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rcbharp
Newbie

Streaming a Radio Station

I am new to ROKU Development. I have extensive computer knowledge in HTML Programming and such and am trying to help someone set an Audio Only Stream up. It is an Internet Radio Channel that uses Radio.co Server systems and is already heard on Apple and Android devices as well as Tune In. It is a solid stream but does not use the ShoutCast system that I have seen in the message boards thus far. Is there a way to build another type of stream through Direct publisher or even a Brightscript sample (which page comes up 404 not there) out there to clone with my own info. The only thing I can find is video file solutions and things like Instant TV do the same thing -- Video Only

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8 REPLIES 8
OddScott
Roku Guru

Re: Streaming a Radio Station

If building using the SDK method, Instant TV can use audio-only streams as well as video streams. I could be wrong, but I don't think that the Direct Publisher method supports audio-only streams.

If using a SHOUTcast audio stream you can even automatically pull in metadata like album artwork: https://www.instanttvchannel.com/roku/shoutcast 

 

www.InstantTvChannel.com - 717-441-4386 - Build a Roku SDK channel in 15 minutes! - Easy Direct Publisher to SDK upgrades!
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NightAire
Reel Rookie

Re: Streaming a Radio Station


@rcbharp wrote:

It... does not use the ShoutCast system that I have seen in the message boards thus far.

This is the problem I ran into as my server is running Icecast2, and the way I solved the stream portion was to take my link, which was originally:

http://MyIcecastServer.com:1234/stream.m3u

and simply dropped the file extension, resulting in the following link:

http://MyIcecastServer.com:1234/stream

I forget when I read about this, but I was confident it would not work... right up until it did. The rest of the InstantTVChannel tutorial on Shoutcast seemed to work for me, except it's not pulling artist / title / album, and when I tested it on Roku it told me there are a couple of advertising code errors I need to clean up. Using a free account, I don't know if I'll be able to fix those or not.

My main concern right now is figuring out how to get my app to display artist / title / album / year / artwork.

I hope this helps!

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OddScott
Roku Guru

Re: Streaming a Radio Station

Instant TV Channel only supports extracting metadata from SHOUTcast audio streams at this time. There may be support in the future for extracting metadata from audio streams with embedded ID3 information.

www.InstantTvChannel.com - 717-441-4386 - Build a Roku SDK channel in 15 minutes! - Easy Direct Publisher to SDK upgrades!
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funkycorneradio
Channel Surfer

Re: Streaming a Radio Station


@OddScott wrote:

Instant TV Channel only supports extracting metadata from SHOUTcast audio streams at this time.


It's not true, the problem must be somewhere else. I used a shoutcast stream (tried both mp3 and AAC) and could not get any metadata displayed, and it's exactly what's happening now with Icecast 2 streaming.

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OddScott
Roku Guru

Re: Streaming a Radio Station

I'll take a look at it for you. What's your channel's 36-character "Channel ID" from the Channels page?

www.InstantTvChannel.com - 717-441-4386 - Build a Roku SDK channel in 15 minutes! - Easy Direct Publisher to SDK upgrades!
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funkycorneradio
Channel Surfer

Re: Streaming a Radio Station

The channel is "Funky Corner Radio" under Music

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OddScott
Roku Guru

Re: Streaming a Radio Station

Ok, found your channel. Looks like the audio stream URL that you are using is pointing directly at the MP3 stream. Instead you'll need to use a URL that points at your SHOUTcast status page, so that the metadata can be scraped off of it. Here's an example SHOUTcast URL that provides metadata: http://185.85.29.161:8000 

www.InstantTvChannel.com - 717-441-4386 - Build a Roku SDK channel in 15 minutes! - Easy Direct Publisher to SDK upgrades!
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funkycorneradio
Channel Surfer

Re: Streaming a Radio Station


@OddScott wrote:

Ok, found your channel. Looks like the audio stream URL that you are using is pointing directly at the MP3 stream. Instead you'll need to use a URL that points at your SHOUTcast status page, so that the metadata can be scraped off of it. Here's an example SHOUTcast URL that provides metadata: http://185.85.29.161:8000 


You are right, that stream works. I tried another stream of mine similar to that one and it works. The problem is I don't want to use it, I need the other one 😞

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