Re: [backstage] Fwd: who to ask: SVG in weather feeds?

[Adam]

Jonathan,

It is really worth the BBC using SVG Graphics when at least 80% of  
internet users are unable to view them.  Currently there doesn't  
appear to be a SVG viewer for IE.


Adam

Quoting "~:'' " <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:


Kathryn,

back from holiday myself, perhaps you are too?
awaiting your response on both these issues:

the discrepancy between symbols and labels on the feed

where are the BBC's SVG weather icons and might the RSS feeds use them?

cheers

Jonathan Chetwynd



On 25 Jul 2007, at 15:33, ~:''  wrote:

Kathryn,

thanks for your prompt and encouraging replies**

the weather gifs are poor imitations of original artwork that is almost
certainly produced and available in SVG format*.  It may be that the
BBC doesn't own the original artwork, if so who does?

For relatively little overhead the BBC's RSS feed could add links to
the original SVG art.

almost everything I publish is public domain, however my SVG feed
viewer is currently offline.
due to the relatively long delays these matters can have, I produced my
own SVG weather symbols set.

the BBC might even beat me and provide the "first" SVG feed.
well I have been asking, and yet to find or be pointed to one ~:"


best wishes

Jonathan Chetwynd

*The benefit being that a similar size file is fully scaleable and far
more attractive. Opera, Mozilla and Safari display SVG natively, that
is without a plugin. http://www.peepo.co.uk is one example of SVG.


On 25 Jul 2007, at 11:38, Kathryn Schmitt wrote:

Hello there,

'Tis I.  We don't have any SVG icons.  Do you mean the gif images of
weather symbols used on the 5 day forecast pages?  Feel free to contact
me off list with your answer...I doubt this conversation is of general
interest to the list.

As for the descrepancy between symbols and labels on the feed, I will
investigate.

Best,
Kass

Kathryn Schmitt
Senior Developer
BBC Weather Centre
2026 Television Centre
T: 020 82259448
M: 0771 7582482

www.bbc.co.uk/weather
www.bbc.co.uk/climate




-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of ~:''

Sent: 25 July 2007 10:03
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: [backstage] who to ask: SVG in weather feeds?

SVG weather feeds: who to ask?

Who at the BBC publishes the weather feeds?

Is there a good reason the SVG icons are not linked within the feed?

regards

Jonathan Chetwynd



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Re: [backstage] Fwd: who to ask: SVG in weather feeds?

[Adam]

That doesn't work as they are sending a PNG file to all browsers which  
is pointless as i might as well just not bother.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e8/Svg_example3.svg/467px-Svg_example3.svg.png

Okay, so SVG is great for resizing image, but for icons i can't see  
any advantage of having them working when 80% of the time you would  
need to send an Jpeg/Gif/PNG image.


I currently have to spend enough time working around bugs in all the  
browsers, i don't really want to add another problem to the mix.


Quoting Brian Butterworth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:


Wikipedia can do it!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Svg_example3.svg


On 02/09/07, Brian Butterworth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:


Is there a backend render that can be used instead when there is no
plugin?  Best of both worlds then...

On 02/09/07, Adam <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> Jonathan,
>
> It is really worth the BBC using SVG Graphics when at least 80% of
> internet users are unable to view them.  Currently there doesn't
> appear to be a SVG viewer for IE.
>
> Adam
>
> Quoting "~:'' " <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>
> > Kathryn,
> >
> > back from holiday myself, perhaps you are too?
> > awaiting your response on both these issues:
> >
> >   the discrepancy between symbols and labels on the feed
> >
> >   where are the BBC's SVG weather icons and might the RSS feeds
> use them?
> >
> > cheers
> >
> > Jonathan Chetwynd
> >
> >
> >
> > On 25 Jul 2007, at 15:33, ~:''  wrote:
> >
> > Kathryn,
> >
> > thanks for your prompt and encouraging replies**
> >
> > the weather gifs are poor imitations of original artwork that is
> almost
> > certainly produced and available in SVG format*.  It may be that the
> > BBC doesn't own the original artwork, if so who does?
> >
> > For relatively little overhead the BBC's RSS feed could add links to
> > the original SVG art.
> >
> > almost everything I publish is public domain, however my SVG feed
> > viewer is currently offline.
> > due to the relatively long delays these matters can have, I produced
> my
> > own SVG weather symbols set.
> >
> > the BBC might even beat me and provide the "first" SVG feed.
> > well I have been asking, and yet to find or be pointed to one ~:"
> >
> >
> > best wishes
> >
> > Jonathan Chetwynd
> >
> > *The benefit being that a similar size file is fully scaleable and far
> > more attractive. Opera, Mozilla and Safari display SVG natively, that
> > is without a plugin. http://www.peepo.co.uk is one example of SVG.
> >
> >
> > On 25 Jul 2007, at 11:38, Kathryn Schmitt wrote:
> >
> > Hello there,
> >
> > 'Tis I.  We don't have any SVG icons.  Do you mean the gif images of
> > weather symbols used on the 5 day forecast pages?  Feel free to
> contact
> > me off list with your answer...I doubt this conversation is of general
>
> > interest to the list.
> >
> > As for the descrepancy between symbols and labels on the feed, I will
> > investigate.
> >
> > Best,
> > Kass
> >
> > Kathryn Schmitt
> > Senior Developer
> > BBC Weather Centre
> > 2026 Television Centre
> > T: 020 82259448
> > M: 0771 7582482
> >
> > www.bbc.co.uk/weather
> > www.bbc.co.uk/climate
> >
> >
> >
> >> -Original Message-
> >> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> >> [mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of ~:''
> >> 
> >> Sent: 25 July 2007 10:03
> >> To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> >> Subject: [backstage] who to ask: SVG in weather feeds?
> >>
> >> SVG weather feeds: who to ask?
> >>
> >> Who at the BBC publishes the weather feeds?
> >>
> >> Is there a good reason the SVG icons are not linked within the feed?
> >>
> >> regards
> >>
> >> Jonathan Chetwynd
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> -
> >> Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group.  To
> >> unsubscribe, please visit
> >> http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html.
> >>  Unofficial list archive:
> >> http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
> >>
> >
> > -
> > Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group.  To unsubscribe,
> > please visit
> > http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list

Re: [backstage] An interview with Mark Taylor, Pres. of UK Open Source Consortium

[Adam]

~:''  wrote:

where are the easy-to-use tools?
Ubuntu and Gnome are hardly mainstream...

the most significant issue is that no open source project outside  
possibly wikipedia is truly popular.

NB wikipedia is not an application or tool.

First, there are thousands of open source projects that are popular.   
Here are a few that i use:


* Apache web server. Runs the majority of web site.
* MySQL - Database
* PHP - Web site scripting language
* Firefox & Thunderbird
* VLC Media Player - Media player
* Filezilla - FTP program
* Many mail servers are opensource, ie Postfix, Sendmail
* ClamAV - Free antivirus scanner
* Spamassassin - Spam filter used by many ISPs
* Gimp - Popular image editor
* Open Office
* Debian & Ubuntu Linux
* SugarCRM - Customer Relationship Management
* Wordpress - Blogging
* MediaWiki - The application behind wikipedia
* Horde - Webmail application

Currently the majority of open source software is mainly used by  
technical users, however with Ubuntu maturing into a great operating  
system this is likely to change with people becoming frustrated with  
the Microsoft experience and looking for an alternative.


My concern is that because the process does not include users, it is  
difficult for their needs to be met.


You can always be involved in the development process of any of these  
programs.  They are always looking for testers and if you get involved  
on the suitable mailing list most developers are open to suggestions  
for improvements.


I would argue that open source software easily meets users needs,  
sometimes better then equivalent commercial software. This is because  
open source software doesn't have to follow the demands of a company  
and are usual started as there is no other software then meets the  
needs of the developers.


Regards

Adam




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Re: [backstage] flash accessibility

[Adam]

Jonathan,

Looks good however it is pretty pointless for the next year or so  
until SVG and  tag support is available in any of the browser  
releases.


I'm extremely impressed with Flash video, It is simple to convert the  
videos using Flash 8 encoder and the files are pretty small.  Can not  
wait until the H.264 codec support is released.


Regards

Adam

Quoting "~:'' ありがとうございました。" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

Simon,

have you seen this rotating, movable video in svg demo?
http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/2007/08/svg-video-demo.html

regards

Jonathan Chetwynd
Accessibility Consultant on Media Literacy and the Internet



On 29 Oct 2007, at 09:23, Simon Cobb wrote:

Hello,

sorry for late reply, I've been on holiday. I agree that the splash
page is annoying - my 3 year old can't get past it as she can't read it
and doesn't know what it's for. But I guess she is young to surf alone.

Anyway, back to the point, deep linking is possible right now with a
bit of js: http://www.asual.com/swfaddress/

and there are plans to build deep linking into flex3 (due out in early
2008):
http://flexwiki.adobe.com/confluence/display/ADOBE/Flex+3+Details++-+Deep+Linking

There are a couple of other things I'm currently investigating to make
more accessible flash:

http://blog.space150.com/2007/1/11/faust-flash-augmenting-standards
http://warpspire.com/journal/web-production/7-flash-myths/

But really, despite the fact that by far the bulk of my programming
experience is in flash, I'm coming around to wondering what really,
really needs to be in flash these days when there are js libraries like
mootools out there. Also, increasingly, I get annoyed with flash taking
the keyboard focus rendering browser keyboard shortcuts unusable and
don't get me started on no text resizing (yes, I know about sIFR).

Currently my list to support the use of flash instead of js consists of:

video
sockets

err, that's it.

Anything else seems to be unnecessary but maybe some of you out there
can correct me?

S.

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of cisnky
Sent: 27 October 2007 16:32
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] flash accessibility

"but flash generally doesn't allow deep linking"

How do you work that out?


On 10/15/07, "~:'' ありがとうございました。" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Simon,

apologies, can be a bit blunt if not downright wrong at times...
peepo.com and peepo.co.uk are projects I ran for many years, designed
for the independent user who can navigate if not the operating system
then have fun browsing the web if not in a sandbox, a select group of
appropriate links.
but flash generally doesn't allow deep linking, so each time the
visitor comes to this site they need help, to get past the first splash.

fwiw, by mistake I opened in Opera, and the cursor isn't visible once
in the site, but not in the active window, probably a bug, but a real
nuisance for carers.

regards

Jonathan Chetwynd
Accessibility Consultant on Media Literacy and the Internet



On 15 Oct 2007, at 09:40, Simon Cobb wrote:

I'm sorry Jonathan, I've read this a few times now and I don't
understand your question: "maybe you are considering the webcam question
doesn't need to be switch accessible?"

This is an interesting subject for me, could you ask the question
another way please?

Thanks

S.

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of "~:''
"
Sent: 15 October 2007 09:21
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] flash accessibility

Simon & Jason,

maybe you are considering the webcam question doesn't need to be switch
accessible?
of course that makes the user dependent on others and is 'frustrating'
to say the least...
Camino 2007101201 2.0a1pre, the smaller window pops open, but seems to
close immediately

regards

Jonathan Chetwynd
Accessibility Consultant on Media Literacy and the Internet



On 15 Oct 2007, at 08:45, Simon Cobb wrote:


Ah... Apple, the champions of open technology and freedom of the user to
choose. Your choice of computer kind of invalidates your righteous anger
at commerical vendors, no?

Of course, I'm just being mischevious :)

Because Flash is my business, I had to go and check your claims on the
Mac on our testbench.

I'll give you that INTG doesn't work in IE on the Mac. But really, who
is using IE/ Mac? Is it realistic for anyone to have to support it in
2007? Certainly, cbeebies client statistics agree, showing almost 100%
using a windows based browser. Further, I've also found through my
research on Flash accessibility that almost all users with accessibility
requirements would also usually use a windows-based machine.

As for the INTG freeze on IE/ Mac, if you want my best guess, I'd say
that IE/ Mac is unable

[backstage] Use of Tinyurl in Emails

[Adam]

Hi,

I've just received an email from the BBC Archive project and noticed  
that all the email links are using Tinyurl.


Now i would argue that the BBC shouldn't be using this type of service  
in emails, mainly as it contradicts the advice i give friends  
regarding following URLs in emails that do not appear associated with  
the sender (for example only follow links to bbc.co.uk in emails from  
the beeb)


Tinyurl is a great service and i can understand why it is used, but i  
feel that using this type of service in a wider audience is a bad idea.


What does everyone else think.

Adam




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Re: [backstage] Use of Tinyurl in Emails

[Adam]

Brian,

I hope your not using the code below anywhere as it looks wide open to  
SQL Injection.


Adam

Quoting Brian Butterworth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

PHP code sample to do the "tinyURL" bit...


http://invalidvaluelocation";;

$result2 = mysql_query("SELECT strURL FROM tblRedirects WHERE txtShortCode=
\"" . @$_GET["code"] . "\";") or die("Query failed");
if (mysql_num_rows($result2)>0)  while ($line = mysql_fetch_array($result2,
MYSQL_ASSOC)) if ($line["strURL"]!="") $strURL=$line["strURL"];

header ("Location: $strURL");

?>



On 07/11/2007, Brian Butterworth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:




On 06/11/2007, James Cox <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>
>  On 6 Nov 2007, at 00:07, Andrew Bowden wrote:
>
>  From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of James Cox
>
> 'course, bbc.co.uk has had some kind of redirect magic for a while:
> http://bbc.co.uk/zanelowe/
>
>
>
> First time I've seen a big fat httpd.conf called magic :)
>
>
>
> and there I was thinking you had some nice routing controller thin-app
> which had some clever logging, tracking and management of such urls :)
>

1544804416 entries would be a bit much for a httpd.conf file, I suspect
what would be required is a ... database.


   though i suspect the problem (and usage of tinyurl) is that to get
> one of those nice urls hooked up, you gotta email someone a request,
> who needs to get approval from a manager
>
>
>
> Well lets just say there is a process and it has to be done sensibly
> else you'd get loads of random redirects.  Although I still think
> bbc.co.uk/breakfast should go to a big portal page for all the BBC's
> breakfast shows :)
>
>
>
>
>
>
>  --
>
> *James Cox,
> *Internet Consultant
> t: 07968 349990  e: [EMAIL PROTECTED] w: http://imaj.es/
>
>
>
>



--
Please email me back if you need any more help.

