URY Wiki - User contributions [en-gb]

User:241

2016-12-19T07:49:46Z

7449:

{{Member
|name=Gavin Atkinson
|start=2000
|end=2004
|shows=
|positions=Head of Computing (2002-11-27 - 2003-11-12)
}}

Gavin Atkinson is a powerful source of information for the URY Computing Team. As a previous Head of Computing, he was part of the team who originally provisioned [[logger1]] and [[logger2]], and now spends his days working for [[IT Services]] and part of the FreeBSD Core Team.

With an internal ID number of 241, he is one of the oldest members in our database.

He has a MyRadio profile [https://ury.org.uk/myradio/Profile/view/?memberid=241].

[[Category:Computing]]
[[Category:People]]

Student Radio Awards

2016-12-19T07:37:47Z

7449:

The Student Radio Awards is an annual event hosted by the [[Student Radio Association]]. Every year, URY enters itself for several different awards, sometimes winning.

== Trivia ==
* URY's very own [[Coco Cole]] was one of the Voices of the Awards in 2012. A small amount of gratification was to be had when she eventually had to read out URY's Best Technical Achievement submission name.
* In 2013, URY was joint first in Most Nominations with Fly FM, and Most Awarded with Fly FM and URN.
* Harry Whittaker was the first person in living Student Radio Association history that has received 3 nominations in a single year.

== Award History ==

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2014 SRAs|2014]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Journalistic Programming
| SCRATCH RADIO (Gold), '''River Safety: York’s Rising Problem - URY (Silver)''', URN (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2013 SRAs|2013]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Technical Achievement (Talkback)
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), URY: Show Planner (Silver), Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Technical Achievement (Show Planner)]]
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), '''URY: Show Planner (Silver)''', Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Bos Tones)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Ellie Wright's World Music)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Entertainment Show (The Harry Whittaker Show)
| The Morning Show with Giles Gear (Gold), Wake and Bake with Laurence and Gareth (Silver), '''The Harry Whittaker Show - ((URY)) (Bronze)'''
|-
| Best Male (Harry Whittaker)
| Pure FM: Glen Scott (Gold), Radio LaB: Danny Fullbrook (Silver), Spark FM: Jonny Chambers (Bronze)
|-
| Best Newcomer (Harry Whittaker)
| Ben Sheppard (Gold), '''Harry Whittaker - ((URY)) (Silver)''', Dom Stirling (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (The New World Order: Part 2: 1651)]]
| '''URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold)''', URY: Trimble (Silver), A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (Trimble)]]
| URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold), '''URY: Trimble (Silver)''', A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2012 SRAs|2012]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| [http://www.studentradioawards.co.uk/content/Awards/2012/Winners/pdf_w3s1i1.pdf Best Station]
| URN (Gold), '''URY (Silver)''', 107 Spark FM (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

[[Category: Awards]] [[Category: History]]

Transmitter

2016-10-02T20:04:45Z

7449:

''Not to be confused with the [[Trasmitter]].''

The piece of apparatus generally referred to as the '''transmitter''' is the box inside URY [[stores]] that converts sound input into radio output. As such, it is one of URY's (and Ofcom's) most cherished pieces of equipment, with sacred rites as to when it can be turned on and turned off.

== Transmitter antenna ==

This is the thing that sticks out of the ground and beams URY to the campuses on 1350kHz medium-wave. It is also a favourite target of heavy plant whenever Vanbrugh is under construction, though usually they prefer to attack the underground power cables instead.

== ATU ==

The box at the base of the aerial, known as the ATU, takes in a big thick cable from the transmitter, and puts out a tiny thin red wire, which connects to the big white metal tall thing. Touching this wire is dangerous and those who do so whilst the transmitter apparatus is running should seek medical attention. It is for this reason, among others, that this box is locked. With a key*.

Nobody knows where the key is, but the lock doesn't work. Just turn the handle.

