RADIO AUTOMATION SOFTWARE - BROADCAST POWER BP2X

This page is kept for archiving purposes, please refer to the Downloads link.

June 09, 2008: Version 2.5.5.8 released.

CHANGES:

1. Added filler for commercial spots where commercials don't line up properly to length of spot. There is a new media type "Filler". Only "Filler" audio files will be used to fill the gaps for commercial spots.
2. Fixed elementRule selection which was randomizing after applying criteria.
3. Jingle mix length was being set the same as the element rule. Now it is set to 0.5 seconds.
4. Changed commercial generation routine in order not to create child program elements. Child program elements were not automating as they should.
5. Removed support in client application for multi-level program elements (parent-child relationships for program elements).
6. Added reportviewer to the installer. This application was missing and users might not have been able to view the reports generated by BP2X because of it.
7. Fixed a null pointer during import of MP3 by dragging and dropping on Media Desk. Also, I have changed the code that reads MP3 tags. You should notice now that MP3 tags will be imported consistently.
8. Changed commercial generation routine to allow commercial spots less than 1 minute in length. Instead of minutes, the dialog box now allows you to enter the duration of a spot in seconds.
9. Added a new plugin (LOVE & HATE). This plugin allows you to tag a song as LOVE or HATE which translates to enabling/disabling the media file. Disabled media files are kept in the database and can be manually played, but the automation engine will not consider them when randomly or by criteria selecting songs. It also allows you to change the style of the currently playing audio file, as long as it is a song.
10. Fixed an index out of bound bug in Commercial Scheduler. This bug was happening when you are scheduling more than 31 days ahead. The code that was retrieving the commercials was returning one day too much.
11. The jingles window can now be floated and displayed at the same time as the other players. This is very handy if you have got two touch screens connected to your PC.
12. Fixed a bug in the player levels exceeding the maximum of 100. There was an out of range error in the program preventing it from painting properly.
13. The automation player was retrieving files every 58 minutes just to refresh its list. However, I have chosen to remove that condition and only refresh the list of files to play when the list currently playing is empty. It takes less than 2 seconds on my P4 3.2 GHz HT desktop computer to retrieve the next list. It can be quicker on faster machines.
14. Added cue points to media files: start, intro, Outro, mix in, and mix out. There is now a new button on the media editor dialog which allows you to set those values. Save the media file if you make any changes to the cue points.
15. Changed the player automation playback to use the cue points defined for media files.
16. Added display of Intro and Outro labels to players on the UI. Now the system will count down to the end of an Intro and the beginning of an Outro and will change the colour of the label.
17. Added a function to cue the player at the Start cue point, when defined, by pressing the ctrl key on your keyboard while clicking with your mouse on the cue button.

April 24, 2008: Version 2.5.5.5 released.

CHANGES:

1. Added support for streaming.
2. Created a new plugin to stream audio from the default sound card to an ICEcast or SHOUTcast server.
3. Updated the NowPlayingWebExportPlugin to publish the 10 last played media files.
4. Updated the installer to include executable files required for streaming and the business objects service executable files. Note that although the application will use remoting when configured to use the business objects service instead of directly connecting to SQL Server, the reporting service and reports rely on directly connecting to SQL Server in this version. I might change this behaviour in future releases. Check my newsletter for more on the business objects service.

March 4, 2008: Version 2.5.5.4 released.

CHANGES:

1. Updated error trapping for SQL Server with clarifying messages. Although this might be considered a security issue, BP2X will now display the database connection string if it can't find a valid connection to the database. A few users were experiencing authentication issues after installation and having the connection string displayed helps with resolving those issues.

   There are four main types of errors which BP2X will look for:

   A. MSSQL TCP/IP disabled

   B. Invalid instance of MSSQL defined

   C. Wrong password defined in the connection string

   D. Database schema not found

   The number of error messages are reduced, when failing to find MSSQL server.
   Upon hitting one of the errors above, BP2X will either direct you to the form entry on my website to read more on this error, or it will dispaly the schema creation dialog box for D above.

2. Changed installer to overwrite files always instead of overwriting only if the file being copied is newer. This means that from now on, the installer will overwrite your config files. Make sure you keep backup copies of your installation before upgrading so you can easily modify the config file to match your configuration after an upgrade.
3. If the RemotePlayerHost application fails to authenticate the RPlayer user, it will exit. Previously it gave you an error message and continued attempting to start the application, displaying more error messages along the way.
4. Fixed database creation script to replace the default password for the user "APR User" with the one the user specified during installation. The value is picked up from the config file.
5. I started work on a new feature, but have not finished it yet.
   Hint: play around with the jingles module, you might be able to see what this function does.
   More info will be published in the next release, when I get to finish coding this new feature.

Feb 28, 2008: Version 2.5.5.3 released.

Changes:

1. Fixed Media Search. There was a bug with the building of the condition statement. Result was always the full set of data in the database. Now it is filtering the result set properly based on the conditions provided.
2. Added Line-in automation functionality in 2.5.5.2 had a bug. A missing translation string was causing clicking on the "Program Elements" tab to throw an error. It is now fixed.
3. Added media drag and drop templating. You can specify defaults for dropped files and if mp3 or ogg have ID tags, they will replace the default values.
4. Fixed bug with reading ID3 version 3 tags which was causing an error with tags that have null values.

Feb 25, 2008: Version 2.5.5.2 released.

Changes:

1. Added automation to the line-in. Now you can add the line-in as a program element which can be automated. I have done a couple of days testing on this feature and it seems to work as expected. This change affects the playback engine and the scheduling screens. Please report issues related to this change, specifically the playback engine, to me, if encountered, and I will attend to it ASAP.
2. A bug was reported by one of our users (ideagirl, thanks), affecting some MP3 files with ID3 version 3 tags with null values. I have made changes to the code that checks for these values to ignore when null.

Nov 20, 2007: Version 2.5.5.1 released.

Changes:

1. Installer now handles installing Microsoft SQL 2005 Express
2. Small bug fix to the WinUI plugin which exports commercials to StationPlaylist

Nov 6, 2007: The beta version of release 2.5.5.0 is now available to download for registered users.

You will find new features in this release:

1. Line In functionality: When you click on the new line in button, on the players tab, all players will lower their volume and the line in audio volume jumps to max. There is a configuration screen which you can use to set effects.
2. Updated audio engine You will find more details on the new features in my next newsletter.

Sep 11, 2007: Fixed a small bug with Program Elements Editor, where the start time and end time were always being set to the start and end time of the program when they should be set to the end time of the previous element and the end time of the program. This bug was corrected in version 2.5.4.3.

The previous version has been removed from this section.

Sep 9, 2007: I've just been notified that the program elements and graphical editor has a bug related to the database fields added in the prior release. This has now been fixed in version 2.5.4.2.

As a registered user, you have early access to this release. I will publish the upcoming release to the public in a week or two and provide further info on the errors in my newsletter.