Brian Butterworth
www.ukfree.tv





--
Please email me back if you need any more help.

Brian Butterworth
www.ukfree.tv







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Re: [backstage] Muddy Boots on Backstage

[Adam]

Matt Lee wrote:

Jason Cartwright wrote:
  

That doesn't really seem to be the way things are going...



It's certainly not the way some would like to take things. It's
certainly one of the things that 'Web Twenty' promotes, but I think it's
 a mistake.

We didn't spend 25 years getting faster computers and larger hard disks
so we could run all our applications over a network and have third
parties store our data.
  
You could argue that computers started this way 25 years ago with a 
central mainframe storing all the data centrally and we moved away from 
this architecture due to limited connection speeds. 

With internet speeds increasing these online systems are very useful for 
the average user who sends emails, writes letters, etc, as they take 
away the burden of looking after software and keeping it up to date.  
This is something that most computer users don't always understand. 

Plus ask a group when the last time they backed up their documents and a 
majority would probably say never or too long ago to be useful.

[backstage] iPlayer search problem

[Adam]

Hi,

If you do a search for Top Gear on iPlayer  
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/search/?q=top+gear&go=Find+Programmes)   
it currently returns three results for clips and the iPlayer advert.   
This seems fine, but if you then watch one of these videos you are  
then presented with links to actual episodes that are currently  
available today on iPlayer.  These are:


* Series 10 Episode 10 http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/b008m4dy.shtml
* Series 10 Episode 8 http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/b008gzy6.shtml

Is there any chance someone could pass this on to the team as its  
slightly annoying that they don't appear in the search results.


Adam


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Re: [backstage] RTMP stream URL resolving script

[Adam]

Andy wrote:

On 23/01/2008, Phil Wilson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
  

Without looking it up, the previous reply (from a Gnash dev IIRC) was that the 
BBC are
using the latest version of Adobe Flash Streaming Server, and this has dropped 
support for
streaming over HTTP.



I remembered it being described as deprecated. My interpretation of
deprecated is that it isn't recommended to use it but it still can be
used. Normally it means it will be removed sometime in the future. For
instance I can use a Deprecated Method in Java and it will still wok
but I will get a warning and it may be removed from Java in the
future. I therefore assumed that RTMP could still be used but wasn't
the recommended approach. I may have been wrong though. (Why would
anyone remove something useful from a software application anyway?
More importantly why would anyone trust a vendor that did that with
their Mission Critical software applications?).
  
You seem to be confusing yourself as RTMP has not been removed and is 
the recommended approach with http apparently being deprecated. 

They probably removed http streaming as it isn't that efficient and it 
makes it easy for people to download the flv videos.  With the streaming 
the videos are harder to copy plus you get the benefits that if you skip 
forward in a video you don't have to wait for the flv to download to 
that point.

When YouTube upgrade, they too will probably lose support for
streaming over HTTP as well.



They currently stream over HTTP don't they? This the BBC could
*currently* do the same.
  
See above.  Like other people have pointed out when You Tube next 
upgrade they will probably stop the current http streams.

Also, I previously asked you if you knew of any alternatives the BBC could have 
used. To
quote you: "Any chance you could actually answer the questions I asked?"



To quote you:
  

This has also been answered before (the last time you asked it, actually). I'm 
not
entirely convinced you've actually been reading replies, or if you have, 
actually paying
them much attention.



Apache has the power to serve files over HTTP. You should check it out
http://www.apache.org/ . Stick a file in a location it can access and
clients can stream from it.
Red5 likely still does HTTP. http://osflash.org/red5

First hit on Google for "Video Streaming Software":
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/streaming.html
(VLC can behave as a server as well as doing playback)
Supports multiple formats and protocols.

  
Apache is okay, but no security and it can only do http, VLC can do 
different streams but it is only designed for streaming one video and 
makes use of multicast and this is not available with many ISPs, so both 
of this suggestions are unusable.


Adam

Re: [backstage] Business Reasons To Support Gnash

[Adam]

[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Playing whack-a-mole with corporate and device use cases that the 
legal or technological implications of Flash being proprietary break 
misses the forest for the trees. These are all just instances of the 
freedom of software users being compromised.


That said, on other lists I've seen people argue that Gnash is 
counter-productive precisely because it supports something that isn't 
an open standard. This would be a reasonable argument if there was an 
open standard to support, but there really isn't (SVG+JavaScript or 
DHTML+AJAX are not substitutes). So I agree that if the BBC could 
provide such a standard that would be really positive.
The BBC have already announced that they are working on a standard with 
a number of other companies.

http://www.p2p-next.org/
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Re: [backstage] DVB-H finally gets formal adoption by the EC (oh and vista SP1!)

[Adam]

Gareth Davis wrote:
Anyhow, personally I'm stuck until I can get a non-DRM HD 
signal into my Linux

Myth PVR.



BBC HD is broadcast in the clear on Astra 2D (28.2E) at 10.847Ghz V
22000SR 5/6FEC, I'm pretty sure it is still broadcast as DVB-S (rather
then DVB-S2 like the Sky HD channels) so a normal DVB-S card and a dish
set up for Sky Digital should do the job.

I'll warn you that a lot of processing power is required to decode the
H264 profile in real time. When the BBC were doing the HD DVB-T trials
across London I had a go at trying to pick it up, and found that my 3Ghz
P4 machine could only managed about 14 fps.
  
I have heard a rumour that Freesat is will be launching around 5th May, 
so it might be worth waiting a few weeks just incase anything changes.

Re: [backstage] Is Freesat going to be HD only?

[Adam]

Brian Butterworth wrote:



On 26/03/2008, *Andrew Bowden* <[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
> wrote:


Freesat will have a mixture of HD and SD channels (exact lineup
still to be announced).  The BBC will be using the same physical
video streams that are used on the Sky platform, so the only HD
channel from the BBC will continue to be BBC HD.

 
I still can't help thinking that this is a terrible idea.  The BBC has 
a massive investment in the BBC+number brands.  BBC One has been 
around for 44 years with that name and nearly 75 years as a channel.  
BBC Two has had been on air for 44 years.   Even BBC Four is now six, 
BBC three is five.
 
Historicially, BBC One has gone from low-res VHF mono transmissions, 
to colour UHF ones, then in stereo and then digitally.  BBC Two 
started out in colour UHF, and has transitioned to digital.  BBC 
three, Four, CBBC and CBeebies have all been digital only.  News 24 
and Parliament started on analogue cable systems.
 
So, now, instead of these channels transforming into digital channels 
- something every consumer can understand - some of the programmes 
will be in HD, but you will need to actually leave the well-understood 
branded BBC channels for a HD service that has no defined programming 
remit, other than to simulcast programmes from the other channels.
 
This is a terrible proposition to put in front of the public.  Why buy 
a HDTV (if you don't have one) if you only get a damp squib of a BBC 
channel.  ITV plans to make ITV1 in HD, Channel 4 is doing (already) 
C4HD, five will do HD. 
 
Even Sky has HD versions of the existing channels.
 
Please Auntie, stop this nonsense!
 
I understand it's hard to put the regional/national inserts into HD 
versions of the channels, but the current HDTV service looks as awful 
as the idea of "UK Today" that used to go out on satellite: something 
to please everyone that pleases nobody.
 
I would have to totally disagree with the above, as i prefer to know 
that every programme on a HD channel is in HD.  No broadcaster is able 
to tguarantee his, so what is the point of having a 50+% of channels on 
this channel in poor quality yet using valuable bandwidth.  Of course 
when everyone has started creating HD content then this will be a 
different matter and i'm sure BBC will switch to broadcasting all 
channels in HD.




*From:* [EMAIL PROTECTED]

[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
] *On Behalf Of *Brian
Butterworth
*Sent:* 26 March 2008 09:30
*To:* backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk 
*Subject:* [backstage] Is Freesat going to be HD only?

 
Is it true that the new BBC/ITV Freesat service (starting 5th
May) will be "HD only"? 
 
Seems a reasonable marketing proposition ("like Freeview but

HD") than the alternative ("like Freeview if you can't get
Freeview"). 
 
So, does this mean there's going to be all the BBC channels in
full-time HD, rather than the 9-hour "simulcast service"? 
 





--
Please email me back if you need any more help.

Brian Butterworth
http://www.ukfree.tv 

[backstage] Over the Air and Nokia Code Camp competition

[Adam]

Just in time for the Over the Air hack day, Nokia have announced a Code 
Camp competition. You can win €15,000 if you write a Nokia S60 app using 
either Flash or WRT.


For more details see 
http://www.forum.nokia.com/main/contests/global_application_contest.html


Adam


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Re: [backstage] Open ID on BBC Blogs

[Adam]

Tim Dobson wrote:
I just looked at this post 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/bbcinternet/2008/04/blogs_getting_better_finally.html#commentsanchor 


and was about to comment when I saw that registration had been enabled.

Any chance we could see OpenID[1] logins sometime soon?

The benefits of OpenID to the end user are pretty simple:
they don't need to have different accounts on every service (in this 
case a blog) in existence.


I'm sure there is some Movable Type code which could be borrowed for 
this.


Anyone else have an opinon on this?

[1] www.openid.net
I always had this idea of OpenID being simple to use, so when Yahoo 
started providing it i signed up to their service, then discovered that 
most current implementations of OpenID do not currently support Openid 
version 2 :-(


Adam
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[backstage] Film Reviews

[Adam]

Hi,

I see the film reviews are nolonger being updated on the BBC site.  Does 
anyone know why and will this mean that the film reviews xml feeds will 
no longer be updated.


Regards

Adam
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Re: [backstage] Film Reviews

[Adam]

Dan Brickley wrote:

Andrew Bowden wrote:
I see the film reviews are nolonger being updated on the BBC site.  
Does anyone know why and will this mean that the film reviews xml 
feeds will no longer be updated.


The Movies site (and it's associated section on BBCi) formally closed on
6 May 2008 - they've left the archive online, however there won't be any
new reviews.  As such, the feeds won't get updated.


The ratings DB at http://www.bbc.co.uk/movies/ (assume this is the 
site you're talking about) still seems open for business. I voted on a 
couple of movies and it increased the counter, eg. 'Average rating: 4 
from 701 votes' in 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2002/03/28/panic_room_2002_review.shtml#


Will the system carry on accepting ratings indefinitely? Is there any 
way to get a movie ratings data dump out of /cgi-perl/polling/poll.pl ?


Yes there is.  The documentation etc is available from 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/movies/syndication/1/docs/, however it probably 
isn't much use anymore.



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Re: [backstage] RealPlayer banished Toady!

[Adam]

[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:


Can Flash be reduced to a controllable toolbar on your start bar, and 
can it be told to stay on top of other windows ... both features that 
I for one use a lot with WMP and (OMG) RP as well.


 

I think this can be done using AIR, but i haven't had a chance to play 
with creating my own AIR application yet.


Adam

Re: [backstage] Nabaztags and BBC Radio...

[Adam]

Andrew Wong wrote:
Just wondering, does anyone here have a Nabaztag, and have they 
managed to get it "broadcasting" streams from BBC Radio, eg Radio 1 or 
6 Music?


Andrew, thinking of shopping for one... (this is NOT a BBC endorsement 
of a French product, needless to say!)
I've got one a Nabaztag, but until BBC provide MP3 streams i've got no 
chance of getting it to work.


Any chance something might be announced before this weekend as i could 
bring it along and get it working.


Adam

Re: [backstage] New Government APIs (plus win 20k to develop your mashup idea)

[Adam]

I doubt you have very little chance with the BBC as i think they 
republished information maintained by a third party who have very strict 
distribution rules. 

Your probably better trying to talk to the FA.  Alternativly there is 
the following message at the bottom of the fixture list, however its 
probably very expensive to purchase the rights.


Copyright © and Database Right 2008[/9] The Football Association Premier 
League Ltd / The Football League Ltd / The Scottish Premier League Ltd / 
The Scottish Football League. All rights reserved. No part of this 
publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or 
transmitted in any way or by any means, (including photocopying, 
recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the 
written permission of the copyright/database right owner. Applications 
for written permission should be addressed c/o Football DataCo Ltd, 30 
Gloucester Place, London W1U 8PL.


Rafiq Swash wrote:
I am building a football discussion website.  I would like to use BBC 
API to retrieve football scores and also league tables.  Is there 
anyone who can give a little tip please.  thank you
 
 
regards,
 
Rafiq


*From:* Adam Hatia <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
*Sent:* Wednesday, July 02, 2008 2:25 PM
*To:* backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk <mailto:backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk>
*Subject:* RE: [backstage] New Government APIs (plus win 20k to 
develop your mashup idea)


On the subject of open maps (or not so in the case of the OS), you 
might be interested in this project: http://openstreetmap.org/


 


(the idea being to create open & free to use street map data)

 

 




*From:* [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] *On Behalf Of *Brian Butterworth

*Sent:* 02 July 2008 12:02
*To:* backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk <mailto:backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk>
*Subject:* Re: [backstage] New Government APIs (plus win 20k to 
develop your mashup idea)


 


This looks quite interesting...

http://openspace.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/openspace/

2008/7/2 Tom Loosemore <[EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>>:

The Cabinet Office's Power of Information Task Force just launched a
competition for mash up ideas using public data. See
www.ShowUsABetterway.com <http://www.ShowUsABetterway.com>

Some new government APIsand data dumps  too:

http://www.showusabetterway.co.uk/call/data.html

Neighbourhood Statistics API from the ONS, Health care information API
from NHS Choices, a list of all UK schools from the DCSF and the zip
of Official Notices from the London Gazette.
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--

Brian Butterworth

http://www.ukfree.tv - independent digital television and switchover 
advice, since 2002

[backstage] TV Feeds

[Adam]

Hi,

Could someone give the TV feeds server a kick as i've just noticed that 
there hasn't been an update of TV Anytime feeds since 18-Jul-2008 
10:08:27 and my site has run out of listings info :-(


Thanks

Adam
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Re: [backstage] Inline hypertext links - you're doing it wrong!

