital package of programs using the format MPEG-4 compression was carried out. Various schemes of delivery of TV programs to transmitters as well as smooth operation of transmitters and encoding speed were tested. The first experience was successful, and the Ministry of Communications and Informatization made a decision on the future development of digital broadcasting using the MPEG-4 compression format.

By the way, today the so-called digital social layer (8 republican channels broadcasted in digital quality and included in the free package of TV programs) covers 97.81% of the country.

Feel comfort with   ZALA
From 2006 to 2007, in the networks of RUE Beltelecom a pilot project of the IPTV service was launched. The questions dealing with the transfer of digital media content via broadband Internet access channels and additional delayed review services were followed up: pauses while watching TV with the ability to resume watching, watching of programs including those already broadcasted earlier (the shift backwards in the broadcasting network), record of TV programs to be broadcasted in the future, using the equipment of the operator. During the first year the subscriber base exceeded 30 thousand subscribers.

Nowadays digital interactive television services are used by more than 900 thousand subscribers and broadcasting network includes more than 89 TV channels. RUE Beltelecom offers additional interactive services   in the TV packages ZALA, as well as the possibility of expanding the total number of channels available for viewing through the formation of an individual package. Thus, the TV receiver of the subscribers of ZALA has become a window to the information space. No need to run home to see favorite series, schedule time, adjusting to television broadcasting. In fact, a subscriber of ZALA has 24 hour access to the content he is interested in.

New Standards
Since 2008 European countries have begun a gradual implementation of digital broadcasting using the new standards. We followed the same way. In 2011, it was decided to use DVB-T2 standard while   deploying the second and third zones of coverage. Nowadays a joint project between RUE Beltelecom and RUE Belarussian Broadcasting center on the implementation of commercial on –air broadcasting launched in October 2013 covers about 40% of the territory of the country, the service is used by more than 38 million subscribers, and digital transmitters broadcasting commercial television programs are installed in 41 broadcasting transmitting centers. It has been promised that the total number of digital transmitters will have been increased to 107 by the end of the year. And in 2015, with the deactivation of analogue television it is planned to install additional 72 digital transmitters.

Note
OTT technology has become a frequent practice in the sphere of the provision of video services via the Internet and is a part of the IPTV technology. The term means the delivery of video signal to the adapter (computer, mobile phone) of the user via the Internet without direct contact with the service provider as opposed to already familiar to us IP- television services, which are provided through a network controlled by the operator with a guaranteed quality. And Smart-TV is more than just TV. This is a technology which implies integration of the Internet and digital interactive services into modern TVs and digital television receivers. New devices that support Smart-TV, are in fact work as computers in the form factor of the TV with the support of its capabilities. All these devices are aimed at supporting entertainment media on the Internet: they enable to watch movies, cartoons and series, finally excluding the need for common television. It is believed that the introduction of this technology has even provoked a surge among developers of interactive applications.