STREAMS

One of the basic methods in MW DXing is to compare the LIVE audio signal to the Internet radio stream of the suspected station. In addition, many DXers listen to the Internet radio streams trying to find a match for the announcement/slogan/program which they have found when listening to their SDR recordings.

There are several good collections of the streams, but the fastest way is to start and control the stream within JAGUAR itself. In addition, if the stream is controlled in JAGUAR, you can.

• control the volume of the stream (making a better match with the LIVE radio signal)
• control the delay between LIVE vs. STREAM (the delay in the stream can be remarkable making the // comparison difficult)
• add the stream to your favorite stream list
• schedule overnight recordings for the streams

JAGUAR's stream support offer a simple control GUI called "STREAMER". The STREAMER GUI contains four buttons which are displayed over the PLAYBAR area.

In the future JAGUAR versions this "stream aided DXing" concept may be extended to support the ARCHIVE recordings as well.

HOW TO

The Internet radio stream can be opened in JAGUAR in two ways:

• Move the mouse cursor over a station (TURTLE/MAPS/FLAGS/OFFSETS), right click and select STREAM from the STATION MENU
• If you have added the stream to your favorites, select the stream from the menu by clicking TOOLBAR > STREAMS

When you try to open any Internet stream, JAGUAR opens the STREAMER GUI and searches the correct web stream using a server search from the FMSCAN database. The STREAMER shows "SEARCHING" > "CONNECTING" > "STREAM" steps (if the STREAM is found, alternatively you can get "NO STREAM" or "PARSE ERROR" messages at the end).

By default the STREAM is played within STREAMER. If that is not possible (but a stream exists), JAGUAR keeps the STREAMER GUI open anyway but also your default browser is opened with the web page where you should be able to find and select the stream playback manually. In this case you have to toggle between your browser and JAGUAR, if you want to change/compare/record the audio between the stream and JAGUAR.

STREAMER

If the stream can be played within JAGUAR, the STREAMER button operations are simple:

• COMPARE: Toggle AM <> STREAM audio
• RECORD: Toggle recording on/off (recording can be done also from the web page audio)
• SETTINGS: Open/close the STREAMER settings window
• EXIT: Release all the STREAMER resources and return to the normal playback

If the stream supports metadata, it is displayed above the (( STREAM )) text - in the CAROLINE example above Bob Seger's "Old Time Rock and Roll" is currently played.

SETTINGS

STREAMER > SETTINGS button has four basic functions:

• SAVE AS FAVORITE: Give the desired name to the stream => the stream will be added to STREAMS.txt. Saved streams will appear to the TOOLBAR > STREAMS menu. You can delete the stream from the file/menu by giving an empty name to an existing stream entry. The STREAMS.txt file can be edited also manually within JAGUAR (TOOLBAR > TEXTPADS > STREAMS)
• REC SCHEDULE: Add the time slot from-to (HHMM-HHMM) which you want to be recorded unattended
• VOLUME LEVEL: Adjust the stream volume level to match the signal level (this has effect only during COMPARE)
• TIME SHIFT: If there's a remarkable stream delay, you can help the comparison by adjusting the TIME SHIFT (this has effect only during COMPARE: TIME SHIFT just shifts the SDR playback position xx seconds backwards)

SILENT STREAMER (ALT-R)

The SILENT STREAMER is a stream recorder that creates attended or unattended mp3 recordings from the desired Internet streams. It can also be used simultaneously with the STREAMER GUI if you want a long continuous stream recorded - not just the // comparison audio. The SILENT STREAMER can also record a different stream than the one currently open in STREAMER.

SILENT STREAMER recordings (ALT-R and scheduled) are saved to the STREAMS folder, the file names contain a time stamp and the stream name.

SILENT STREAMER can use only streams that are defined in the STREAMS.txt. The stream menu for ALT-R is the same which is shown when TOOLBAR > STREAMS is clicked. The STREAMS.txt file simply contains "STREAM NAME, STREAM URL" pairs, one pair on each line. For example Malawi BC can be defined to STREAMS.txt as

MBC MALAWI, http://154.66.125.88/broadwavehigh.mp3

The keyboard key ALT-R is reserved for "REC STREAM" on/off: the user can press ALT-R, select the stream to be recorded and go to sleep :-) Next morning another ALT-R press will save the long recording => station's overnight programming is available for further studies (however there may be max listening time in use on the server side - so the full overnight recording may not be possible in most situations).

SCHEDULED SILENT STREAMER

If you don't want to record the whole overnight or maybe want to record several different streams during the night, you can schedule the SILENT STREAMER simply by adding the desired time slot via STREAMER > SETTINGS > REC SCHEDULE or manually to the end of the STREAMS.txt line, for example

MBC MALAWI, http://154.66.125.88/broadwavehigh.mp3, 0155-0205

Each stream can only have one timer and there can be only one stream recording running at a time.

NOTE: SILENT STREAMER recordings may not work in every Windows installations.