Determining mean opinion scores (MOS) for variable bit rate audio streams

1. A method, comprising:

performing, by one or more computer systems,

monitoring a communication over a network;

detecting (i) a first portion of the communication including packets having a first packet payload size, and (ii) a second portion of the communication including packets having a second packet payload size, the second packet payload size different from the first packet payload size;

deriving (i) a first bit rate corresponding to the first portion of the communication based, at least in part, upon the first packet payload size, and (ii) a second bit rate corresponding to the second portion of the communication based, at least in part, upon the second packet payload size;

calculating (i) a first Mean Opinion Score (MOS) for the first portion of the communication based, at least in part, upon the first bit rate, and (ii) a second MOS for the second portion of the communication based, at least in part, on the second bit rate; and

generating an overall MOS for the communication based, at least in part, upon (i) the first and second MOS, and (ii) a distribution of the packets having the first and second packet payload sizes.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the communication includes a Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) audio stream.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the network includes a Voice-over-IP (VoIP) network.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the communication is encoded with an Adaptive Multi-Rate (AMR) codec or an Enhanced Variable Rate codec (EVRC).

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first MOS provides a first numerical indication of a first perceived quality of the first portion of the communication from a receiver's perspective, and wherein the second MOS provides a second numerical indication of a second perceived quality of the second portion of the communication from the receiver's perspective.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein generating the overall MOS includes calculating a weighted average of the first and second MOS based on a first weigh proportional to an amount of packets having the first packet payload size and on a second weigh proportional to an amount of packets having the second packet payload size, respectively.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

performing, by the one or more computer systems,

detecting a third portion of the communication having a third packet payload size, the third packet payload size different from the first and second packet payload sizes;

deriving a third bit rate corresponding to the third portion of the communication based, at least in part, upon the third payload size;

calculating a third MOS for the third portion of the communication based, at least in part, on the third bit rate; and

generating the overall MOS for the communication based, at least in part, upon (i) the first, second, and third MOS, and (ii) a distribution of the monitored packets having the first, second, and third packet payload sizes.

8. A network monitoring system, comprising:

a processor; and

a memory coupled to the processor, the memory configured to store program instructions executable by the processor to cause the network monitoring system to:

receive an audio signal in a Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) stream over a Voice-over-IP (VoIP) network, the audio signal encoded using a Variable Bit Rate (VBR) codec;

determine that a first portion of the RTP stream corresponding to a first portion of the audio signal is transmitted with a first bit rate;

calculate a first Mean Opinion Score (MOS) for the first portion of the audio signal based, at least in part, upon the first bit rate;

determine that a second portion of the RTP stream corresponding to a second portion of the audio signal is transmitted with a second bit rate, the second bit rate different from the first bit rate;

calculate a second MOS for the second portion of the audio signal based, at least in part, upon the second bit rate; and

generate an average MOS for the audio signal based, at least in part, upon the first and second MOS.

9. The network monitoring system of claim 8 , wherein the VBR codec is selected from the group consisting of: an Adaptive Multi-Rate (AMR) codec and an Enhanced Variable Rate codec (EVRC).

10. The network monitoring system of claim 8 , wherein the VoIP network includes a mobile network.

11. The network monitoring system of claim 8 , wherein to determine that the first portion of the RTP stream corresponding to the first portion of the audio signal is transmitted with the first bit rate, the program instructions are further executable by the processor to cause the network monitoring system to:

determine a packet-time used by the VBR codec in the first portion of the RTP stream;

determine a payload size of a packet in the first portion of the RTP stream; and

calculate a bit rate for the RTP stream based, at least in part, upon the packet-time and the payload size.

12. The network monitoring system of claim 11 , the program instructions further executable by the processor to cause the network monitoring system to:

use the calculated bit rate as the first bit rate for the first portion of the RTP stream.

13. The network monitoring system of claim 11 , the program instructions further executable by the processor to cause the network monitoring system to:

select the first bit rate as being a bit rate value prescribed by the VBR codec that is closest to the calculated bit rate.

14. The network monitoring system of claim 13 , wherein to select the first bit rate, the program instructions are further executable by the processor to cause the network monitoring system to:

add or subtract a bit rate deviation value to or from the calculated bit rate.

15. The network monitoring system of claim 14 , wherein the bit rate deviation value corresponds to a number of bits in a padded portion of the packet's payload.

16. The network monitoring system of claim 8 , wherein to generate the average MOS, the program instructions are further executable by the processor to cause the network monitoring system to:

calculate a packet payload size distribution corresponding to the first and second portions of the RTP stream; and

calculate a weighted average of the first and second MOS using the packet payload size distribution.

17. A tangible electronic storage medium having program instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by a processor within a computer system, cause the computer system to:

calculate a packet payload size distribution for an audio stream encoded with different bit rates;

calculate Mean Opinion Scores (MOS) for each of two or more portions of the packet payload size distribution based, at least in part, upon the different bit rates; and

determine an overall MOS for the audio stream based, at least in part, upon the calculated MOS and the packet payload size distribution.

18. The tangible electronic storage medium of claim 17 , wherein the audio signal is transmitted in a Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) stream over a Voice-over-IP (VoIP) network.

19. The tangible electronic storage medium of claim 17 , wherein the audio signal is encoded using an Adaptive Multi-Rate (AMR) codec or an Enhanced Variable Rate codec (EVRC).

20. The tangible electronic storage medium of claim 17 , wherein the program instructions, upon execution by the processor, further cause the computer system to:

flag the audio stream in response to the overall MOS meeting a threshold value.