NewsTicker is flexible enough to be run all manually, all automated, or a combination of the two. Increasingly, it is becoming popular to schedule much of NewsTicker’s actions using your traffic system, with your automation system directly triggering it. This chapter deals with configurations specific to automated control of NewsTicker.
Runlevel Priorities
When NewsTicker is predominantly controlled via automation versus a human, it’s critical to configure it for the various scenarios that may occur. To that end, your runlevels will typically fall into two categories: scheduled runlevels and unscheduled runlevels.
- Scheduled runlevels These are any runlevels you can be scheduled in your log, and more or less occur regularly. They would include morning show crawls, bugs, snipes, and your legal ID.
- Unscheduled runlevels These are any runlevels that can’t be schedule in a log because they are “of the moment”. Examples include severe weather, EAS, breaking news, and school closings.
Runlevel priorities become important when you are airing a scheduled runlevel, and circumstances warrant an unscheduled runlevel to play, such as an EAS trigger. When this occurs, the unscheduled runlevel will compare its priority to that of the runlevel current airing. If its priority is greater than that of what is currently airing, it will stop the existing runlevel and play itself instead. If the priority is equal to or less than the currently airing runlevel, the unscheduled runlevel will not air.
| Tip: You don’t need to manually set a priority for every runlevel. The default value of 0 typically works for most, requiring just modifying those unscheduled runlevels with a higher priority. |
Naturally, if all you ever used were scheduled runlevels, then the notion of setting a priority for each runlevel would be unnecessary because you are specifying which runlevel you want at a specific time.
Individual priorities can be set when editing a runlevel from within the runlevel’s Edit Details screen.
To see all the priorities, or to change several at a time, click Edit Priorities from the main Broadcast screen.
This display shows each runlevel in descending order of priority. The default priority is zero.
Contact Closures
Contact closures provide a very basic level of automation control. Each intelliCommander has four dry inputs and four outputs. You can also purchase an optional 20 output expansion board.
Inputs Inputs can be used to do anything from starting a runlevel, to pausing, resuming or stopping an existing runlevel. They can also be used to tell NewsTicker when you are in or out of a local break.
Outputs Outputs can be closed and opened from within a LOGIC file, or in response to an action like new severe weather or the first school closure. Typical uses include triggering external keyers, DVEs, audio carts and caption bridges.
Input and output assignments are made in the configuration screen for the intelliCommander to which the contact is connected. For more details on the configuration, see Chapter 4: Broadcast Module.
Crispin
NewsTicker advanced automation through Crispin is implemented via VDCP. Through this interface, you may start, pause, resume and stop a runlevel via secondary events.
Configuration
A separate serial connection must be made from the Crispin device server to the NewsTicker server for each character generator you will be independently controlling. As the NewsTicker server accepts RS-232 serial connections, you may need to use an external device to convert RS-422 (from Crispin) to RS-232 (into NewsTicker). We suggest externally powered converters.
In the Crispin Device Server, configure each port using the VDCP driver and the “Profile” flavor.
Operation
VDCP commands in Crispin require a duration, after which Crispin will automatically issue a “stop” command. However, during a newscast, durations aren’t hard timed. To get around this, NewsTicker responds predominantly to the VDCP “play” command and ignores the “stop” command. Instead, all actions are issued via a VDCP “play”, using the House ID (or Material ID) to indicate the action. It is recommended you set the duration of each event to only a few seconds.
Below are all examples of VDCP “play” commands.
| House ID | Description |
| #12 | Plays runlevel with ID of “12” |
| #103 | Plays runlevel with ID of “103” |
| AM Crawl | Plays “AM Crawl” runlevel |
| Late Spo | Plays “Late Sports” runlevel |
| *pause |
Pauses runlevel currently airing on the CG |
| *resume | Unpauses runlevel airing on the CG |
| *stop | Stops runlevel airing on the CG |
Play To play a runlevel, you can either specify the runlevel ID with a preceding pound sign (#), or type the first eight characters of the runlevel name. NewsTicker’s Broadcast module requires all runlevels be unique within the first eight characters to conform with VDCP limitations on playlist naming.
Pause/Resume/Stop All three actions are performed by preceding each command with the star character (*). It isn’t necessary to specify the runlevel name since NewsTicker doesn’t care which runlevel it is pausing or stopping.
Note that in some cases, it may be desirable to use a combination of VDCP commands and contact closures.
Harris
NewsTicker advanced automation through Harris is implemented via the Universal Sercom Driver. Through this interface, you may start, pause, resume and stop a runlevel via secondary events, as well as specify optional arguments directly from the log, such as the current program title of a promotional snipe.
Please contact NewsTicker support for configuration information.