[Adam]

Brian Butterworth wrote:
It's probably worth having a look at this story on the BBC News The 
Editors:


http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2008/08/new_ways_of_linking.html

I can't think of a better example of doing something really simple and 
straightforward completely wrong. 

Instead of a  there loads of silly Javascript popus 
like those rather mad adverts you get on some sites. 

You wouldn't think there's been a standard way of doing this for 
almost 15 years...


I actually like the idea that they are using javascript to insert the 
links into the page, as it means with noscript it is possible to block 
apture.com and then all the links disappear.


Adam
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Re: [backstage] TV Schedule web api

[Adam]

Hi Matt,

I currently use the TV-Anytime feeds and have been tempted to move to 
the programmes feed, however there are a few problems with making the 
change.  These are:


   * only short descriptions available
   * no genre information on channel listings page (ie
 http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcone/programmes/schedules/south_east.xml)
   * no link between data in TV-Anytime feeds and programmes, making
 any historic information difficult to integrate.

Any suggestions of how to get around these problems, so i can finally do 
the switch.


Adam


Matt Hammond wrote:

I'm looking at trying to add TV-Anytime as a format to /programmes.

Out of interest, I'd be interested to know what api calls you, or any 
others, are/were planning on using, and what parts of the data you 
would be extracting.


As is inevitably the case, for some parts of TV-Anytime format, there 
is a clean mapping from data in the /programmes back-end, but for 
others it is less clear!


regards



Matt

On Mon, 27 Oct 2008 15:51:22 -, Chris Newell 
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:



At 15:05 2008-10-27, you wrote:

I was wondering if anyone knew if this web scheduling api was actively
maintained
http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/


Anthony,

The API is maintained but we would encourage you to use 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/developers for new applications.



My question inparticular is:
If anyone minded if it was used directly by a user application, or 
would

prefer if the
results from it were cached in a file ?


Many people use the API directly but you can also download bulk data 
files from: http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/


Cheers,

Chris

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Re: [backstage] How come more and more of my iPlayer content seems to be being served by Yahoo?

[Adam]

Christopher Woods wrote:

D:\Documents and Settings\Christopher>tracert 92.122.210.183

Tracing route to a92-122-210-183.deploy.akamaitechnologies.com
[92.122.210.183] over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1 1 ms 2 ms 3 ms  brum2-router0 [192.168.1.1]
  2 *** Request timed out.
  327 ms32 ms30 ms  213.161.72.69
  456 ms21 ms27 ms  so-0-0-0.mpr1.lhr2.uk.above.net
[64.125.27.225]
  540 ms56 ms57 ms  ge-4-0-0-1303-dcr2.tsd.cw.net
[166.63.218.193]
  665 ms20 ms20 ms  xe-4-2-0.xcr1.lnd.cw.net [195.2.25.58]
  7 *   21 ms22 ms  akamai-gw4.ldt.cw.net [195.2.15.134]
  820 ms21 ms21 ms
a92-122-210-183.deploy.akamaitechnologies.com [92.122.210.183]

Trace complete.

D:\Documents and Settings\Christopher>tracert 213.155.157.140

Tracing route to UNKNOWN-213-155-157-140.yahoo.com [213.155.157.140] over a
maximum of 30 hops:

  1<1 ms<1 ms<1 ms  brum2-router0 [192.168.1.1]
  2 *** Request timed out.
  3 *   75 ms20 ms  213.161.72.69
  460 ms72 ms34 ms  ldn-b3-link.telia.net [213.248.101.105]
  522 ms48 ms21 ms  UNKNOWN-213-155-157-140.yahoo.com
[213.155.157.140]

Trace complete.
  
Both of the ip addresses are owned by Akamai content distribution 
network that BBC & Yahoo use to distribute their content.


*whois 213.155.157.140*

inetnum:213.155.157.0 - 213.155.157.255
netname:AKAMAI
descr:  Akamai International B.V.
org:ORG-AIB7-RIPE
country:GB
admin-c:NARA1-RIPE
tech-c: NARA1-RIPE
status: ASSIGNED PA
mnt-by: TELIANET-LIR
source: RIPE # Filtered

*whois 92.122.210.183*

inetnum:92.122.0.0 - 92.123.255.255
netname:EU-AKAMAI-20071113
descr:  Akamai Technologies
country:EU
org:ORG-AT1-RIPE
admin-c:NARA1-RIPE
admin-c:NF1714-RIPE
tech-c: NARA1-RIPE
tech-c: NF1714-RIPE
status: ALLOCATED PA
mnt-by: RIPE-NCC-HM-MNT
mnt-lower:  AKAM1-RIPE-MNT
mnt-routes: AKAM1-RIPE-MNT
mnt-domains:AKAM1-RIPE-MNT
source:     RIPE # Filtered

Adam

[backstage] Two questions: Comment Blogs and EU proposals

[adam]

Hi All,

I'm new on this list.

Two questions.

1.  Is there any way to access the blog comments that users make in  
response to some articles/opinions that appear in the BBC news or  
other sites?  I am some colleagues are interested to develop some  
applications for such comments.


2.  Does anyone know how I can successfully contact members of the  
Innovation Culture team at BBC Research and Innovation?  I am writing  
an EU Framework Programme 7 proposal which I would like to pitch to  
the Innovation Team, the BBC being a "use case" for which we would  
gather data, requirements, and test a prototype system.  I've tried  
calling and emailing, but had no success so far.  I think the BBC  
would be very keen to participate in this project and find it very  
useful.


If you want to know more about the proposal, you can check out a  
workshop I co-organised.  It is on legal language, but the FP7  
proposal is more general.  See the conference site -> Workshops ->  
Natural Language Engineering of Legal Argumentation:


http://www.ittig.cnr.it/Jurix08/

Cheers,
Adam Wyner

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[backstage] Comment Blogs and FP7 Proposal

[adam]

Hi,

Thanks to Steve, Michael, Paul, Stephen, and Andrew for their replies  
to my previous posting.


I've still not been able to get in contact members of the Innovation  
Culture team at the BBC in order to invite them to consider  
participating in an FP7 Internet and Communication Technology/Future  
and Emerging Technology proposal.  But, perhaps someone there reads  
this list, so I'll knock on this log-drum a bit more.  Besides,  
perhaps there are others who would be interested.


The basic idea:
To develop an online decision-support tool that supports dynamic,  
collaborative, open, devolved, multi-lingual argumentation using a  
controlled language which parses the input, then transforms it into a  
formalised, implemented language of argumentation that enables  
automatic calculation of justified claims.  Output is generated in  
natural language or as an argument graph.


Simply put, users would enter their comments in a structured format  
(natural language rather than semantic web markup), the automated part  
of the system would parse the input, provide a semantic  
representation, link the comment to previous comments in a structured  
way, then calculate results of the current standing of the "debate".   
We have a concept of how to do this in a reasonable fashion; we have  
an excellent team of collaborators.


The BBC's role would be to provide data, user requirements, and a test  
context for this system.  The comment blogs give us data to analyse  
how such debates are currently used; the results of our analysis would  
contribute to the construction of the tool.  The BBC is interesting to  
us because it supports comment debates, has a public mandate, and  
functions across languages.  The tool would productively use and  
contribute to the BBCs comment content.


Turning to some of the specific suggestions.

Paul suggested:
Have Your Say has an RSS feed of comments
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/rss/rssmessages.jspa?forumID=5700
You can get more than the standard 20 or so messages it throws out by
adding &numItems=500 to the URL.

This works nicely and I see how to get more from similar blogs  I also  
now see that other blog sites (Guardian) also allow one to download  
all comments with respect to a particular posting.


The drawback is that I have to go from blog to blog manually.  I would  
prefer some central, indexed repository (if one exists) of blogs plus  
comments.


Stephen commented on this point:
...someone involved in that section of the bbc site might be able to  
point you to a raw feed of all comments within a forum.  I'm sure Ian  
can find out if it is possible to open up some form of official  
comment feeds to backstage.


However, I've not heard more about this (it is only Monday though...)

I don't see how to make use of Stephen's comment:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/blogs/ <-- posting/accessing directly is  
restricted to invite only, i suspect it only works when added to a  
blog by SSI.


Andrew wrote about another source of comments:
a comments feed for a most interesting recent post on BBCi Labs, is
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/blog131/rss/acs?dnauid=movabletype131_40565

What I took away from this is that where there are blogs with  
comments, I should

1.  Look to see if there is a list of all blog comments available
2.  Look at the page source to see what sort of information on rss is  
available, as that might allow me to link to where the comments are  
stored?


One additional point, I didn't know this previously, but there are  
apparently blog specific search tools.  If I knew more about the URL  
structure of the blogs with comments at the BBC, I could use the  
search tools to search within a specified domain.  That could be  
helpful.


In any case, many thanks for these suggestions.

Cheers,
Adam


Dr. Adam Wyner
Department of Computer Science
King's College London

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Re: [backstage] Make the primary operating system used in state schools free and open source

[Adam]

Richard Lockwood wrote:

I allege that the advantages of switching to Free
Software *can* outweigh the costs (sic) of support, teaching, and third
party staff upgrading their skills to more open, flexible and studiable
systems. ;-)



I like the use of the word "allege".  Can you demonstrate it?
  
There is number of problems that prevent the wide use of Linux, Open 
Office and other open source applications.  These are:


   * Microsoft offers the OS and Office at extremely competitive prices
 to schools.  I have heard it quoted as being around £5 per license
 for Office.
   * Parents have an expectation that MS Office will be taught in the
 classroom as it is what they know and use in their work place.
   * The majority of schools have limited IT resources and might have
 limited experience of using and securing Linux and other open
 source software.  They could be substantial costs in retraining staff.

I totally agree that opensource has a great to offer schools with 
applications like Moodle, Audacity and many others, but currently I 
don't think many schools are ready for Linux/Ubuntu and OpenOffice.


Its a shame BBC Jam was killed. That could have really improved the 
educational software market.


Adam

Re: [backstage] Get me off this list!

[Adam]

Its a majordomo list so you may be able to remove yourself with a few emails

Email : majord...@lists.bbc.co.uk <mailto:majord...@lists.bbc.co.uk>

In the message put

unsubscribe backstage

or the following if you want to unsubscribe a different email account

unsubscribe backstage y...@email.com


If that doesn't work try:
unsubscribe *
unsubscribe * y...@email.com

Hopefully that unsubscribe you from all list.

Adam


Zen wrote:

PLEASE - I second this!


On 11 Sep 2009, at 15:03, Simon Cross wrote:


Me too.

Can someone please fix the unsubscribe?

S


On 10/09/2009 15:05, "Alun Rowe" > wrote:


Visiting this: 
http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html


Then putting in my details and pressing GO sends me to

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/cgiemail/creativearchive/backstage/discuss.txt

Which says:

Error
No email was sent due to an error.

   500 Could not open template - No such file or directory

  /home/system/www/creativearchive/backstage/discuss.txt
cgiemail 1.6


Help!




--
Simon Cross
Product Manager, BBC iD
Online Media Group, Future Media and Technology,
BC4 C4, Broadcast Centre, White City
simon.cr...@bbc.co.uk 
07967 444 304
twitter: sicross

[backstage] BBC iPlayer and the Nokia N900

[Adam]

Hi,

Nokia have released the Nokia N900 phone based on their Maemo operating 
system.


As it doesn't support S60 WRT that the current Nokia phones iPlayer app 
is written in is there anyway i can access the iPlayer videos directly.


I can access the current videos and play them, but they are unwatchable 
as the phone can't handle them.  This might be due to the standard 
streams using the VP6 codec, although i haven't been able to confirm this.


The specs are:
* Firefox Mobile browser
* Flash 9.4
* Maemo OS based on Debian with ARM processor
* User Agent "Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux armv7l; en-GB; rv:1.9.2a1pre) 
Gecko/20090928 Firefox/3.5 Maemo Browser 1.4.1.21 RX-51 N900"


Is there a work around to get iPlayer working on this phone and videos 
watchable?


Thanks

Adam

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Re: [backstage] Google Maps

[Adam Bowie]

This is worth looking at: http://www.google.com/apis/maps/


Adam


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Re: [backstage] Test

[Adam Hopkinson]

Yep, same here - details below:


From: Sean Dillon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Date: 12-Aug-2005 17:21
Subject: Re: [backstage] Google News launch RSS and Atom service
On 16/08/05, Angelo Evangelou <
[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:same here
On 8/16/05, Martin Belam <[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
I know there have been some issues with the Majordomo servers, and thatsome work is planned on them, but I'm not aware that they have packed incompletelyMartin Belam, Senior Development Producer, BBC New Media & Technology
-Original Message-From: [EMAIL PROTECTED][mailto:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
] On Behalf Of Phil MossopSent: Tuesday, August 16, 2005 3:43 PMTo: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] TestLast message I got was on the 12th. Same for everyone else?
Phil Mossop[EMAIL PROTECTED]- Original Message -From: Graeme MulvaneyTo: 
backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Sent: Tuesday, August 16, 2005 2:45 PMSubject: Re: [backstage] Testit's been a bit quiet of late...On 8/16/05, Ben Metcalfe <
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:Yes, I hate it too when dumb people like myself send "TEST" messages.Doh, this obviously it working...Sorry.Ben :: 
backstage.bbc.co.uk
--You can't build a reputation based on what you are going to do.-Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk
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[backstage] TV Listing Prototype

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

I haven't got around to annoucing my prototype after submitting it last 
sunday, so here it is.


