Radio-Assist 7.5, the extensive digital audio range

To broaden the Radio-Assist 7.5 range, NETIA launches a new module for newsrooms: the SCRIPT dispatch-processing tool. Script works with the other Radio-Assist 7.5 modules in compliance with radio companies' news-desk operating methods, and provides tight integration of linked text and sound. Developed in collaboration with journalists, Script has all the features required for end-to-end news management, from capture to broadcast.

Dispatch capture from different sources (satellite, modem and so forth) is based on a protocol defined by providers. Script is compatible with all the standard protocols (AFP, REUTERS, AP, BLOOMBERG, IRN, etc.). The system can handle several press agencies at once, whether they use Roman, Cyrillic, Arabic or Chinese characters. Filters are applied to all dispatches and can be modified for the user's convenience. They are multilingual. The filtering criteria the user defines can be instantly accessed just by selecting them. Filter results are automatically classed in order of arrival. The user sees a summary with the first lines of the dispatch and can subscribe to a specific service, such as agency subscription or notice of arrival of an urgent dispatch (HotBox).

The system includes tight integration of text processing and linked sounds. The text editor has all the usual word processing functions: choice of typeface, font size and style, paragraph format and the copy/paste, cut and delete functions. When a dispatch is used to create a text, it is not itself altered. Several users can read the same dispatch at the same time. When one or more sounds have been edited with the Snippet tool, the newsman can drag and drop them to the text to make a complete news report in just a few minutes. When the report is ready, it is dropped directly into the news playlist using the Feder-All Desk tab, the Radio-Assist 7.5 module providing secure shared access to on-air schedules. NETIA has put all its wide experience in ergonomics into the design of Script to ensure it is quick and easy to use, with helpful features like universal drag and drop, many keyboard shortcuts, a clear and instant view of events, etc. In 2004, RTM (Radio Télévision du Maroc) and VOV International (Voice of Vietnam) chose Script for their newsrooms.

The latest Radio-Assist 7.5 range by NETIA has a new Multi-track production tab. The great asset of this product is its capacity to combine all the current digital audio facilities to meet the production requirements of general-interest radios. The Multi-track function makes it easier to mix items from different tracks. Each track has its own editing and mixing tools (recording, separate fade and panning curves for clips and tracks, sequence stretching, sequence mastering, Mute and Solo functions, etc.). As users have requested, NETIA has incorporated a whole range of quality sound effects: equaliser, compressor, reverb, hiss control, etc. Based on the popular ergonomics of the Snippet tool, the Radio-Assist 7.5 Multi-track can be controlled entirely with the drag and drop function to move items from one track to another, modify sequences with a click of the mouse or select them on the fly. To make life easier for its users, the Multi-track interface as designed by NETIA includes automatic enlargement of the work area, an end-of-screen scroll function, right and left mouse click and keyboard shortcuts.

The 7.5 version of the Radio-Assist range now operates with any DirectX-compatible sound card. NETIA has designed and developed a high-performance software overlayer with its own drivers and libraries. Conversion is faster in linear and compressed modes alike. All the usual functions (playback, recording, editing, etc.) are available and give excellent results. In addition, there is a wide bandwidth from 48 to 8 kHertz.

Many tests have been run to validate several types of card, such as:

France Inter and NETIA

Radio France has chosen NETIA's Radio-Assist 7.5 for the digitisation of France Inter.

150 workstations use Radio-Assist in linear (non compressed) to prepare programmes, for archiving and for music. An extra 130 workstations for the editorial staff are equipped with the full Radio-Assist range.

Le Mouv' et NETIA

Radio France has chosen NETIA's Radio-Assist 7.5 to equip its 24 x 7 rock station Le Mouv with a network of 70 production workstations.

NETIA, in collaboration with Radio France, has ensured the migration of information from the old broadcast system to Radio-Assist.

Olympic Games Radio in Athens

The Olympic Games radio is based at the Radio Athina studios, where technicians have been working hard since September 2002 at getting ready for the great event by installing a full Radio-Assist 7.5 system.

The Games radio is now up and running, with several extra workstations and broadcasting on 104.4 FM. This has all been made possible with straightforward ergonomic tools like Radio-Assist 7 Snippet or Air-Cartstack..

HRT, the intricacy of long-term archiving

Croatian radio Hrvatska Radio Televizjia (HRT) has been equipped for several years now with a complete Radio-Assist acquisition-to-broadcast digital audio system.

This year, HRT decided to install an overall archiving system (history, assets and daily items) for the entire company, one that can be accessed by everyone in the best conditions. It decided on a synergy combining the skills of EMC², NOA and NETIA.

