Bouncy Radio Center 10 is now well into development and today I’ll be taking you over the changes in the Bouncy Radio Center “Main” Home page.
Bouncy Radio Center
Bouncy Radio Center 10: Radio Panel
- July 14, 2011
- Programing & Internet
- No Comments
Bouncy Radio Center 10 is now under way in the development stages but besides the main application, the one part of the system that is seen and used the most by thousands of users across the world, is the Radio Panel. Those of you who are familiar with the Radio Center, you’ll be aware that the Radio Panel is a free hook available for the Bouncy Radio Center which adds a little panel to the Board Index, if your not familiar with what it is.. well, I guess you now know…
Plans For 2010!
- January 8, 2010
- General Ramblings, Programing & Internet
- No Comments
With 2009 over, its time to focus on the plans for this year, in regards to my work, there’s a lot of stuff to come. Firstly, the massive IP.Mail application, which so far is proving to work amazingly well and has had a lot of support. I’m hoping to have the first public Beta version of IP.Mail released by the end of January.
Bouncy Radio Center will also see a new version coming out, and more importantly, a new module which will allow for people with dedicated servers to run and manage their own SHOUTcast server right from within the radio center itself.
Bouncy XBox LIVE will also have some cool updates, this time for the Forum Achievements which people have been awaiting for a while.
For BouncyServers, we shall be soon doing an updated on our licensing software in order to have everything managed from 1 client area instead of the 2 client areas we currently have (for hosting services and licensing) this should make everything much easier for everybody.
More updates will be coming soon, so check back!
Anthony
Radio Center, XBox LIVE & License Control Updates
- October 13, 2009
- Programing & Internet
- 3 Comments
Its been a while since i have posted on my blog, I’ve been crazy busy with lots of updates and new Apps. First of all lets talk about updates to current Apps.
Bouncy Radio Center v9.1
This was a pretty big update on my part, mainly with new module the Radio On-Demand feature which is now a part of the radio center and comes free at no extra cost to new and existing license holders. radio On-Demand provides a secure way to provide music to your members without compromising the security or privacy of the MP3. in a nutshell, it prevents people downloading the files, and only allows for them to listen to the file “On-Demand”. This is a fantastic way to promote songs you have for sale, as such, i added some features to add buy now links and price fields to each On-Demand file.
As well as this cool new feature some bugs and improvements have been made to the system, for example the RAJAX module has been re-written using an output function in order to feed live data to other hooks and modules. As a result, this prevents those annoying errors people were having in Internet Explorer and other problems where the browser would cache the RAJAX data causing old entries to be shown. This is now a thing of the past.
Bouncy Radio Center 9.1 Change log
FIXED: Listeners chart error after a new installation
FIXED: Scheduling a show with an end time at midnight returns a
BRC302 error that the show cannot end before it has started
FIXED: Problem with the flash charts when a custom admin directory
name is used
FIXED: Problem with the LiveStream Player when a custom Admin
Directory is used
FIXED: Flash Charts do not work when .htaccess is used within
admin directory
FIXED: Livestream player fails to initialize when a .htaccess
file is used within the admin directory
ADDED: Support for Radio Request Hook
ADDED: Support for Bouncy License Control Center Application
FIXED: RAJAX Support for Internet Explorer. data Now updates correctly.
ADDED: New RAJAX Methods and data construction using
$this->buildOutput() functions.
ADDED: Radio On-Demand feature
Bouncy XBox LIVE v2.1
Updates to Bouncy XBox live were mainly just compatibility and fixes for IP.Boards new version of their forum software. A list of changes is below.
Bouncy XBox LIVE 2.1 Change log
FIXED: Public Module Ordering
FIXED: JS Errors in Internet Explorer
FIXED: Theme Errors
ADDED: Support for Bouncy License Control Center Application (REQUIRED)
ADDED: IPB 3.0.4 support
ADDED: Halo 3 theme
Bouncy License Control Center
This is a new app which is required to be installed for the above licensed apps to work correctly. This adds better management of your app licenses as well as finally being able to reset your own local keys, a feature i initially overlooked during the development of these apps. This app will also provide you with latest information directly from us, a list of available apps with links to product pages, purchase pages and latest version information. You will also find some options which load up OUR license control panel right inside your Admin CP!
Check out the image below for some screenshots of the latest apps.