The web site is http://bbc.ask-adders.com/.  It provides a simple way of 
viewing the programs on at the moment and you can drill down to find the 
genres and then programs that are in the same genre.  You can also 
register and create your own listings, but this needs further development.


If you phone 0870 0689 358 or 01483 60462 the TV Listings for the main 
channels read out to you.  This is using Asterisk and a VoIP connection 
to both voipuser.org and sipgate.co.uk who are providing the PSTN to IP 
gateway.


Finally you can text 07914 229975 with a message and you will be sent 
the current programs on that channel. The messages you need to send are


   * TV BBC1
   * TV BBC2
   * TV BBC3
   * TV BBC4
   * TV CBBC
   * TV CBEEBIES
   * TV NEWS

I am interested to hear any feedback. 
Have fun.


Adam
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Re: [backstage] combining prototypes?

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

I will very happily help in the development of this system.  My current VoIP
phone system could easily be slightly modified to work in nearly any 
setup. The
only requirement is a connection to an upto date database that contains 
all the

listings and a PC powerful enough to re generate all the sound files when
required.

Its all developed on mainly opensource software, ie Asterisk, Perl and a few
modules.  The only other problem is a licence or suitable replacement voice
would be required.

SMS is another problem as there don't appear to be any free/cheap SMS 
gateways. I just decided to use a Pay as you go phone with SMS bundles 
and just pay for

all the texts.

Regards

Adam

Quoting Mario Menti <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

Looking at the prototypes published on this list and on the backstage
site, it occured to me that by combining some of them, we may end up
with the ultimate multi-channel multi-purpose "web/SMS/IM/VoIP/chatbot
tv schedule search/suggestion/comparison/reminder" app (ok, the name
will need some work...)

Is anyone interested in sitting down together and discussing the
potential of integrating some of the various ideas and concepts shown
in these prototypes?

Cheers,
Mario.

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Re: [backstage] Thinking about consolidating 'things'

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

Have a look at MythTV (http://www.mythtv.org), it does exactly this and 
records

it to a MPEG file.  It is extremely good and I've used it for a while.

Its got several great plugins to add additional features, and if you've 
abit of

spare cash it can handle multiple tv cards.

Adam

Quoting Chris Walker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
Consolidating the various initiatives into something more useful as a 
rounded product would be the way I'd go.


We do a lot of work with streaming media here, delivering everything 
from initial rushes to broadcast quality final spots to desktops. 
Users can search, browse, view, and compile playlists, share the same 
with others, and so on. Its not rocket science, but it can be time 
consuming to build.


With respect to the BBC feeds, it suddenly occurred to me that 
tonight I'm a) wanting to watch Spooks, and b) not able to because 
I'll be at work. I don't use VHS as I'm not cool enough to be retro, 
and I don't have access to my PVR from here.


If I could browse BBC schedules in a format as easy to use as the Sky 
EPG through a web browser, and then remotely queue recording 
instructions for my Media Center PC, PVR, or jury-rigged Hauppage 
style recorder, that would be very very good.


If I could do the same via mobile or PDA (no biggy) then even better. 
My Blackberry can get stuffed of course, because its inherently 
rubbish.


From my point of view, the initiatives I've seen on the list so far 
are simply different ways of displaying data - which is all well and 
good, but since they are effectively pointers to a broadcast 
programme (in the main) it would be logical to include that end 
product in the grand scheme of things.


Once recorded, I should be able to (once again, remotely) compile a 
playlist in my preferred order, so that I can get in from work and 
choose to watch Spooks, and any other number of programmes that may 
have been broadcast tonight/anytime.


Of course, if you wanted to go balls-to-the-wall about it, you could 
then share your playlists or playlist items with others, and they 
could then stream or download to their own suitable equipped device 
direct from you.


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Re: [backstage] Developer jobs

[Adam Leach]

Jonathan,

The original question has been answered by Andrew Bowden.   You might 
want to check the archive.

http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/msg00806.html

Adam

Jonathan Chetwynd wrote:


Stephen,

sense of humour failure isn't usually this prevalent even in the BBC.
how about an answer to the original mail:
"Could anyone enlighten me as to how much grades 7D and 8D actually  
pay?"


regards

Jonathan Chetwynd
Accessibility Consultant on Learning Disabilities and the Internet

29 Crimsworth Road
SW8 4RJ

020 7978 1764


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[backstage] Competition

[Adam Leach]

Hi All,

Is there any news on the results of the competition?

It has been a few weeks and unless I have missed something, it hasn't been
mentioned for a while.

Unfortunately the VoIP and SMS parts of my project are currently unavailable as
I'm on holiday and didn't want to leave it running unattended and my computer
has a habit of over heating :-(

On a different subject would anyone have any use for a TV Listings SOAP Service?
 I'm currently working on one to help integrate the different parts of my
project, but could make it available to other people.

Have fun, I'm off for some Moroccan mint tea :-)

Adam

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Re: [backstage] iMP

[Adam Bowie]

The BBC World Service is on both XM and Sirius, and BBC Radio 1 is
timeshifted on Sirius (so that the breakfast show is on at breakfast
time etc). I don't believe that Radio 4 is on any of the services.


On 11/8/05, Millie Niss <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I don't know exactly what iMP is, so I hope I am not totally off-base
> here...
>
> However, I am a (US) American who would defnitely be willing to pay (if the
> price were reasonable) for BBC content.  My main interest is the radio
> programming, which someone here said isn't a problem to distribute, but I am
> also somewhat interested in BBC TV.
>
> Right now, I cannot even get The World Service Radio in English _on the
> radio_ during most of the day.  The World Service is broadcast for only a
> few hours a day on my local "public" radio station (this actually means
> "private, non commercial" -- US "Public Radio" is nonprofit but privately
> owned & operated, supported by individual and corporate donations and a very
> small amount of indirect government subsidies).  In the past, Americans
> could get World Service radio directly from the BBC on other bands (MW or
> LW), but now that isn't beamend towards the U.S.  The web site provides
> streaming and some on-demand access to programs, but not full archives or
> downloadable versions of most programs.  (I have enjoyed the podcasting
> trial of From Our Own Correspondent, for example, but that is an
> experiment.)
>
> I quite understand that the BBC is funded by UK Licensing fees and that they
> cannot afford to offer me all the services for free that license-payers get
> for their money.  But I would be happy to pay for my content if I could
> afford it.  After all, I donate money to my public radio stations and pay
> for cable TV and Internet access, so I am accustomed to paying for media
> content.  I cannot get the BBC content at any price right now, at least not
> easily.  (One issue is that I do not have broadband, so that maybe iMP would
> not help me.  Broadband is much more prevalent in Europe and Asia than in
> the U.S., and so what I really want is to get my BBC content on the radio
> and TV!)
>
> Is the BBC Radio (and if so, which stations?) available on satellite radio?
> That is quite expensive & impractical (especially for non automobile use)
> still but I'd consider subscribing to satellite radio if I could get the
> World Service and Radio 4.
>
> Millie
>
> - Original Message -
> From: "James" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: 
> Sent: Monday, November 07, 2005 10:40 AM
> Subject: Re: [backstage] iMP
>
>
> > Releasing iMP to the world would almost end piracy of the BBC's content.
> > Releasing it to the UK would still keep all the BBC's content available
> > over the net through the standard ways.  What better way to maintain
> > control and quality than to irradicate the need for piracy of BBC
> content..?
> >
> > I actually wouldn't object to paying for this as a seperate service and
> > I wouldnt be suprised if this is not the way forward for non-uk
> > citizens.  Seems fair enough, we pay our £££ per year and if Joel from
> > America wants it, he can but it'll cost him a percentage of the standard
> > lic. fee.
> >
> >
> > Andrew Bowden wrote:
> >
> > I'm at work so I can't check at the moment, but ISTR that my telly
> > licence has a unique reference number with it.
> > 
> > 
> > >>>This is going back a few years (say about 3-4).  I used to buy my
> > >>>license from the old Post Office, and those didn't have a unique
> > >>>number on them.  The ones you get sent by TV Licensing do.
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>Hmm, I didn't know that.  I wonder how you get them to move
> > >>the licence to
> > >>a new property when you move house if you don't have a
> > >>licence number?
> > >>The online form[1] has the licence number as a required field.
> > >>
> > >>
> > >
> > >I remember filling in that form back in October 2001 and thinking
> > >exactly the same!  IIRC, I just put down that I had no license number.
> > >But there wasn't a knock on my door, and when it came up for renewal,
> > >the letter came from the right address.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >-
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> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
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Re: [backstage] iMP issue

[Adam Leach]

This is a bigger problem as iMP is using standard Microsoft WMA DRM 
files.  As this is widely used, there are more people interested in 
bypassing the DRM system, and so eventually it will always be bypassed, 
plus its created by Microsoft.


Other codecs are less widely used and known about, so in theory should 
be more secure.  With the BBC providing the shows for free, there is 
less of a reason to crack the codecs, although someone is always going 
to try it.


Adam

vijay chopra wrote:

Shame; even thought I hate DRM, I know that PHBs love it, and if they 
cant work it, it means the Beeb might scram iMP :(


On 13/11/05, *Dave Whitehead* < [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote:


Seems BBC may have a problem with the iMP trial, apparently it's
possible to get round the DRM thus taking away the watch within
7days restriction
 
source - http://groups.google.co.uk/group/uk.tech.digital-tv

<http://groups.google.co.uk/group/uk.tech.digital-tv>




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[backstage] BBC TV Listings Feed

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

The TV Listing feed isn't available yet for today (24-01-2006).

Just wondered if your having any problems today generating the feed.

Thanks

Adam


This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.

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RE: [backstage] BBC TV Listings Feed

[Adam Leach]

Thanks for the quick response, the updated listing are loaded on my site
:-)Adam http://bbc.ask-adders.comQuoting
Ben Metcalfe [EMAIL PROTECTED]:>>>> Hi,>>>> The TV Listing feed
isn't available yet for today (24-01-2006).>>>> Just
wondered if your having any problems today generating the feed.>>>> Thanks>>>> Adam>> Hi Adam, thanks for your mail.>> Yeah, not sure what
happened but I noticed that there is now an archive> for today:>> http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/20060124.tar.gz>> It came in just a few minutes ago.>>> Will investigate.>>>> Cheers> Ben :: backstage.bbc.co.uk>> -> Sent via the
backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group.  To unsubscribe, > please visit
> http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. 
> Unofficial list archive: > http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/>


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Re: [backstage] Today's TV-Anytime tar is broken

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

Is there any news of this as there doesn't appear to be a file for today :-(

Appart from this problem, the data is really great and I'm currently 
hacking Perl TV::Anytime to make use of the additional data that is 
hidden in these files.  I'm make a patch available once it is fully 
working.


Adam

Quoting Mario Menti <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

Hi there,

looks like today's TV-Anytime tar file (20060306.tar.gz at
http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/[1]) is broken - could

someone fix and

replace it?

Thanks,
Mario.




Links:
--
[1] 
/horde/services/go.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fbackstage.bbc.co.uk%2Ffeeds%2Ftvradio%2F


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RE: [backstage] Today's TV-Anytime tar is broken

[Adam Leach]

Thanks for getting it fixed.

Everything is working fine today.

Is there any news on new feeds or developments.

Adam

Quoting Murray Walker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:



looks like today's TV-Anytime tar file (20060306.tar.gz at
http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/[1]) is broken -
could someone fix and replace it?


consider a ticket opened, and people on the case.

eta for fix : probably tomorrow.  apologies.

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Links:
--
[1] 
/horde/services/go.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fbackstage.bbc.co.uk%2Ffeeds%2Ftvradio%2F
[2] 
/horde/services/go.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fbackstage.bbc.co.uk%2Farchives%2F2005%2F01%2Fmailing_list.html
[3] 
/horde/services/go.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mail-archive.com%2Fbackstage%40lists.bbc.co.uk%2F



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RE: [backstage] Today's TV-Anytime tar is broken

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

This feed has stopped working again.

Could you have a look at it please.

Thanks

Adam

Quoting Murray Walker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:



looks like today's TV-Anytime tar file (20060306.tar.gz at
http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/[1]) is broken -
could someone fix and replace it?


consider a ticket opened, and people on the case.

eta for fix : probably tomorrow.  apologies.

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Re: [backstage] BBC Jobs in Radio and Music Interactive

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

7D is the job level and determines the pay range.  These is a useful
email in the archives with full details.

http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/msg00806.html

Regards

Adam

Arpit Jain wrote:
Hi,
  
Could anyone explain what do Grade (like Grade 7D) stand for in the job
descriptions?
  
Thanks,
AJ
  
  On 5/7/06, Ian
Moss <
[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
  All
London jobs ?

Is their likely to be anything cropping in the Manchester area in the

foreseable ?