Digital audio systems are now indispensable for exchange and production in the broadcasting business. These systems, comprising numerous workstations, large amounts of data and transfer volumes, can reach awesome sizes. NETIA has designed two automatic middleware, Media Management and DBShare, to underpin the reliability of these systems by ensuring access to stored data. NETIA has also worked hard at making the Radio-Assist system compatible and easy to interface with other archiving systems.

Some examples are the perfect integration of Radio-Assist with the MSI Managed Storage Diva at Bel RTL in Belgium, and the ACS (Advanced Computer System) Electtra at the RAI in Italy...

Radio Mainwelle and NETIA

Radio Mainwelle in Bayreuth is a local radio which mainly broadcasts music interspersed with news, traffic and weather reports. For its overnight schedules, Radio Mainwelle has opted for the Radio-Assist automatic broadcast module Air-Playlist.

This uses a GPI control system to switch automatically to night satellite broadcasting with commercial breaks scheduled at set times. During the day, Radio Mainwelle is compered by several DJs who use the manual broadcast module Air-DDO which has been designed specifically for their type of requirements.

WNEM TV5 a choisi la gamme Radio-Assist 7.5 de NETIA

WNEM Radio chooses Radio-Assist 7.5 The WNEM TV5 news broadcasts have the widest audience in the Mid-Michigan area. With its new radio, WNEM TV5 of the Meredith group expects to extend this audience even further.

WNEM TV5 has chosen the NETIA Radio-Assist 7.5 range especially for the way it integrates with the iNews dispatch processing software, a very straightforward process whereby a Windows ActiveX window opens in iNews to give direct access to the Radio-Assist 7.5 production and broadcast tools. For instance, sound files are simply dragged and dropped from one window to another to gradually build up a cartstack filled with the files referenced in the scenario put together with iNews. This tight iNews/Radio-Assist integration makes life in the newsroom at lot easier.

Kair FM and automation

The stations offer local news, and some local programming with disk jockeys, and live broadcasts from local events. Much of their 24-hour broadcast day is filled with programming from a satellite music provider, located in Denver (Colorado). National news is received by a satellite link with the Associated Press Radio Network.

"KAIR wishes to give more and more scope to their local programming while taking advantage of automated shows for some dayparts. By choosing NETIA's digital system Radio-Assist 7 , KAIR will have additional capabilities to change between broadcasting modes with flexibility," according to Scott Slocum of TurnKey Media Systems, NETIA distributor in the USA. Until now, KAIR has been using an old DOS-based digital audio system. The first stage of the conversion to Netia consisted of transferring the local audio recordings of program elements with all their metadata (name, dates, type...) from the old storage method (the "aptXTM" format) to one of the more popular new ones (MPEG). Thanks to NETIA's conversion automat, Autofill, this conversion of thousands of files has been greatly simplified. The second stage of this project will be the reduction of the number of hours of satellite shows, by local preparation of numerous hours of voicetracked musical programming with a DJ voice insertion ( Voice-Over), using the Playlist Prep tool.

With a mouse click, all of KAIR's daily program schedules, local and otherwise, are quickly imported into the playlist. The Voice-Over function gives an immediate access to recording and tracking functions for the insertion of a voice between songs and other recorded program elements.

PTo manage all of its resources, KAIR has the latest version of NETIA's Command Center. In the heart of the system, Command Center is a distributed command dispatcher which transparently handles all of the orders sent out or received from KAIR's workstations, pointing them to the relevant applications. When programming is received from the satellite, there are certain times during the broadcast when GPI signals are transmitted, allowing local stations the opportunity to insert relevant information (local weather and commercials, local news...). The function of Command Center is to coordinate those instructions within the system so that an on-air station starts automatically and takes over with the playlist planned at those precise satellite-driven moments. With Command Center within the system, each application is given the opportunity to launch or execute one or many orders.

In the same way, Command Center can execute recording commands. In the case of KAIR Radio, it is required that certain satellite-sent commercials and feature programs be automatically recorded for broadcast during the hours when the station is airing locally-originated shows. Other programs are captured for later playback through off-air feeds from program providers.

Numerous radio operations in North America now choose to use different sources of programming, to broadcast on many channels, and to insert local switchovers. This evolution calls for a real command dispatcher arrangement, which can provide reliable automation of these functions, totally transparent for the audience. The system which KAIR AM & FM in Atchison, Kansas has chosen is one of today's best solutions to provide the necessary flexibility and functionality required for broadcasters.. TurnKey Media Systems is located in Olathe, Kansas, a suburb of Kansas City. For further information on the NETIA products, the company can be reached by mail at P.O. Box 126, Olathe, Kansas USA, 66051, by phone at 913-568-2254, and by Internet e-mail at NETIA@TurnKeyMediaSystems.com.

