open and debug a stream | monitor and troubleshoot a stream | inspect a specific ad break
You can monitor and debug a live stream video for a specific stream session. The stream activity monitor allows you to see details about the numbers of ads, ad breaks, fill and served durations, and troubleshoot issues in real time.
For live linear streams, it automatically updates as new ad breaks occur in the session.
Alternately, you can use a debug key to see activity or troubleshoot a video stream.
Open and debug a stream
Video on demand
-
Sign in to Google Ad Manager.
-
Click Video, then Stream activity monitor.
- Enter a session ID or debug key.
- Click Debug stream.
Live linear
- Sign in to Google Ad Manager.
- Click Video, then Stream activity monitor.
- Enter a session ID or debug key.
- Click Debug stream.
Monitor and troubleshoot a stream
When you click to debug a session ID, the stream activity monitor displays information about the session, including your request URL, content, and filled percentages, broken down by ad break.
The following metrics are displayed:
| Metric | Description |
|---|---|
| Streaming time | Total time elapsed including content and ads. |
| Number of ads | Total number of ads available for the associated ad break. |
| Filled duration | Combined duration of the ads that were selected to serve during the ad break.* |
| Served duration | Combined duration of ads that actually served during the ad break.** |
| Served percentage | Percentage of ad break duration that actually served.(served duration / ad break duration) x 100 |
* If fill duration is less than the ad break duration, the remainder is filled with the live stream's ad slate. Learn more about slates.
** If an ad pod successfully serves all its ads, served duration should be equal to fill duration.
Tracking events
The stream activity monitor displays server-triggered tracking events when using server-side beaconing (SSB), or client-triggered tracking events when using the DAI API.
Tracking events are not displayed in the stream activity monitor with IMA SDK implementations.
Inspect a specific ad break
You can click any row, which represents an ad break, to see more information about individual creatives served during the break, and any errors that occurred during the break.
Creative ID
You can see the creatives that were chosen to serve, including both the ad server and creative ID from the VAST responses. If the creative is hosted within your Ad Manager network, you can click the creative ID to open the actual creative, and review its configuration.
Troubleshoot based on VMAP and VAST responses
You can click to expand either the VMAP or VAST requests and responses, for an individual ad break.
You should review the request URLs to ensure that all of the parameters in this ad request are what you expect. Verify that all expected parameters were passed to the application and set correctly for this user.
- Ensure that the ad unit (
iu) and key-values (cust_params) are correct. - If you are using the Ad Exchange, ensure that the
description_urlis correct. - If this is a VOD stream, ensure that the
vidandcmsidvalues match the content.
If you are not sure why a specific ad was chosen to serve, and if Ad Manager is used as your ad server, you can copy the request URL from the stream activity monitor into the delivery tools for for in-stream video and simulate an ad request to show you which ad rules or creatives would serve for this ad request. You can also test by copying either the tag or the VAST XML onto the Video suite inspector to see how the ads display, visually.
