The ScaleEngine channel system is a type of linear playout system: it takes a playlist of video assests, VOD or live streams, and plays them in order as a single output stream. This can be used to create scheduled programming or as a constant video loop.
Channels can be used with the switchboard, either to allow live content to cut over scheduled programming, or by using the channel as a loop to fall back to if the live stream goes down. You can see an example of this in the tutorial: How Do I Keep A Stream Always On?
Channels are found in the control panel under "Streaming > Channel". Clicking on the name of a channel will take you to the channel management page. The channel manage page is mostly the same as any other stream manage page, with sections for start/stop, recording, restreaming, etc.
Build your ScaleEngine channel with your uploaded VOD clips.
The output of a ScaleEngine channel is a single video stream, functionally identical to a live stream. You can set up players and transcoding exactly the same as for live streams.
Note that you can enable recording for a channel if desired, but be warned that this will generate a large amount of recording files as the channel runs 24/7. Our default for channels is to not record.
In the channel manage page, you have a list of the playlists that are setup for the stream, and when they're scheduled for. Clicking on the name of the playlist will take you to a manage page for that playlist.
In the manage page, the "Scheduled" option controls when this list will start. Once that time is reached, this playlist will become active and loop until another playlist becomes reaches its scheduled time.
The playlist section has the list of items that make up the playlist. To add items to the list, use the "Add source" button at the bottom of the items. This will add a new entry in the list of items. Expand this item, set the source to "VOD", and click "Browse" to select a VOD file.
Items can be rearranged by dragging. When you are finished, click the save button at the bottom of the page to save your changes.
If you select a source of "live" when adding an item to the playlist, this will add a live stream. Use the "Stream" dropdown to select the stream you wish to add. Note that you can only add streams that are on your -chorigin (ScaleEngine channel origin) app, which must be selected when creating the live stream.
When this item comes up in the list it will start playing the live stream, until the stream stops. If the stream is not live, it will be skipped, and the playlist will continue to the next item. You can also limit the length of the live item by setting the length field. This is a duration in seconds. If this field is set, it will skip to the next item when the live stream has played for that number of seconds.
The "Scheduled Start Time" field controls when the list will start playing. When this time is reached, the playlist will start playing on the stream, replacing the current list. The ScaleEngine channel origin only checks every 5 minutes, so you must schedule start times at least 5 minutes in advance. Note that the ScaleEngine channel origin will still perform the start, it will just be after the scheduled time, on the next 5 minute interval.
The 5 minute interval can be bypassed by scheduling the list for the current time, and using the reload button manually.
All of these operations are available for programmatic control by using the ScaleEngine API.
In the stream controls section, there is a dropdown with a number of actions. The following options appear in channels:
This will immediately close the stream.
This control stops the channel, then starts it playing the currently scheduled list from the start. Use this to start your channel if it is stopped.
This control will cause the curent playlist to immediately take over and start playing on the channel. There is a video number field that controls which item the playlist will start playing on, with 1 being the first item at the top of the list.