✨ Open Source Broadcast Automation
Holiday Visitors
Techsoup Canada Grants and Free Services
Are you a non profit needing; web hosting, grants, subsidized rates for commercial hardware and software. CJUC Radio (Whitehorse) recently utilized this easy to access service for a 3,500.00 USD grant for the Azure web hosting offer. There is an entire catalogue of services, products and hardware available to non profit groups.
https://www.techsoup.ca/product-catalog
We can help you access and utilize these services for your broadcast operation, both in Canada and through international partners.
https://meet.techsoup.org/about-us/techsoup-global-network/
Emergency Alert Heartbeats
Heartbeats are received once per minute. If obplayer misses a heartbeat the monitoring process will reset itself after 2 minutes. You can see this count down in the player dashboard >Alerts The app will display in red an error if missing heartbeats.
Compatibility for TLS 1.2
This issue about missing CAP alert information attachments was reported recently, from my understanding is to do with being able to use TLS 1.2 (to fetch attachments). AWS where many attachments are stored recently dropped support for older TLS 1.1 in favour of TLS 1.2
All of our hardware players are current with TLS 1.2
For DIY installs to check if your install is working with TLS 1.2, use this tool.
How do I view past CAP Emergency Alerts in Canada?
Visit these resources to view archived emergency alerts.
https://alertsarchive.pelmorex.com/en.php
https://alertsarchive.pelmorex.com/fr.php
Open Source Tech Update
Improved logging tool
Filter and display types and groups of real time log messages to help configure and diagnose issues.
Language filters in media library
We added all 7 thousand ISO-639-3 languages that makes for a lot of scrolling to find the applicable one and created a special search filter to find results quicker
Indigenous Language – Kwakʼwala vs Kwakiutl
One of the puzzles I have been researching is how/why there is a mix up in the ISO-639-3 (https://iso639-3.sil.org/code_tables/639/data ) classification of the Kwakʼwala language. This affects our OBserver language selection menu that is populating all 7K known languages.
Alert Bay first discovered that Kwakʼwala is missing, instead it is referenced by a different name Kwakiutl. Turns out there is a reason for this. In the ISO table it lists this language, including translations to other languages. So they are both correct. Kwakʼwala is the way indigenous people reference this language and Kwakiutl is the english translation. I think ISO left this intentionally, because there are already a lot of materials that are tagged as Kwakiutl from previous researchers.
The recognized 3 digit language code kwk refers to both these spellings\translations.
We are adding into observer UI the ability to display alternative translations, if they are available like this one, so it will display the indigenous spelling in the drop down.
US LPFM Community Radio Sector *** Open for Business ***
The FCC says 1,336 low-power FM hopefuls filed applications before the filing window for new stations.
https://www.radioworld.com/news-and-business/fcc-receives-1336-lpfm-applications
How long does it take to get a CRTC radio licence in Canada? Part 2
The CRTC announced it will defer new applications relating to radio for the next two years as it focuses on implementing its regulatory plan to modernize the broadcasting system. Canada most likely will not see a new community, ethnic, faith, indigenous or commercial radio station for the next 3 – 5 years. If Government of Canada is saying local news and media are important, this makes no sense at all. Radio startups will have to wait until year 3 before engaging engineering services, for a possible application in year 4, that is more like 6 years from now before they can order equipment, estimated 7 years before operational at the earliest (2030). This could be the end of over the air FM broadcasting as we know it, public spectrum could be auctioned off and repurposed for 5G, then community media sector is outsourced directly to Bell\Rogers wireless.
https://broadcastdialogue.com/crtc-initiates-two-year-deferral-on-radio-complaints-applications/
Where to buy a Raspberry PI?
Global shortage of Raspberry Pi is still affecting supply. Here is a tool to show where you can find Pi and current pricing.
CJUC Radio Winter Solstice Fundraiser
With AI present in broadcast, community radio will be one of the last places that actually have humans.