== Big thick cable ==

This cable carries the transmission signal from the transmitter in stores to the ATU. The cable runs approximately as follows:

* Out of the back of the transmitter box in stores
* Into some stores ducting
* Out of the back stores wall and into the Vanbrugh covered walkway
* Into Vanbrugh Nucleus
* Into the Vanbrugh JCR area
* Through the JCR area
* Into the Vanbrugh Dining Hall's Kitchens
* Through the kitchen and bar back office
* Through the old Vanbrugh Substation room (yes, really)
* Into an underground duct created just for the use of URY
* Out by the substation (underground), and to the ATU

There is a manhole access cover from where you can see the technically-URY-owned ducting carry most of the campus network fibre.

At some point during its journey, the cable runs parallel to (list may not be exhaustive):
* Inter-building power
* Vanbrugh-Grimston House-URY fire alarm cabling
* The ITS cross-lake fibre bundles (redirected from Central Hall around 2013) to use the ducting that runs directly to the ETU

== The transmitter breaking incident ==
During some works around Vanbrugh, it was noted that some building contractors had identified the nice pole outside as a useful place against to lean metal fencing. We requested this not happen, but it didn't stop happening.

A short period of time later, it was noted that the transmitter appeared to no longer be "transmitting". A few attempts were made to turn it off and on again, to no avail - only some of the lights were turning on.

Some staring at the schematics for the transmitter (it's all in the manual!) later, and a potential cause was identified. We had a blown '''fuse'''. 13A? Alas, no. 5A? It was not to be. We're talking a short blow fuse with a rating in the milliamps. You can't just get those in your local home electrical shop. ITS and Estates did not have one either, so we went to our local electronics shop instead, in Leeds.

We bought some new fuses.

We put one of them into the transmitter and switched it on.

For the briefest moment, everything lit up as if it was operational. Then it returned to its previous state - only some of the lights on the front panel were illuminated. Hoping it was a duff fuse, a second attempt was decided as the next decision.

However, just as the fuse was inserted into the transmitter and we were preparing a power on, two burly-looking men in high vis jackets burst through the open stores door and demanded to know immediately where the fire was. The burst of power that was sent through the big thick cable before the fuse tripped emitted an electromagnetic pulse similar to what the fire alarm control cables running parallel to it would expect to be carrying if the current state of URY was "on fire". So all the control systems thought that our building thought it was on fire, but it didn't.

Anyway, the transmitter was sent off for repair and it took something like three months and quite a bit of money. So don't break it.

Transmitter

2016-10-02T20:03:40Z

7449:

''Not to be confused with the [[Trasmitter]].''

The piece of apparatus generally referred to as the '''transmitter''' is the box inside URY [[stores]] that converts sound input into radio output. As such, it is one of URY's (and Ofcom's) most cherished pieces of equipment, with sacred rites as to when it can be turned on and turned off.

== Transmitter antenna ==

This is the thing that sticks out of the ground and beams URY to the campuses on 1350kHz medium-wave. It is also a favourite target of heavy plant whenever Vanbrugh is under construction, though usually they prefer to attack the underground power cables instead.

== ATU ==

The box at the base of the aerial, known as the ATU, takes in a big thick cable from the transmitter, and puts out a tiny thin red wire, which connects to the big white metal tall thing. Touching this wire is dangerous and those who do so whilst the transmitter apparatus is running should seek medical attention. It is for this reason, among others, that this box is locked. With a key*.

Nobody knows where the key is, but the lock doesn't work. Just turn the handle.

== Big thick cable ==

This cable carries the transmission signal from the transmitter in stores to the ATU. The cable runs approximately as follows:

* Out of the back of the transmitter box in stores
* Into some stores ducting
* Out of the back stores wall and into the Vanbrugh covered walkway
* Into Vanbrugh Nucleus
* Into the Vanbrugh JCR area
* Through the JCR area
* Into the Vanbrugh Dining Hall's Kitchens
* Through the kitchen and bar back office
* Through the old Vanbrugh Substation room (yes, really)
* Into an underground duct created just for the use of URY
* Out by the substation (underground), and to the ATU

There is a manhole access cover from where you can see the technically-URY-owned ducting carry most of the campus network fibre. Somewhere in there is

At some point during its journey, the cable runs parallel to (list may not be exhaustive):
* Inter-building power
* Vanbrugh-Grimston House-URY fire alarm cabling
* The ITS cross-lake fibre bundles (redirected from Central Hall around 2013) to use the ducting that runs directly to the ETU

== The transmitter breaking incident ==
During some works around Vanbrugh, it was noted that some building contractors had identified the nice pole outside as a useful place against to lean metal fencing. We requested this not happen, but it didn't stop happening.

