Icecast - Aug 2005 - Re: Forcing individual clients to alternate mount points

Greetings

I'm new to the forum but have been streaming successfully with 
SimpleCast/IceCast2 for about 8 months.  Both Simplecast and IceCast2 
are running on the same Win2K system.  Now I want to do something that 
has me stumped.  It really is a two pronged problem.

Here's the setup:

Icecast is encoding the same live audio to multiple mount points, 
allowing me to easily track the reliability of the individual clients.  
These are 24/7 actual RF radio station repeaters.  The clients are 
running Linux and are unattended.

Now I want to be able to automatically switch a given client to an 
alternate stream for an hour, then switch back to the main stream.  The 
alternate stream will be pre-recorded material, while the main stream 
continues the live audio being encoded by SimpleCast.

So, my questions are:

1.  Can I set up a secondary streaming source that establishes my 
alternate mount point?  This can't be SimpleCast since it is live only. 
 Do I just use a different port number?  Any recommendations for the 
streaming source?

2.  I know that using the admin facilities I can manually force a 
client to an alternate mount point.  But is there a good way to do this 
on an automated basis?

Thanks for any suggestions.

Dick Trump

Dick Trump wrote:
> 1.  Can I set up a secondary streaming source that establishes my 
> alternate mount point?  This can't be SimpleCast since it is live only.
> Do I just use a different port number?  Any recommendations for the 
> streaming source?
Here I am, answering my own question (partially).  I set up a test system 
and quickly brought up a second stream using EZStream.  It does exactly 
what I need to do.  The command line interface will make it easy to play 
on schedule.

But I'm still unsure how to move a client from one mount point to another 
under program control.  Do I need to dig into XML to accomplish that?  Or 
can I just use the HTTP messaging system of my choice?  Maybe I'll bring 
up Ethereal and sniff out what is happening.

But if somebody can give me some hints, I'd sure appreciate it.

Regards

Dick

Dick Trump wrote:
> But if somebody can give me some hints, I'd sure appreciate it.
Gee.  Here I am again with my own answer and it really was pretty easy, 
but I do still have a question.  All I have to do is set up my main 
stream as the fall back for each mount point.  The primary mount point 
for each location will be the "alternate" temporary stream.  I've 
tested it and it works.

The only thing I have left to figure out (other than integrating it 
into my automation system) is how to make a file to play once with 
EZstream, then exit.  It wants to repeat and I don't want it to.  Does 
anybody know if there is a command line flag or something that can be 
put in an m3u file that will force it to play only once?

Dick