Bouncy Radio Center 9 – Admin Modules
- June 5, 2009
- Programing & Internet
- 4 Comments
The Bouncy Radio Center admin modules are now complete! and with it some cool new features.
First of all it now has its own error reporting functions meaning if there is a problem with your radio connection it will tell you what the problem is, and suggest how to resolve the problem (see above screenshot).
Now, there are 2 modules, an Overview Module and a Managment Module. Overview is the default and gives you a quick look at various things about your radio such as Scheduled Shows Today, Scheduled Shows This Week, number of resident DJ’s and number of Guest DJ’s. It now also has an upgrade history showing you what versions you installed and when.
Managing DJ’s is now much more simple. You no longer have to search for a member and edit their profile. You can now see all DJ’s from one page, Add new guest or resident dj’s, change a dj’s type or delete a dj (see below image)
Bouncy Radio Center 9 should now be ready for release very soon! Not much further to go boys and girls!
Stay Tuned!
Bouncy Radio Center 9 – LiveStream Update
- May 20, 2009
- Programing & Internet
- No Comments
Just a quick message really. There is going to be a major overhaul on the livestream player, Basically it is going to be put into its own module / class and there’s now 28 selectable themes for it, including the themes you are already familiar with.
This should allow for better calls to the livestream player in hooks and modules that people may create. Thinking ahead 
Anyway, i will post another article soon with a sneaky peak at the skins that will be available.
Listen Info Update – Bouncy Radio Center 9
- May 19, 2009
- Programing & Internet
- No Comments
Right then, well I’ve been a busy bunny since my last article with updating the listener info detection for media players, and, well, there’s now 7 which are recognised successfully (see below image).
- Winamp
- iTunes
- VLC Media Player
- Real Player
- Bouncy Radio Center LIVE Stream
- SHOUTcast App for iPhone / iPod Touch
- Windows Media Player
If you know of any other popular media players that are used to tune into your radio just let me know the name of the media player, and the user agent information, and I’ll add it to the standard list.
Also to answer questions i often get asked about VLC player. The reason its not added as an option to tune in with is because VLC uses all sorts of file types and supports lots of methods, as such, you can use VLC to tune in using the winamp link or the iTunes link, and so on. Any entry for VLC would be nothing more than a duplicate of another link so not really needed, but it IS supported.
If you want to send me a recommendation for a media player just comment on this article and I’ll respond. If you have Bouncy Radio Center v8 installed you can tune into your radio with the media player you want to submit and grab the User Agent data from the listener info there.
Bouncy Radio Center 9 – Listener Info
- May 19, 2009
- Programing & Internet
- No Comments
Information is something you can never have to much of (except in Beth’s case where she likes to describe in detail her trip to the toilet). Well the new Radio Center 9 is no different and at this point, I’d like to introduce you to the new listener info pop up box.
As you can see it has a few new additions since its v8 counterpart such as player icons and under runs. So, first of all the player icons, nothing more than a visual representation of the player that listener is using. In v8 you would have to look at the User Agent box and determine from that. Well with a lot of patients and some regular expressions you can now see a cool little icons for each listener. If however the player is not recognised, an unknown icon will be displayed and you can check out the user agent field for more information.
Now onto under runs. A lot of radio owners are often faced with members of their forums or radio listeners saying that the radio keeps stuttering or buffering, and as a radio owner its hard to determine whether just this 1 listener is having the problem, or if all listeners are having a problem. On a DJ point of view this usual results in the do having to disconnect and reconnect, just to be safe. well no there is no need. You can check to see if all listeners are experiencing under runs or buffering.
For example, listener ID 482 in the above image, lets imagine he has 12 under runs, and the other listeners have 0. We can safely assume that the problem is with that listeners internet connection and act accordingly, asking the listeners to ensure they are not using all their bandwidth downloading or if there using a 3G connection as they are tuned in with an iPhone/iPod Touch, so from these 2 new bits of information (player and under runs) we can assume maybe this listeners signal has dropped or there speed has reduced causing under runs / buffering.
If all listeners are having under run problems then you can assume that the DJ is having bandwidth problems with his upload speed and ask him to reduce the bit rate accordingly, alternatively, if your radio is not hosted with BouncyServers (probably the best host in the world) it could very well be a server lag problem.
As you can see, these new features don’t give you a definitive answer, but they help MUCH more in determining the cause of any lag issues.