Cheers,

Ian

> Um - most of these jobs aren't viewable...  :-(
>
> Cheers,
>
> Rich.
>
> On 5/5/06, Helen Pickford <
[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>
>> Hi there
>>
>> We in Radio and Music Interactive are recruiting for front and
back end
>> developers in addition to other posts. If you are interested
please

>> apply on
>> the BBC jobs website.  There will also be more jobs coming up
in the
>> next
>> few weeks so if you are interested keep your eyes on the
website.
>>
>> Client Side Developer:(Front end)

>> https://jobs.bbc.co.uk/jobportal/search/vacancy.aspx?id=8222
>>
>> Senior Client Side Developer: (Front end plus management

>> responsabilities)
>> https://jobs.bbc.co.uk/jobportal/search/vacancy.aspx?id=8223
>>
>> Software Engineer: (Backend)

>> https://jobs.bbc.co.uk/jobportal/search/vacancy.aspx?id=8395
>>
>> Senior Software Engineer (backend plus management)

>> https://jobs.bbc.co.uk/jobportal/search/vacancy.aspx?id=8224
>>
>> Technical Project Team Leader: (To manage a team of Technical
Project

>> Managers)
>> https://jobs.bbc.co.uk/jobportal/search/vacancy.aspx?id=8225
>>
>> Take a look at some of our work on http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio or
>> http://www.bbc.co.uk/music
if you are interested.
>>
>> Cheers
>>
>> Helen

>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
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[backstage] TV Data Feed

[Adam Leach]

Sorry to raise another problem, but the TV Anytime data feed hasn't 
been created since the 27th May.


Thanks

Adam


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Re: [backstage] Publishing TV listings? BDS are after you...

[Adam Leach]

This is another point of data collected and gathered using tax/license
fee payers money, yet we can't access it without paying substantial
fees.

Until this changes small/spare time developers will not have the
resources to create innovative web sites and ideas that BBC Backstage
are trying to support.

Adam
ps - Sounds like someone isn't making enough money so are looking for
another revenue stream

Dave Whitehead wrote:

  
  
  
  James-
  Looks like you got the same email
that Andrew Flegg of http://www.bleb.org/ got,
he manage to get agreement from BDS that using the bbc tvanytime data
doesn't require a fee being paid but he's had to remove the ITV data. 
You would of thought that tv companies would love for everyone to know
when their programmes are on with schedules being the ideal media but
sadly not.
   
  I think those who allow it for no
fee are in a better position, especially as we're moving toward mass
PVR usage.
   
  Dave
  http://www25.brinkster.com/lakeuk/xmltv/xmltv.htm
   
  
-
Original Message - 
From:
James
Cridland 
To:
backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk 
Sent:
Thursday, June 22, 2006 10:32 PM
Subject:
[backstage] Publishing TV listings? BDS are after you...


To warn the list: I've just had a veiled legal threat from BDS (a part
of Red Bee Media, formerly part of the BBC).

The email virtually accuses me of publishing TV schedules against the
terms of the Broadcasting Act 1990, and asking me to formerly register
my use of TV schedules for BBC (and ITV) so that a licence can be given
(which costs many hundreds of pounds a year). 

There isn't, to my knowledge, any special conditions for personal or
non-commercial use of this information; and given that they are quoting
the Broadcasting Act 1990 at you, I don't quite see how any terms from
BBC Backstage are able to over-ride the "law". 

I'd quote the email here, but it's apparently 'confidential', and I
respect the list-owner. I have reprinted it in full elsewhere, though:
they didn't read *my* terms and conditions...

As an aside: I don't publish TV schedules.

Comments welcome, I suppose...

-- 
http://james.cridland.net/contacting_me/
  

Re: [backstage] Publishing TV listings? BDS are after you...

[Adam Leach]

Quoting Tim Cowlishaw <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

On 6/23/06, Adam Leach <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:


This is another point of data collected and gathered using

tax/license fee

payers money, yet we can't access it without paying substantial

fees.



I should point out here that BDS are not funded by the license fee,
they are a private company, so this may not be true.



Yeah, i understand that point, but the BBC ultimately creates the TV 
schedules and then has agreements with other companies to sell this 
information.


Without Backstage we would have no free access to TV Listings, so 
thanks Backstage.


Adam
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Re: [backstage] Funny Story

[Adam Leach]

Gordon Joly wrote:
[snip]
I have a phone (that runs Windows Mobile) but does not have Flash 8: 
discuss.


You can just download it from 
http://www.adobe.com/products/flashplayer_pocketpc/ :-P


Adam
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Re: [backstage] armageddon or just dark days for Aunty's weather forecasts?

[Adam Leach]

On Realplayer running on Windows XP the forecast starts after 2 minutes 
of blank screen.


Then it starts talking about snow over the weekend.  Something strange 
is going on here


Adam

Jonathan Chetwynd wrote:

armageddon or just dark days for weather forecasts?

is Aunty keeping things close to her chest?
all I get is a silent black screen for over 4 minutes as the weather 
forecast, using OS X or win'98, real player or BBC media player ...


cheers

Jonathan Chetwynd

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/bb/bb_weather_uk.ram

or http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/broadband/pg_footer.shtml#



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Re: [backstage] Movies Data

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

This looks really useful.  One thing i've noticed is the film details 
don't have a link to the BBC Page, so there is no way of linking back to 
you easily. 

Are we allowed to link directly to the Movies Cinema search page from 
any pages created using these feeds?


Adam

Matt Chadburn wrote:

Hi,

Due in part to the new BBC Movies Interactive TV service that launched today
we've had the opportunity to tidy up and document the output of a few
systems that create the bbc.co.uk/movies site ...

 - http://www.bbc.co.uk/movies/syndication/1/docs/

The service includes a few handy RSS feeds ...
 
 * Weekly Cinema Reviews - Films out in UK cinemas this week.

* Coming Soon - Films out in UK cinemas in the next few weeks.
* Further Ahead - Approximate release dates for Films out in the next year

Along with various parts of the site in various flavours of XML ...
 
* Film Reviews - Official BBC Movies review. Contains cast, crew etc.

* User Rating - Star based user ratings.
* User Comments - User submitted mini-reviews and opinions.
* What's On - Films showing on the BBC this week

Would love to hear from anyone with interesting ideas on what they might do
with the information or any pointers on improvements we might make.

And for Red Button (DSat, Freeview, DCable) fans ...

"With BBC Movies, you can watch video interviews, reviews, special features
and trailers. Plus, you can access cinema listings for your area, win
prizes, add your own reviews, and generally keep up to date on all things
movies." - http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/bbci/

Thanks,
Matt - Interactive Drama & Entertainment



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Re: [backstage] BBCHD Free to Air and SKY (non SKY+)

[Adam Leach]

Your be lucky to get something that cheap.

Just checked maplins and found a High Definition FTA Satellite Receiver 
for £200 and it states it can handle BBC HD.  
(http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=99265&&source=14&doy=12m2)


The alternative is to use your PC and get a Satelite TV Card (or 
Freeview card if you are in range of the Crystal Palace Transmitter) and 
use the PC to decode the HDTV.


Adam

Dave Ruislip wrote:

I cannot seem to get any clarity of my desire to get BBC HD via a traditional 
(non SKY+) Dish WITHOUT having to go SKYHD Box. There has been mention of Pace 
Box but someone mentioned there would need to be LNB changes?. Can anyone 
advise the simple approach. Also something in the region of max 100 pounds 
seems worth investment. Any advise. THANKS

-
 Now you can scan emails quickly with a reading pane. Get the new Yahoo! Mail.
  


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Re: [backstage] Flash required?

[Adam Leach]

Jonathan Chetwynd wrote:

Flash required?

anyone care to suggest why this is in flash?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/live_stats/html/map.stm

seems unhelpful at best.

Well Jonathan you can always click on the accessible link on the page 
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/live_stats/html/lowbycountry.stm


I actually like the animation and the graphics as i feel it adds value 
to the information.


Adam
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Re: [backstage] Flash required?

[Adam Leach]

Andy wrote:

On 05/03/07, blogHUD <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

they soon found out that a MASSIVE majority of users to BBC News
Online had the version of Flash I needed


I was always told we needed the BBC to cater for the people who aren't
in the majority.
If you are only going to cater for the majority then why do we even
bother with a BBC in the first place?
I always thought BBC is mainstream and other government media companies 
like Channel 4 are for the minorities.


I think it's amusing when I see people bemoan the use of Flash for 
things

that sure, can be done in AJAX etc.

I would recommend never using Flash.
By using Flash the BBC is forcing users to enter into a legal contract
with a third party, just to use the BBC's site.
You can always click the links for the flash free version.  No one is 
forcing you to look at the flash content. I reckon if you took a random 
sample of people from the street the vast majority would prefer the 
flash version.

Oh and on the subject of VM, how does the flash VM protect me if I am
worried about the player itself being hostile?
I can not accurately determine what actions it is going to take. I am
sorry but I am not skilled enough in reverse engineering to look at
binary level data and determine what the code does.
Blimey if your that paranoid you should start using lynx immediately.  
How do you know that all the images on the BBC web site haven't been 
infected with a virus like the WMF exploit 
(http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS06-001.mspx), plus 
all that nasty javascript that is all over the web these days.


Anyway i thought this was the BBC Backstage mailing list and not the BBC 
Bashing mailing list :-P


Adam

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Re: [backstage] Mobile tech fun, anyone?

[Adam Leach]

Kim Plowright wrote:


So… an aquaintance is organising a pervasive gaming event on the south 
bank, and wants to run a mobile phone based game during the event.


Is anyone here a genius with any of the following, or know any harware 
types that might be willing to provide sponsorship in kind?


This is *completely without my BBC hat on* by the way.

  /- automated messaging service (that you can configure to only
  receive SMS messages so people with old phones can play)/
  /- a way of recording phone calls to hard disk (so that we can
  pick out the best encounters & cut together the finished poem in
  the translation we create)/

  /- A connection between the two things so that you get another
  SMS once you've called the hotline/
  /- an easy way of of editing the sound files together/
  / /
  /Ideally this whole process would be automated so that we don't
  need volunteers to man phone lines all night... /
  / /
  /We have no money to speak of so freeware / begborrowsteal
  solutions greatly appreciated... As you can probably tell from
  this email I am a dunce when it comes to tech stuff so please
  speak very slowly... /

Kim


Hi Kim,

The best option is Asterisk (http://asterisk.org/) as it can do the 
following:


   * It can record phone calls. Depending on the complexity the
 standard voicemail system might be perfect as this is designed to
 record messages and then email them to the specified email address.
   * Allows creation of automated menu systems
   * Detects caller-id and this can be recorded in database.
   * Allows the user of variety of VoIP Services, so you can have a
 local number for free (ie - sipgate.co.uk) or use a community
 service like http://voipuser.co.uk.
   * Its open source and works without problems on most unix/linux/bsd
 based operating systems, so would work fine with gammu or gnokii

Of course it all depends on scale of the gaming event, as if there are 
going to be large numbers of simultaneous phone calls you will need alot 
of hardware and bandwidth.


If you send details of exactly what you need i might be able to help, 
but i have never used Asterisk for anything larger then a 1 or 2 users 
at the same time


Adam

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Re: [backstage] BBC announces 3G mobile syndication trial with Orange, Vodafone and 3

[Adam Leach]

Brian Butterworth wrote:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2007/03_march/29/3g.s
html

Can we have the BBC one, BBC THREE and (in particular) BBC News 24 streams
online please?  


If you can stream them on a mobile, it would be useful if they could be
provided online in the same format (I mean, that's what you are doing
anyway...)
  
I doubt it is that easy.  Anyway you can always get a Slingbox and then 
watch any freeview channels.


Adam
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[backstage] Google Developer Day

[Adam Leach]

Not sure if anyone has mentioned, but Google is planning a Developer day 
on 31st May.


Spaces are limited, but you can sign up at 
http://www.google.com/events/developerday/en_GB/details.html


Adam
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Re: [backstage] Google Developer Day

[Adam Leach]

There are a few extra places released if your quick.
http://services.google.com/events/developerday_rsvp-en_GB

Adam

Mr I Forrester wrote:

Damm I missed it!

Wow they really cranked this up a notch this year!!!

Ian

Adam Leach wrote:
Not sure if anyone has mentioned, but Google is planning a Developer 
day on 31st May.


Spaces are limited, but you can sign up at 
http://www.google.com/events/developerday/en_GB/details.html


Adam
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[backstage] TV-Anytime Feeds

[Adam Leach]

Hiya,

Over the weekend something seems to have gone wrong with the TV Anytime 
feeds as all the data files are extremely small and contain no program info.


Could someone have a look and give the server a kick

Thanks

Adam

For example "more 20070521BBCOne_*"
::
20070521BBCOne_cr.xml
::

xmlns:xsi='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance' version='1'/>

::
20070521BBCOne_pi.xml
::

xmlns:xsi='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance' xml:lang='en'>
 
 
   
 

::
20070521BBCOne_pl.xml
::

xmlns:xsi='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance' xml:lang='en'>
 
 
   
 


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[backstage] TuneMyFeeds

[Adam Burt]

Hi All,

Just to share a little app with you all that I've been working on for
Mac OS X called TuneMyFeeds:
http://homepage.mac.com/a.burt/tunemyfeeds/

The aim with TuneMyFeeds is to covert RSS text to audio files and pop
it into iTunes. Being dyslexic I wanted to have a fast way to keep up
with my RSS feeds on the move. It's free so if you fancy give it a
spin :)

Have a good weekend.

Cheers
Adam
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Re: [backstage] Getting Recipe Data

[Adam Leach]

Tom Loosemore wrote:

Been there once before a couple of years ago...

iirc , every TV chef owns his/her rights to the recipes that appear in
aggregate in the recipe db on bbc.co.uk/food

So it's fearsomely complex (therefore expensive) to even begin
clearing, presuming BBC could ever get the necessary rights from
individual chefs, which is doubtful TBH.

sorry...
How about a searchable rss feed or similar that returns links to the 
specific recipes.


