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Could I Run a TV Station on Linux?

JesusQuintana asks: "I'm working with a low-power television station to update their playback system. Currently they're using tape and I've been tasked to move them to computerized playback (MPEG-2, etc.) There are proprietary solutions (very expensive) and there are companies that bundle software with Windows and standard x86 hardware. Overall, they are generally unimpressive and won't sell the software without bundling it with their own hardware. (They won't let us buy our own storage.) We have the expertise to build our own infrastructure (NAS, redundancy, etc.), but really just need the equivalent of iTunes for high quality video. There are lots of other pieces needed to complete the work-flow (such as encoding the media), which could be accomplished on Mac or Windows or even Linux. But what about playback? We need something that will play back these files at their scheduled times (perhaps scheduling cron jobs to change playlists) to broadcast quality hardware (SDI or YUV video). Could we run a TV station on Linux?"

5 of 321 comments (clear)

  1. Of course you can by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    With Linux, all you have to do is concatenate 6 strings on the command line and edit 3 configuration files and you can accomplish anything!

  2. HowTo by Crazy+Man+on+Fire · · Score: 5, Funny

    There some pretty good information about TV station automation here

  3. Re:answer by kfg · · Score: 5, Funny

    But implimentation is left as an exercise for the student.

    KFG

  4. Program in APL by krell · · Score: 5, Funny

    You can even write the entire program to run the station itself in a mere 11 characters of APL code.

    --
    Where were you when the voynix came?
  5. Re:little software available for linux. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I know you didn't ask for any composting, editing, or formatting software. And I know you plainly asked for Linux. But you should really check out Final Cut Pro. It doesn't do what you want and doesn't run on the platform you suggested, but I used it once and it was great.

    Mod me up informative!