A short period of time later, it was noted that the transmitter appeared to no longer be "transmitting". A few attempts were made to turn it off and on again, to no avail - only some of the lights were turning on.

Some staring at the schematics for the transmitter (it's all in the manual!) later, and a potential cause was identified. We had a blown '''fuse'''. 13A? Alas, no. 5A? It was not to be. We're talking a short blow fuse with a rating in the milliamps. You can't just get those in your local home electrical shop. ITS and Estates did not have one either, so we went to our local electronics shop instead, in Leeds.

We bought some new fuses.

We put one of them into the transmitter and switched it on.

For the briefest moment, everything lit up as if it was operational. Then it returned to its previous state - only some of the lights on the front panel were illuminated. Hoping it was a duff fuse, a second attempt was decided as the next decision.

However, just as the fuse was inserted into the transmitter and we were preparing a power on, two burly-looking men in high vis jackets burst through the open stores door and demanded to know immediately where the fire was. The burst of power that was sent through the big thick cable before the fuse tripped emitted an electromagnetic pulse similar to what the fire alarm control cables running parallel to it would expect to be carrying if the current state of URY was "on fire". So all the control systems thought that our building thought it was on fire, but it didn't.

Anyway, the transmitter was sent off for repair and it took something like three months and quite a bit of money. So don't break it.

Rob Stoneduck

2016-10-02T19:42:19Z

7449:

[[File:Rob Stoneduck.jpg|thumb|Rob Stoneduck, January 2014]]

Rob Stoneduck is the official URY mascot - and has been since he first appeared in the station in early 2012.

== Acquisition ==
One Red Paperclip[http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.co.uk/] is the story of a man who traded a red paperclip until he had up-traded all the way to a house. It's an exciting adventure that has inspired many people. Not to be left out, in 2012 the RAG team wanted in too - they started with a red paperclip and wanted something that at the end they could sell and give the earnings to charity.

So, on a winter's morning, during an episode of what is suspected to be an unscheduled, unplanned episode of No Show Scheduled[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/11541/] (during that time it was broadcast at 1am), two lovely RAG representatives appeared at the station door, explained the situation, then asked what we would trade for two toy ducks. After some digging around, we offered them a pair of cool-looking sunglasses that had been lying abandoned on a shelf for some time. This makes Rob's birthday most likely to be between 30th January and 5th February 2012.

After discovering the fluffier duck could quack when we squeak it, he quickly became popular on many of URY's shows, and was dubbed "Rob Stoneduck", after the then-station manager of the same name[http://ury.org.uk/people/6978/].

The other duck has not been seen since.

== The Student Politics Phase ==
Rob Stoneduck briefly went on a road trip to outside YourSpace one day, as part of Refreshers' Fair 2013. As part of the "Where was Stoneduck?" game that featured on what had now become URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/12643/], Rob ventured into the YUSU Sabbatical Office. [[Kallum Taylor]] was then a guest on the show, who needed to guess where Stoneduck was. After guessing correctly, Rob Stoneduck enjoyed his time so much, he left with Kallum to learn more about what goes on within YUSU.

Rob Stoneduck was rescued by [[Lloyd Wallis]] a week later, notably shaken up and with a collar and a bell around his neck. Rob does not speak about what happened whilst he was there, but [[Bob Hughes]] informs us that there was a lot of "getting thrown around".

== Recent History ==

Due to the realisation that most new URY freshers never actually get told who Rob Stoneduck is, the [[Computing]] team attached a label with the duck's name on it to Rob one night in September 2016. Whether it remains is a mystery.