This would be useful in other areas like Top Gear review of cars where 
it might be useful to link directly to the information.


Adam
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[backstage] TV Anytime Data

[Adam Leach]

Hiya,

The TV Anytime data file is a zero byte file today.  Could you please 
investigate.

http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/
http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/20070613.tar.gz

Thanks

Adam
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Re: [backstage] TV Anytime Data

[Adam Leach]

Excellent, thanks

Chris Newell wrote:

At 07:47 13/06/2007, Adam Leach wrote:
The TV Anytime data file is a zero byte file today.  Could you please 
investigate.

http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/
http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/20070613.tar.gz


Adam,

Problem noted and fixed.

Cheers,

Chris

___
*Chris Newell
*Lead Technologist

*BBC Research
*Kingswood Warren
*Tel:*  +44 (0)1737 839659


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Re: [backstage] DRM does not work... what next?

[Adam Sampson]

"Richard Lockwood" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> I still don't see how having DRM'd content free (of charge) over the
> internet from the BBC is worse than having no content from the BBC
> over the internet.

Because it's not free of charge -- it's our license fee that's going
to pay for the useless DRM technology, even if we don't use it. I
don't like paying more money to make something less useful.

-- 
Adam Sampson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <http://offog.org/>
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[backstage] TV Anytime Data

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

The TV Anytime data for today only appears to have tv information for 
BBC World Service, BBC Radio 1 & BBC Radio2.


The file is only 163k, whilst the file is normally 825k.  Could you 
investigate.


http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/
http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/feeds/tvradio/20070620.tar.gz

Thanks

Adam
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Re: [backstage] Project Kangaroo - what's the point?

[Adam Bowie]

I don't think there's a set-top box involved.

Surely it's just early discussions to try to achieve a single
downloading architecture across all the UK broadcasters?

At the moment I have to download one app. for the BBC, another for
4od, another for Sky Anytime and goodness knows what for Five, ITV or
any other broadcaster. And they're not all necessarily compatible.

A single solution would be sensible in the long run.


On 6/21/07, Brian Butterworth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

I read about "Project Kangaroo" in the press the other day.  It seems to be
a "set top box" iPlayer.

http://www.pocket-lint.co.uk/news/news.phtml/8242/9266/BBC-ITV-C4-Project-Kangeroo.phtml

Wouldn't the BBC be better off just getting broadband Freeview Playback
boxes to exchange content with each other, rather than this "top down"
solution?

Oh, and it would cost almost nothing to run...

--

Brian Butterworth
www.ukfree.tv

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Re: [backstage] Project Kangaroo - what's the point?

[Adam Bowie]

On 6/21/07, David Woodhouse <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

On Thu, 2007-06-21 at 15:47 +0100, Adam Bowie wrote:



>
> A single solution would be sensible in the long run.

No. A selection of _open_, interoperable solutions would be sensible.



As a user, I don't want to have install a new piece of software every
time I download a different piece of programming from a different
broadcaster.

Aside from anything else, multiple clients all using peer to peer
technology will kill my broadband connectivity.

Of course an open solution would be best. But then there's DRM which
currently each broadcaster has their own solution to (even if they're
really all the same just now), but I'm not going to get into that...
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Re: [backstage] No TV-Anytime Data today

[Adam Leach]

Nah, its not that bad.  The service has worked perfectly for ages, but 
the server must be having issues at the moment.


Phil Winstanley wrote:

Perhaps we should rename it TV-Sometimes ?

:)

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Adam Leach
Sent: 22 June 2007 10:22
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: [backstage] No TV-Anytime Data today

Hi,

There is no TV Anytime data today :-(

Could someone give the server a kick.

Thanks

Adam
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--
received to: andyb.com
Message ID : o7c6774f383dc45ad91d15557999db181.pro
Sender ID  : [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Msg Size   : 1k







This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and
intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are
addressed.

If you have received this email in error please notify the originator of
the message. This footer also confirms that this email message has been
scanned for the presence of computer viruses, though it is not
guaranteed virus free.

Original Recipient: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Original Sender   : [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Original Send Date: 22/06/2007  - 10:36:53



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[backstage] No TV-Anytime Data today

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

There is no TV Anytime data today :-(

Could someone give the server a kick.

Thanks

Adam
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[backstage] backstage feed on .Mac Reader

[Adam Burt]

Over the weekend I thought I'd take a look at the backstage feed on
.Mac Reader, the site that renders RSS feeds on the iPhone for you. As
the iPhone not out over here I've desied to use FireFox instead. The
fist two articales have not renerd to well on the listing of articales
as you'll see from the screen shot...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/aburt/687881335/

The full url for the feed...
http://reader.mac.com/mobile/v1/http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/news/index.xml

Cheers
Ads
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Re: [backstage] backstage feed on .Mac Reader

[Adam Burt]

I came across this fun little app today iPhoney :)
http://www.marketcircle.com/iphoney/


On 7/2/07, Christopher Woods <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Yep, someone had put it on their twitter page - interesting that the one you
posted in differs slightly, here's the one I found:

iPhone User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en)
AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A538a Safari/419.

Wonder why the vendor (419 vs. 419.3) differs slightly? Anyway, I loaded up
that RSS feed in Firefox using a user-agent spoofer and it loaded - but it
looks horrible! Obviously Apple aren't sticking to web standards :D


  _

From: Mario Menti [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: 02 July 2007 10:18
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] backstage feed on .Mac Reader


On 7/2/07, Christopher Woods <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:


Time to find (and spoof) the iPhone's user-agent!



Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like
Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A538a
Safari/419.3





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Re: [backstage] backstage feed on .Mac Reader

[Adam Burt]

As for the hardware inside check out - http://stream.ifixit.com/

On 7/3/07, Ian Betteridge <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:


On 03/07/07, Brian Butterworth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> So this is a new OS and different from the main OS, like Windows Mobile
> is 100% code different from Vista?


From what I can gather, it's the same core OS, but with parts which aren't
needed removed and a completely different UI. Not sure what processor it's
running on either.

Re: [backstage] backstage feed on .Mac Reader

[Adam Burt]

If you've guys have not seen this, Apple now have there development
guidelines up for the iPhone:
http://developer.apple.com/iphone/



On 7/3/07, Matt Hammond <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

On Tue, 03 Jul 2007 15:17:20 +0100, Brian Butterworth
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>> > From what I can gather, it's the same core OS, but with parts which
>> > aren't needed removed and a completely different UI. Not sure what
>> processor
>> > it's running on either.
>> >
>>
> At least it's an ARM, which makes this device a "son of" both the Apple
> Newton and (eventually) the BBC Micro...

Its one of ARM's latest: an ARM1176JZF (Java acceleration, TrustZone,
Vector floating point support) part, fabbed by Samsung.

 http://www.engadget.com/2007/07/01/iphone-processor-found-620mhz-arm/
 http://www.arm.com/products/CPUs/ARM1176.html

This core can be clocked at up to 600-700MHz though there's no guarantee
Apple have chosen to run it anywhere near that fast.



Matt

--
| Matt Hammond
| Research Engineer, FM&T, BBC, Kingswood Warren, Tadworth, Surrey, UK
| http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/
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[backstage] O2 - iPhone deal - UK

[Adam Burt]

It looks like O2 have the iPhone in deal in the bag for the UK...
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/telecoms/article2028678.ece

Cheers
Adam
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Re: [backstage] BBC TV and Radio 7-day listing

[Adam Leach]

Thanks Andrew,

I've been meaning to change my web site to use the api, but that gives 
me a chance to enjoy the weekend of sport.


Adam

Andrew McParland wrote:

Sorry, we've been having a few problems.  For the moment you can find a more
up to date set of TV-Anytime schedule data files at:

http://72.249.74.119/tv-anytime/

Due to this being a temporary measure the address may change, and the files
may not be updated as regularly as we would like, but this should keep you
going for a bit.  We are working towards a better solution and, for the
moment at least, we do intend to keep the files of data coming.  We'll keep
you informed as any changes happen.

Andrew 
BBC Research and Innovation


On Thu, Jul 05, 2007 at 06:03:37PM +0800, Flynn, Terry wrote:
  

Mario, Thanks, I know about the API but prefer the files if their going
to be maintained... its been a couple of weeks now, so suppose I better
accept the change :(   I'm an old, old UNIX programmer and my tools of
choice are C and shell script - have a high level of inertia with these
new java and perl thingies... Worked out how to make the API calls with
wget, so just a matter of loading my little database - simple
update...Thanks again for the suggestion...
 
Terry


 




From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mario Menti
Sent: Thursday, 5 July, 2007 14:19
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] BBC TV and Radio 7-day listing


	On 7/5/07, Flynn, Terry <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 


Sorry if I missed any announcement - will Backstage be
continuing the TV and Radio schedules in TVAnyTime XML format? Last
update was June 21... As screen scraping the web site is illegal, this
is the only option available to many of us to get BBC schedules for
whatever purpose... 


Terry

I don't know about the plans for the TV-Anytime files, but the
best way to get BBC schedule information is probably through the BBC Web
API:  http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html

The API can give you query results in both TV-Anytime or a
slightly simpler XML format. 


HTH,
Mario.
	 



	 





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Re: [backstage] feeds with icons or pictures?

[Adam Leach]

Jonathan,

You asked a similar question a year ago when the rights of images was 
disscussed.  Perhaps you might want to check the archives.


Adam

~:'' ありがとうございました。 wrote:

Davy,

the quality of images used as links is unlikely to present a "rights" 
issue.

in fact fair use probably covers this in any case.

it's more likely a case that it hasn't been considered, combined with 
most newsreaders not being configured for images...


cheers

Jonathan Chetwynd



On 22 Jul 2007, at 13:01, Davy Mitchell wrote:

I think this is a rights issue so the news RSS is text only. I would
like to see the User contributed photos on RSS. Thought about screen
scraping but backstage does but encourage that.

Davy

On 7/22/07, "~:'' ありがとうございました。" 
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Gary,

thanks for that...I'm looking for more than just an identity logo,
icons or images that change.
after all that's what RSS is about...
hence my mention of the weather.

cheers

~:"

Jonathan Chetwynd



On 21 Jul 2007, at 17:06, Gary Kirk wrote:

BBC News has an icon built in to feeds, see my example at
http://xinki.org.uk/site

On 21/07/07, "~:'' ありがとうございました。"
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> feeds with icons or pictures?
>
> anyone care to share their favourites?
>
> are there any bbc feeds with icons or images, beyond the weather?
>
> cheers
>
> Jonathan Chetwynd
>
>
>
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> please
> visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html.
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[backstage] Can we have a developer mailing list?

[Adam Leach]

Is there any chance of a separate developer list for discussion of APIs, 
services, Geek events, etc.


The BBC with the encouragement from Ian & Matthew are providing some 
great sources of information for doing mashups and organising some great 
events like Hackday, but this mailing list is just becoming a BBC 
Bashing list.


Adam


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Re: [backstage] iPlayer Today?

[Adam Leach]

Dylan Dawes wrote:

I'd be interested to hear how others fare with iPlayer on their laptops.
I installed 4OD on mine recently and the  CPU-hogging blighter brought
the whole thing to a virtual standstill even when it wasn't in "active"
use (I had to take it off in the end). So I'm not falling over myself to
install the iPlayer, as I'd like to still be able to use my laptop for
things other than catching up with great TV, like writing the occasional
email ... :)

Dylan.

I'm new here ... Sorry
  
With performance and Kontiki, i would recommend disabling the 
kService.exe Service under administration tools in the control panel on 
XP when you are not using 4oD or iPlayer, then you can be sure that you 
are not seeding any programs whilst not downloading anything.


Adam
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Re: [backstage] iPlayer Today?

[Adam Leach]

Andy wrote:

On 29/07/07, mike chamberlain <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
  

Options 3, Buy an off the shelf solution and use it. Bonus points if
the people whose content your licensing are happy with it and will
endemnify you against someone cracking it.


Yes use an Off the shelf solution, provided it satisfies the criteria
"Platform Neutral". The BBC's claim "We had no choice but to use MS
DRM" is clearly false as there where 2 perfectly good options.
  
What are these two perfectly good options that could provide the same 
fuctionality as Microsoft DRM & Kontiki.


Adam

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Re: [backstage] O2 wins Apple iPhone deal - at a hefty price

[Adam Lindsay]

Ian Forrester wrote:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/sep/17/mobilephones.apple


(I'm quite curious about the "as much as 40% of any revenues" quote in 
the article: everywhere else has reported a consensus of 10%.)



In the light of the amount of "unlocking" or hacking going on. Don't you think 
the rest were actually quite lucky to have not got into this deal with Apple?


Well, I would also consider how mainstream mobile phone unlocking is
today, and how much of a deterrent it is to the mobile operators in 
seeking phone exclusives.


I would then also consider Apple's end-to-end system for delivering 
software updates, easily capable of invalidating any unlocks, as well as 
Apple's stated commitment to delivering new features for the iPhones 
over at least two years (thus making consumers want to update their 
phones). I don't know of another mobile phone maker as interested in 
managing already-sold devices.


Speaking more anecdotally, I know that O2 is likely to get my wife's 
custom with the iPhone, and I'm likely to follow, eventually.


adam
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Re: [backstage] Mobile Developer Un/Conference/Camp

[Adam Lindsay]

Jason Cartwright wrote:
The mobile industry frequently simplifies these bandwidth caps to 
layman-friendly numbers (such as an approximate number of pages), 
because the average consumer doesn't understand what " xGb" means. This 
"1,400 pages" number was said in a press conference with mainstream 
media - pretty understandable to simplify the jargon down.


I'm sure the actual cap numbers will come out sometime soon.