NETIA in Africa

RTM (Radiodiffusion Télévision Marocaine) has chosen Radio-Assist 7 for digitising its sites. In November, Mosaique FM, Tunisia's first private radio station, selected NETIA to equip its studios. NETIA's rigorous approach in meeting each customers exact requirements partly explains this success.

RTM has several sites throughout the country. A complete digital system has to be installed at each of them (Casablanca, Fez, Layoune, Tetouan, Dakha, etc.). Networked around one or more servers, each system contains a number of automatic or manual acquisition stations, several production stations with highly ergonomic editing tools, scheduling and broadcast stations which interface ergonomically with the console in place. Priority goes to the news rooms which have really innovating production, processing and scheduling tools to work with. For items the radio wants to keep, there is an automatic CD-ROM archiving module. The recorded and indexed CDs can be accessed from any workstation on the network, so items that have been saved and deleted from the server can be quickly restored to the Radio-Assist database.

Mosaique FM was launched on 7th November 2003, the 16th anniversary of the date President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali came to power. To celebrate the occasion the President announced that Tunisian radio and television was henceforth open to private enterprise. With a complete Radio-Assist 7 system, Mosaique FM also focuses on internet broadcast, both live and recorded. NETIA's StreamIn is tailored for this requirement: in live mode, the process is fully automatic, and in recorded mode (on demand), the technician selects the items to broadcast with a click of the mouse.

Over several years, NETIA has formalised a rigorous approach which is adapted to each new installation. Three stages are defined in discussion with the client: project management, implementation plan and deployment. Two project coordinators are appointed for project management, one by the client and the other by NETIA. The implementation plan is vital: it spans the period from start-up to project finalisation. It consists of a regularly updated document which shows how the project is progressing and what decisions are made as it advances. Once all the preparations have been made for deployment, the process can start. As NETIA systems already installed have shown, the Radio-Assist 7 modular approach offers a great many deployment options. Radio stations always wish to reduce as far as possible the length of time analogue and digital technologies run side by side. The best way has to be found to deal with all the problems and get the system right before the majority of the users are on line.

Since 1997, when the first MEDI 1 system was installed in Morocco, NETIA has signed a number of contracts which have confirmed its reputation in North Africa for seriousness and reliability.

Major communication project for the government of South Africa

New powerful tools in this range, such as the Script dispatch processor, were deciding factors in favour of NETIA, a company well known for the perfected design of its products.

The project involves setting up a big information production centre where programmes and documentaries will be broadcast all over the country via a network of local radios. In the end, 103 radios will have direct V-Sat satellite access to all the resources of the huge General Access Server based in Johannesburg. Two government studios (Capetown and Pretoria) two production centres based on the Parliament, fully equipped with Radio-Assist systems, and the local radios will feed information into the server which can then be accessed from anywhere in the country.

The main server will thus be the core of an input network, which implies the need for a powerful archiving function and fast retrieval of data by a 470GB JukeBox CD-DVD. The server automatically feeds information to a government website which can be consulted on request. Each local radio will have its production and broadcast workstation. Items are transferred by dragging and dropping them from the main server to the local database ready for broadcast. Local radios will find the NETIA QuickPlayer broadcast program is exactly what they need: it is ergonomic, straightforward and reliable.

Voice of Vietnam

VOV International has selected NETIA's Radio-Assist 7 to equip its studios and editorial staff. More than seventy production workstations have been ordered; VOV International has opted for the new version of Air-DDO, the broadcast software of Radio-Assist. This choice by VOV shows once again that NETIA is a major provider of technology to the broadcast industry.

Okinawa Houso

Okinawa Houso has selected NETIA's Radio-Assist 7 to equip its studios mainly for the very ergonomic interface and the reliability of NETIA's softwares already proven in BBC, Radio France, ABC etc worldwide.

New nominations in Europe

Fred Van Eijk Parc Scientifique du Sart Tilman 16 rue du Bois Saint-Jean 4102 Liège Ougrée Belgique Tel +32 4 361 70 34 f.vaneijk@netia.net

Jan Van Galen Tolweg 20 3851 SKERMELO Pays-Bas Tel +31 6 12 96 90 29 j.vangalen@netia.net

A new distributor in India

HORIZON BROADCAST ELECTRONICS PVT LTD 202 207, Tower B, Global Business Park Sikanderpur, Mehrauli-Gurgaon Road 122002 Haryana Inde

Nandy Bhatia Tel: +91 124 256 2512 / 13 Fax: +91 124 256 1428 Info: nandybhatia@hbeindia.com Web: http://www.hbeindia.com A new distributor in Mali S/C BREHIMA TRAORE BP E 3062 Bamako Mali

Eric Mboz'o Mvele Tel: 223 78 31 Info: eric_1a@yahoo.fr