And this boys and girls, is just one more reason why the Bouncy Radio Center is the best all round SHOUTcast management solution around.
Let me know what you think, and stick around for more updates very soon!
work, Work, WORK!
- May 17, 2009
- General Ramblings, Programing & Internet
- No Comments
Everybody works in one way or another, we all have jobs to do, and for the last few days, I’ve been dreading getting out of bed for a few reasons. First of all, because I’ve not been eating properly or getting much sleep at all over the last few weeks which is leaving me a bit short in the old energy department, and secondly, because i know I’m going to have to stare at a screen full of code for hours, and that being the reason for the first.. erm.. reason..
Seriously though, I have just spent around 8 hours finishing off the new Radio Center Sidebar Hook, and why, because it’s a long process meeting standards.
Hooks for example come bundled in 1 xml file, this file has to contain language strings, template bits, settings, PHP code, help files, database queries and so on.
Now the radio sidebar hook only contains 1 template bit, 12 settings, 24 language strings, 1 PHP file and 1 help file and its taken me all this time to complete it.
Saying that, the sidebar module uses the RAJAX module and has some JavaScript coding in it also, so I’ve had to add some stuff to the RAJAX module to auto update certain elements of the sidebar. Still, most people will look at the sidebar and think nothing of it, its small, it doesn’t look too complicated, and in reality, its taken hours and hours to complete.
The fun doesn’t end there though, oh no. I’ve still got loads of other bits to complete, the main board panel hook for starters, its almost done, i just cant decide if i like the look of it or not, mainly because of the padding with the default IPB table class, however i did write a class called “RadPad” specifically for the radio, but i haven’t decided if i want to use it or not yet.
Then there’s the global radio bar hook, which i haven’t even started yet.. HA! fun times!
As far as the actual radio center goes lets see, the History page is completed, done, dusted, the schedule page is done on the public side, but I’m not happy with the way scheduled entries are laid out, so that’s probably going to have an overhaul. DJ List, not started, Downloads, not started, Linking, Not done but that’s an easy one, Stats, done, but not finished.
Mentioning the stats, i forgot to post on my blog about them, so i will write an article shortly about the new stats features.
Despite all the work i have done so far, completion still seems a long way away. I’ve literally been getting up, working on the radio center, going to bed, getting up, working on the radio center, going to bed.
Time off today i think, but saying that, I’m to anxious to get it finished i end up going back to it, telling myself I’ll just do a little edit here an there and before i know it am full on writing modules and crap.
Anyways, enough ranting from me, I’m gonna go eat.
Bouncy Radio Center 9 Licensing Options
- May 17, 2009
- Programing & Internet
- 9 Comments
So while i have been working away for hours and hours every day over the last few weeks working on the new Radio Center, I’ve been thinking about how to give people the best value for money when using the Radio Center.
Now, personally, i would like to give the best deal to loyal BouncyServers customers, and this comes in the form of giving them the new Radio Center absolutely free. On a business point of view this would be crazy and would be a stupid idea, so i was thinking, what’s the best way to give BouncyServers customers a free Radio Center whilst still being able to maintain the costs of the licensing server and keeping the production and updates of the software active.
At this point 2 things came to mind, the first one is building a separate copy of the radio center which has adverts bundled into it, we get some advertising, and the client gets the free software. However, nobody likes adverts, and adverts wont pay the bills. This is when i had the second idea, i could lock the radio center to only function with radios provided by BouncyServers, and there we have it.
Now, this is a great idea, but it has its flaws, first of all clients with standard cheap radios would not cut the running costs for both the radio and the radio center, so we would have to set in some conditions.
These conditions… well, i will be setting up a minimum spend amount on the radio, for example, if you spend £** on a bouncyservers radio, we will give you a free license for the brand spanking new Bouncy Radio Center.
This benefits both us and the clients, we get additional custom as people would start using our radio servers instead of other radio servers, and the clients will get the radio center absolutely free with no additional cost, all they would have to do is get there radio from us.
Of course this is just going to be one of the available options, we will still have the usually options for people who run there own radio servers or do not wish to move allowing them to purchase a radio license the old fashioned way. Were happy, there happy, everybody’s happy!
If you have any thoughts or suggestions on this please comment and let me know, even throw across your own licensing ideas if you think there is a better option.