My guess is that "1400 internet pages per day" translates to 100MB, or 
~70KB/page. Whenever says "14" of something, I immediately think of that 
as an approximation to 100/7. (That's an odd product of growing up in a 
place with 7% sales tax.)


And since people seem to be interested in this topic, I'll throw out 
this provocative titbit: thanks to O2 being pretty open about their 
"Simplicity" tariff, it's pretty easy to piece together a guess that 
Apple is being paid £14 per month per iPhone customer on O2.


Apologies to Ian for doubting the up-to 40% revenue share in the article 
he pointed to. That ends up being completely plausible.


More details here:
http://lindsay.at/blog/archive/2007/09/19/the-hidden-cost-of-the-uk-iphone-269-252.html


adam


On 9/18/07, *Frank Wales * <[EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote:

Jakob Fix wrote:
 > Matthew: "18 months contract. There is a limit: 1,400 internet pages
 > per day would break the deal as part of fair usage agreement."
Wait, what?

Which internet page do they have in mind, I wonder?  I bet it's more
like
google.com <http://google.com> than amazon.com
<http://amazon.com>.  I also wonder about the exchange rate between
internet pages, AJAX requests, MP3 files and e-mail messages; a limit
based on requests rather than total bytes transferred would be
highly comical.

And is the limit a cap, or merely the threshold to the land of
severely enlarged bills?
--
Frank Wales [ [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>]
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--
Jason Cartwright
Web Specialist, EMEA Marketing
[EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
+44(0)2070313161



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[backstage] iPhone SDK news

[Adam Lindsay]

http://www.apple.com/hotnews/

Native third party applications on the iPhone (and iPod touch) will be 
enabled via an SDK as of February 2008.

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Re: [backstage] iPlayer usage

[Adam Lindsay]

nick richards wrote:

Hi guys,

I saw a del.icio.us post from Tom Coates earlier asking how many
people actualy *use* the iPlayer:



I went back and noticed that the original poster's question wasn't 
answered: are there any plans to reveal statistics on iPlayer usage?


adam
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Re: [backstage] iPhone Apple opens up iPhone to app developers

[Adam Lindsay]

Steve Jolly wrote:

Brian Butterworth wrote:
Why does it take four months to publish a SDK?   Surely Apple must be 
using the SDK already to create their own applications? 


Steve Jobs gives a reasonable explanation in his announcement - that 
they want to implement a robust security model for third-party apps, 
something they don't need for internal development.


http://www.apple.com/startpage/


And as I can attest to, having recently hacked my iPod touch, the 
security model that's in place right now is not sufficient.


And anyway, classes and methods do not a full API make. Nor is an API 
alone the full SDK toolchain that is needed (and, now, promised).


adam
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Re: [backstage] Use of Tinyurl in Emails

[Adam Lindsay]

Martin Deutsch wrote:

But if you're talking well-designed URLs for journey planning, see:
http://www.traintimes.org.uk/cardiff/birmingham/8:00



Thank you for that site pointer. An excellent example, and a great one 
to bookmark!


adam
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Re: [backstage] Use of Tinyurl in Emails

[Adam Lindsay]

Steve Jolly wrote:

Jonathan Tweed wrote:
Don't forget to also drop at least u, otherwise you might end up with 
offensive short codes.


You may have noticed that the programme ids don't have any vowels in 
them. This is deliberate ;-)


Sounds like an interesting little algorithmic challenge - what shortcode 
generation algorithm eliminates accidental real words while compromising 
optimally between simplicity and efficiency?


It's been discussed in the Mac blogosphere recently:
http://www.rogueamoeba.com/utm/posts/Random/RASN2-Swears-2007-10-16-15-00.html

Essentially, generate as normal, and reject on matches from a dictionary.

adam
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[backstage] Advertising on the BBC Website

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

I'm currently looking at the latest scores page on the BBC web site 
(http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/live_scores/default.stm) 
and there are two adverts on the page.  One advert is between the grey 
and red bar at the top of the page and the other is down the right hand 
side.


Now i'm using a UK ISP Bulldog to access the site, so i'm a bit confused 
why i am seeing these adverts as the FAQ states that the accuracy is 99.6%.


I've just checked my IP address 84.9.146.*** with several free ip to 
location databases and they all report this ip address is located in the UK.


It looks like for some reason i was redirected to 
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/ and that appears to be displaying adverts to 
everyone when they are available. If you access that you will see while 
the page loads there is a big white box at the top where adverts appear.


Adam



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[backstage] iPlayer and TV Anytime Feeds

[Adam Leach]

Hi,

With the annoucement that iPlayer is apparently going live on Christmas 
day, are there any plans to provide links to the programs on iPlayer in 
the TV-Anytime data feeds.


Adam


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Re: [backstage] iPlayer search problem

[Adam Leach]

Michael Smethurst wrote:

in the meantime you could try /programmes

top gear is at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006mj59

  
Excellent, i didn't know that had the streaming programs, plus you get 
the longer description with the programmes page.


Is there any chance you could give some indication if the program has 
got signing as there doesn't appear to be any clear indications in 
either iPlayer or the programmes pages.


Adam

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Re: [backstage] iPlayer search problem

[Adam Leach]

Michael Smethurst wrote:

hi adam

pips (the database behind both iplayer and /programmes) allows an episode to 
have multiple 'versions'. each of these versions can have associated on demand 
availability. and each version has a 'derivation reason' which may be: 
lengthened, shortened, signed, with burnt in sub-titles etc

at the moment iplayer is only exposing a single version of each episode (which 
may or may not have signing). In time (I believe) multiple versions will be 
made available. when that happens we'll be able to provide a choice of version 
where available and (for /programmes at least) navigation faceted by the 
availability of sign language

erm, does that answer your question?
  

Thanks Michael,

Yeah, sort of answers my question, although i didn't really explain the 
question too well.


My point was that this top gear episode 
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b008gzy6) is signed, yet there is no 
way on knowing that until you start watching it.  If i had downloaded 
this via the p2p client i would have been a bit disappointed, but then 
again its available so its better then nothing.


The navigation on the Programmes beta site is great, especially the 
ability to quickly navigate between previous and later episode in the 
series.  Makes it very easy to find episodes that you might have missed.


Apart from me being fussy about a few things, iPlayer is great and i'm 
yet to find a friend who isn't impressed with it


Adam

-Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Adam Leach
Sent: Fri 12/28/2007 7:02 PM
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] iPlayer search problem
 
Michael Smethurst wrote:
  

in the meantime you could try /programmes

top gear is at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006mj59

  

Excellent, i didn't know that had the streaming programs, plus you get 
the longer description with the programmes page.


Is there any chance you could give some indication if the program has 
got signing as there doesn't appear to be any clear indications in 
either iPlayer or the programmes pages.


Adam

  

Re: [backstage] BBC iplayer on exotic devices

[Adam Leach]

Andy wrote:

Sorry to reply to my own post.

Everyone appears to be using a url of the form:
rtmp://217.243.192.52:1935/ondemand?_fcs_vhost=cp41752.edgefcs.net&auth=SECRET_KEY&aifp=v001&slist=STREAM_NAME

But I can't find it *anywhere* in the iPlayer HTML or Javascript.
Can't find it in the XML either.
Is it hidden in the actual flash object itself?
I am a little wary of hardcoding in an IP. What if the BBC decide they
need to switch some machines round and the IP changes?


Also would it be possible to turn On indexing in /iplayer/
particularly /iplayer/metafiles so we can see what data is actually in
there

Firebug is great for tasks like this.

The following seems to return an ip, so perhaps it is the method Akamai 
use for determining the nearest server for streaming the videos.


http://cp41752.edgefcs.net/fcs/ident

Adam
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Re: [backstage] Business Reasons To Support Gnash

[Adam Leach]

I hope the BBC does not spend licence fee money on the development of
Gnash.  This money should be spent to benefit the majority of the
license payers, not just a very small group.  

I'm sure once Gnash has got the capability to run the flash used on the
BBC website they will happily support it.

Adam

On Tue, 2008-03-04 at 22:19 +0100, Dave Crossland wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> It seems Gnash is attracting a lot of funding and direct support these days...
> 
> When will the BBC support access to the Flash-based parts of its
> websites with free software by helping the Gnash project?
> 
> -- Forwarded message --
> From: James Northcott / Chief Systems <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Date: 4 Mar 2008 21:45
> Subject: [Gnash-dev] Gnash, Flash, Adobe, and cash
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> 
>  Hello,
> 
>  My business partners and I are currently working on a Linux-based
> application that requires Flash playback.
> 
>  Adobe has specifically excluded our application from bundling a Flash
> player under the terms of their free distribution license, and our
> efforts to negotiate some sort of paid licensing agreement have
> stalled.  At this point, we are looking for alternatives, and it would
> seem that helping Gnash would be a viable option for us.
> 
>  This leads me to ask the following questions:
> 
>  1.   What is stopping the Gnash team from fully implementing the
> Flash 9 file format?  Where could we help the most?
> 
>  I understand there are some legal issues with those who have agreed
> to the Adobe EULA making contributions to Gnash.  I'm also sure that
> there are manpower issues, as well as funding issues.  I would
> appreciate someone taking the time to explain where the largest issues
> lie.  We have some programming resources available, although we have
> no experience with the Gnash codebase at all, as well as a potentially
> large number of sample Flash movies that play correctly in the Adobe
> player but not in Gnash.
> 
>  2.   What kind of monetary investment would be necessary to
> significantly speed up Gnash development?
> 
>  I realize that this may be a difficult question to answer, but we are
> quite serious.  We were prepared to pay Adobe to license their player,
> but this seems to have hit a dead end - could our contribution to
> Gnash help speed up development, and if so, how large a contribution
> would be required to overcome the blockers for Flash 9 support?
> 
>  We understand the open source model, and we are not interested in
> owning the copyright or changing the license of the Gnash code.  We
> are simply willing to pay to get Flash 9 playback in our product, if
> this ends up being within our budget.
> 
>  I appreciate any feedback you have for me.
> 
>  James
> 
> 
> ___
>  Gnash-dev mailing list
>  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>  http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/gnash-dev
> 
> 
> 

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[backstage] BBC Support page

[Adam Leach]

Just trying to find a support page as i've got a number of errors when
accessing the weather page and i've come across this

http://www.bbc.co.uk/support/

Shame it isn't a live stream, we could see what the Internet operations
are upto.

Adam

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[backstage] BBC Three Live Arena

[Adam Leach]

Okay, who has changed the channel on the BBC Three Live Arena
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/livearena/) as it was
broadcasting ITV 1 Dukes of Hazard

I did wonder what was going on when i saw adverts being played, but then
the ITV logos started appearing on the screen.

I've got a few screenshots that show it happening.

http://adders.eu/bbc_three1.png
http://adders.eu/bbc_three2.png

Someone might what to fix it, i have completed the contact us form.

Adam

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Re: [backstage] BBC Three Live Arena

[Adam Leach]

Blimey i wasn't expecting it to be stopped that quickly this time of
night. I was thinking i could watch the Australian F1 GP on it :-p .

Even streaming ITV1, the speed of the streaming is extremely impressive
with only a few seconds delay when compared to Freeview, i'll have to
check it out next week for BBC Three.
 
On Sun, 2008-03-16 at 02:39 +, Richard Compston wrote:
> Finally got in touch with Siemens...
> They've stopped the encoder & are  looking into why the source got
> switched.
> Thanks for heads-up, Adam :)
> Rich.
> 
> On Sun, Mar 16, 2008 at 1:18 AM, Michael <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> On Sunday 16 March 2008 00:36:45 Adam Leach wrote:
> > Okay, who has changed the channel on the BBC Three Live
> Arena
> > (http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/livearena/) as it was
> > broadcasting ITV 1 Dukes of Hazard
> >
> > I did wonder what was going on when i saw adverts being
> played, but then
> > the ITV logos started appearing on the screen.
> 
> 
> Oh dear.
> 
> It still seems to be showing ITV1 at the moment... (or "3" as
> we called it
> when I was a wee kiddie)
> 
> 
> Michael.
> (no idea who to tell...)
> 
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> 

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Re: [backstage] Xinhua Doctored BBC Screenshot?

[Adam Leach]

A quick check of the Google cache would have told you it has changed and
the screen shot is valid.  Google claim they crawled the site at 17 Mar
2008 13:09:39 GMT.

http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache%3Ahttp%
3A//news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7300312.stm

Adam


On Mon, 2008-03-24 at 23:39 +, Tim Dobson wrote:
> As someone who has a pronounced dislike of propaganda and 
> misinformation, I have been following the recent events surrounding 
> Tibet, quite carefully.
> 
> By reading the news stories from both the Chinese and the Western point 
> of view, one can see the large difference in opinions.
> 
> I was interested today, to read on Xinhua, the Chinese State news 
> agency, that the BBC had been accused of displaying an image of a 
> ambulance with a caption stating that "There is a heavy military 
> presence in Lhasa".[1]
> 
> Interested that it was citing a BBC article, I did a quick search to 
> find the original article and accompanying photo [2]. The caption of the 
> photo on the BBC page instead says "There have been many reports of 
> injuries and deaths in Lhasa".
> 
> Intrigued by the differences that the articles show, I looked at the 
> last updated text in both the Xinhua screenshot and the BBC article.
> They show exactly the same time and date.
> 
>  From this I would infer that the Xinhua screenshot has been doctored, 
> however, in order to give them the benefit of the doubt:
> 
> Does anyone BBC-side (or otherwise) have any idea about whether one can 
> change one of these image captions in the live content without updating 
> the "last updated" tag.
> 
> If you think there are other explanations or can expand on anything I 
> have said, feel free to.
> 
> I would not be *surprised* to see doctored screenshot, however I would 
> be interested about it's context and effect.
> I would also be interested if the BBC had silently changed the caption 
> to this image in question.
> 
> [1] http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-03/23/content_7841316.htm
> [2] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7300312.stm
> 
> 
> Tim
> 
> 

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Re: [backstage] Embracing the torrent of online video

[Adam Leach]

On Wed, 2008-03-26 at 23:46 +, James Cridland wrote:
> * Yes, yes, RealPlayer. I'm working on it, though, for radio. Expect
> to see changes in May.

Does this mean we might finally get something similar to the streams
that are provided by Virgin Radio, ie MP3 streaming?

Of course Ogg streams would be nice, but Ogg doesn't work on a standard
Windows pcs either and you have previously stated usage on Virgin Radios
site is extremely low so its probably not worth the effort.




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iPlayer Caching was Re: [backstage] iPlayer in Wii

[Adam Leach]

On Sun, 2008-04-13 at 07:43 +0300, Brian Butterworth wrote:
> 
> 
> On 12/04/2008, Michael <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 
> On Saturday 12 April 2008 05:57:49 Brian Butterworth wrote:
> > If it were all doing using HTTP it would be easily cached,
> of course, as
> > you can do this with a proxy server, either a configured-in
> one as used on
> > corporate and educational networks, or as a transparent
> proxy.
> 
> Ignores the fact that most caches will not cache objects over
> a certain size.
> (The maximum usually based on average object size, which is
> dominated by
> small images and HTML). Also it depends on the purpose the
> cache is there
> for - speed or bandwidth savings, and even then you still need
> a maximum, it's
> just where you set it which will vary.
>  
> Every proxy server I have set-up allows you to configure this!  There
> is no reason whatsoever that large files cannot be cached, and even
> part-retrieved.
>  
> If this is really a problem, then you could set up a server for each
> ISP with the files copied on their network with the Iplayer software
> being redirected to the fastest file when available.
>  
> So, if you watch a programme on a BT (Phorm! boo, hiss) ISP line, you
> get the stream from iplayer.btinternet.com, on talktalk from
> iplayer.talktalk.com etc.
>  
> If we are talking of saving the ISPs the billions of pounds they claim
> it cannot be beyond the wit of us programmes can it?
>  

NTL used to run invisible proxies throughout their network, however it
caused many problems.  Since they changed to Virgin Media they have now
removed all these proxies from their network.

It adds an additional link in the chain that can fail.  In the past i
have had problems accessing content when the proxy i was assigned to had
problems and was failing to return pages.  

Other problems are the majority of proxies available will not cache
proper streamed content, so this talk of using proxies would be
pointless.

The alternative is taking the Akamai idea a step further and adding
distribution servers in the exchanges, but it has already been pointed
out that this is not possible with the current IP Stream product.

None of these solutions are scalable or useful for any other content
provider.  What happens when ITV catchup, 4od or any other service
becomes popular to the same level as iPlayer.

The best solution is the industry hassles Ofcom and then get transit
fees reduced by BT to reasonable levels. 

Adam


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RE: [backstage] Zattoo - live streaming BBC channels

[Adam Hatia]

FWIW, I think not everyone is the same in this regard. Personally, I also 
prefer to watch a clear picture with picture & sound breaking up occasionally 
than every programme behind a snow scene, no matter how "perfect" the audio 
might be. I'd rather just listen to the radio if the latter was the case!
 


-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Christopher Woods
Sent: 20 May 2008 02:20
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: RE: [backstage] Zattoo - live streaming BBC channels

> You'd think...  But then my first flat in London barely 
> managed to get analogue...  I actually got a digital box in 
> the first place because it offered a better picture!  A clear 
> picture that broke up once every 90 seconds was preferable to 
> watching fuzz and snow.

Interesting you should say that, I was thinking about this whilst watching
the footie on the TV the other day - our analogue reception is awful (and we
don't have a roof aerial where we are at the moment, so it's bunny ears all
round) and whilst the picture is awful, bar a few moments of static the
audio is quite fine. The contiguousness of the audio also helps with
tolerance - I can quite happily tolerate a poor quality video feed if the
audio's fine. Same goes for cinema - people seem to put up with awful
quality video so long as the sound's good (odd really, a strange
psychological thing which must have some link with the way our brains
interpret natural sound, and the way it introduces its aural coping
mechanisms when our eyes are starved of sufficient input).


Personally I'd rather have naff analogue with continuous audio where I can
gist the few words I miss, rather than have a lossy (moreso than analogue,
arguably) digital signal with squelchy audio and dropouts every so often. I
put up with it on my PC's freeview receiver, but I still find myself
wandering into the kitchen to tune in on the analogue set.

I think I'm a bit strange.

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RE: [backstage] Spam was Thinking Digital conference

[Adam Leach]

On Fri, 2008-05-23 at 13:52 +, TRYPHENA BRADE wrote:
> Thank you for a DECENT reply.
>  
> We AIM to:
>  
>   * host videos on BBC
>   * the Thinking Digital site
>  
> Thanking you in advance

Sorry,

but i don't seem to understand how  Gospel music and Basic IT training
videos are relevant to the Thinking Digital website.

I suggest you research relevant sites and contact them appropriately
instead of spamming mailing lists with the same message multiple times.

Adam

>  
> > Date: Fri, 23 May 2008 14:20:08 +0100
> > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> > Subject: Re: [backstage] Thinking Digital conference
> > 
> > Tryphena,
> > 
> > if you could perhaps reword your initial post, so as we could
> > understand what you are actually trying to acheive, we might be able
> > to help.
> > 
> > Are you talking about hosting your videos on BBC or the Thinking
> Digital site?
> > 
> > Clarity and brevity will get you everywhere.
> > -
> > Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe,
> please visit
> http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html.
> Unofficial list archive:
> http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
> 
> 
> 
> __
> Get Started! 

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RE: [backstage] BBC Look East HTML rich newsletter

[Adam Hatia]

Brian,

> For example, you can't use the "class" operator to format items.  I
have used this rather basic function to translate my "class" items to
the 
> more basic "style" items:

Actually, CSS stylesheets are fully supported by Outlook, Outlook
Express, and Thunderbird at least, and I am using CSS to generate
size-efficient HTML emails that use the stylesheets from the website
(though obviously, the path to the css file needs to be a full absolute
URL) - do you still have an email client that doesn't support CSS, if
so, what is it?

Adam 

 



From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Butterworth
Sent: 05 June 2008 07:55
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] BBC Look East HTML rich newsletter

 

Matt,

I sorted an automatic email notification system just recently on
ukfree.tv and I think I might be able to give you a few pointers.  The
site uses PHP, so my examples will be in that.  If you can't follow it,
then let me know.

(You can subscribe/unsubscribe by visiting http://www.ukfree.tv/ and
using the box in the 'my settings' item at the top left.

To send an HTML email, as you have already found out I guess, you need
to ensure you have the right headers:

function sendHTMLemail($strEmail, $strHTML, $strSubject)
{


// To send HTML mail, the Content-type header must be set
$strHeaders  = 'MIME-Version: 1.0' . "\r\n";
$strHeaders .= 'Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1' . "\r\n";

// Additional headers
$strHeaders .= "To: $strEmail <$strEmail>\r\n";
$strHeaders .= "From: --- updates <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>\r\n";

// Mail it
mail($strEmail, $strSubject, $strHTML, $strHeaders);

}


As you have found out, the level of CSS support in HTML email message is
limited.  For example, you can't use the "class" operator to format
items.  I have used this rather basic function to translate my "class"
items to the more basic "style" items:

function translaterhsbox($strTitle, $strContent, $strDummy1, $strDummy2)
{
return "$strTitle" .
strtr($strContent,array("class=\"lyrOffsite\""=>"style=\"font-size:
8pt;\"")) . "";
}

Basically you need to ensure that you format everything with styles, for
example:



But you can still use graphics from your web-site.  However many email
programmes will block the graphics until you agree to download them.

http://www.ukfree.tv/2k8_graphic.php?a=a2&t=UK%20Free%20TV%20email
%20update\">

If you have written your document in using CSS, someone can probably
write a bit of code to automatically "expand" the raw HTML to convert
all the 'class'es to 'styles'.

You might like to know that the other constraints (java, scripting,
flash) are to protect email users from viral abuse, not a lack of will
to implement it.

Hope this helps

2008/6/4 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

 
 
Hello there,
 
I'm a journalist working for BBC East in Norwich and I've joined this
mailing list to get advice and guidance - and possibly some ideas -
about a project I've been working on for the last 6 months.
 
With the backing of my bosses at Look East and BBC English regions, I've
designed, developed and launched a new graphics-rich e-mail newsletter
which we now send out each day to about 2000 or so subscribers.
 
This newsletter is hard to describe, but what it does is to aggregate
links - complete with headlines and thumbnail images - to the latest
video news items which appear on the main Look East website, a 'blog'
section promoting that evening's programmes with nested links expanding
on the stories being discussed, drop down menus featuring linking to BBC
East regional weather, news and sport sites and an occasional text
ticker which promotes whatever we fancy - often our local radio
stations.  
 
It's conceived primarily as a content delivery vehicle first, then a
promotional tool, a way of combining all the services offered by the BBC
in my region into one tidy package and also a way of elaborating on the
stories we're working on.  
 
To subscribe -temporarily if you want, I won't mind :-) - go here :
 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/lookeast/newsletter/subscription.shtml
 
Now the thing is, is that I'm a relative novice who is learning as I go
along.  What I've learned is that e-mail can only support very basic
html and that there are limits to what features we can incorporate into
this newsletter.  However, I'm determined to max out the potential and
capacity of this rather unusual way of delivering BBC content.  Any html
tricks, ideas, criticisms, improvements, widgets or whatever anyone on
this mailing list can offer in the way of developing this newsletter
concept, I'd be hugely gratef

RE: [backstage] BBC Look East HTML rich newsletter

[Adam Hatia]

Anyone wishing to understand fully the extent of CSS support in all the
commonly used email clients might like to read this:
http://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/archives/2007/04/a_guide_to_css_supp
ort_in_emai_2.html - it's an invaluable resource!

 

 

 



From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Butterworth
Sent: 05 June 2008 09:07
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] BBC Look East HTML rich newsletter

 

Adam,

However many mail clients don't support the automatic (or even manual)
loading for CSS files.  As you cannot know the client being used, you
have to go for the common set of features.

It's a common error to assume that everyone uses a particular client.

2008/6/5 Adam Hatia <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

Brian,

> For example, you can't use the "class" operator to format items.  I
have used this rather basic function to translate my "class" items to
the 
> more basic "style" items:

Actually, CSS stylesheets are fully supported by Outlook, Outlook
Express, and Thunderbird at least, and I am using CSS to generate
size-efficient HTML emails that use the stylesheets from the website
(though obviously, the path to the css file needs to be a full absolute
URL) - do you still have an email client that doesn't support CSS, if
so, what is it? 

Adam 

 



From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Butterworth
Sent: 05 June 2008 07:55
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] BBC Look East HTML rich newsletter

 

Matt,

I sorted an automatic email notification system just recently on
ukfree.tv and I think I might be able to give you a few pointers.  The
site uses PHP, so my examples will be in that.  If you can't follow it,
then let me know.

(You can subscribe/unsubscribe by visiting http://www.ukfree.tv/ and
using the box in the 'my settings' item at the top left.

To send an HTML email, as you have already found out I guess, you need
to ensure you have the right headers:

function sendHTMLemail($strEmail, $strHTML, $strSubject)
{


// To send HTML mail, the Content-type header must be set
$strHeaders  = 'MIME-Version: 1.0' . "\r\n";
$strHeaders .= 'Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1' . "\r\n";

// Additional headers
$strHeaders .= "To: $strEmail <$strEmail>\r\n";
$strHeaders .= "From: --- updates <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>\r\n";

// Mail it
mail($strEmail, $strSubject, $strHTML, $strHeaders);

}


As you have found out, the level of CSS support in HTML email message is
limited.  For example, you can't use the "class" operator to format
items.  I have used this rather basic function to translate my "class"
items to the more basic "style" items:

function translaterhsbox($strTitle, $strContent, $strDummy1, $strDummy2)
{
return "$strTitle" .
strtr($strContent,array("class=\"lyrOffsite\""=>"style=\"font-size:
8pt;\"")) . "";
}

Basically you need to ensure that you format everything with styles, for
example:



But you can still use graphics from your web-site.  However many email
programmes will block the graphics until you agree to download them.

http://www.ukfree.tv/2k8_graphic.php?a=a2&t=UK%20Free%20TV%20email
%20update\
<http://www.ukfree.tv/2k8_graphic.php?a=a2&t=UK%20Free%20TV%20email%20up
date%5C> ">

If you have written your document in using CSS, someone can probably
write a bit of code to automatically "expand" the raw HTML to convert
all the 'class'es to 'styles'.

You might like to know that the other constraints (java, scripting,
flash) are to protect email users from viral abuse, not a lack of will
to implement it.

Hope this helps

2008/6/4 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

 
 
Hello there,
 
I'm a journalist working for BBC East in Norwich and I've joined this
mailing list to get advice and guidance - and possibly some ideas -
about a project I've been working on for the last 6 months.
 
With the backing of my bosses at Look East and BBC English regions, I've
designed, developed and launched a new graphics-rich e-mail newsletter
which we now send out each day to about 2000 or so subscribers.
 
This newsletter is hard to describe, but what it does is to aggregate
links - complete with headlines and thumbnail images - to the latest
video news items which appear on the main Look East website, a 'blog'
section promoting that evening's programmes with nested links expanding
on the stories being discussed, drop down menus featuring linking to BBC
East regional weather, news and sport sites and an occasional text
ticker which promotes whatever we fancy - often our local radio
stations.  
 
It's conceived primaril