== Rob Stoneduck in Popular Culture ==
''This area is in need of expansion. Have you seen or heard some of Rob Stoneduck's antics?''

* Rob Stoneduck was a key point in a game called "Where was Stoneduck?" in URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy. Each week, we'd send him out to somewhere on campus, ask where he was, and he would quack in response. Curious looks were often garnered from others, particularly when he started quacking in Costcutter. Guests or listeners would then need to guess where he was based on ambient noise (only presenters can speak duck, so his answer to "Where are you today?" was lost in translation for all but the instigators).
* Rob Stoneduck featured on the intro interstitial for the 2012 [[Christmas Single]]

[[Category:URY History]]

Rob Stoneduck

2016-10-02T19:40:25Z

7449:

[[File:Rob Stoneduck.jpg|thumb|Rob Stoneduck, January 2014]]

Rob Stoneduck is the official URY mascot - and has been since he first appeared in the station in early 2012.

== Acquisition ==
One Red Paperclip[http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.co.uk/] is the story of a man who traded a red paperclip until he had up-traded all the way to a house. It's an exciting adventure that has inspired many people. Not to be left out, in 2012 the RAG team wanted in too - they started with a red paperclip and wanted something that at the end they could sell and give the earnings to charity.

So, on a winter's morning, during an episode of what is suspected to be an unscheduled, unplanned episode of No Show Scheduled[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/11541/] (during that time it was broadcast at 1am), two lovely RAG representatives appeared at the station door, explained the situation, then asked what we would trade for two toy ducks. After some digging around, we offered them a pair of cool-looking sunglasses that had been lying abandoned on a shelf for some time. This makes Rob's birthday most likely to be between 30th January and 5th February 2012.

After discovering the fluffier duck could quack when we squeak it, he quickly became popular on many of URY's shows, and was dubbed "Rob Stoneduck", after the then-station manager of the same name[http://ury.org.uk/people/6978/].

The other duck has not been seen since.

== The Student Politics Phase ==
Rob Stoneduck briefly went on a road trip to outside YourSpace one day, as part of Refreshers' Fair 2013. As part of the "Where was Stoneduck?" game that featured on what had now become URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/12643/], Rob briefly ventured into the YUSU Sabbatical Office. [[Kallum Taylor]] was then a guest on the show, who needed to guess where Stoneduck was. After guessing correctly, Rob Stoneduck enjoyed his time so much, he left with Kallum to learn more about what goes on within YUSU.

Rob Stoneduck was rescued by [[Lloyd Wallis]] a week later, notable shaken up and with a collar and a bell around his neck. Rob does not speak about what happened whilst he was there, but [[Bob Hughes]] informs us that there was a lot of "getting thrown around".

== Recent History ==

Due to the realisation that most new URY freshers never actually get told who Rob Stoneduck is, the [[Computing]] team attached a label with the duck's name on it to Rob one night in September 2016. Whether it remains is a mystery.

== Rob Stoneduck in Popular Culture ==
''This area is in need of expansion. Have you seen or heard some of Rob Stoneduck's antics?''

* Rob Stoneduck was a key point in a game called "Where was Stoneduck?" in URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy. Each week, we'd send him out to somewhere on campus, ask where he was, and he would quack in response. Curious looks were often garnered from others, particularly when he started quacking in Costcutter. Guests or listeners would then need to guess where he was based on ambient noise (only presenters can speak duck, so his answer to "Where are you today?" was lost in translation for all but the instigators).
* Rob Stoneduck featured on the intro interstitial for the 2012 [[Christmas Single]]

[[Category:URY History]]

Trasmitter

2016-10-01T09:41:51Z

7449:

[[Category:In-jokes]]

The ''Trasmitter'' is a small object* for which the Technical/Engineering Team leads were principally responsible for maintaining until 2013[https://ury.org.uk/mediawiki/index.php?title=Constitution&oldid=17].

* I can't remember what object. Was it a pen? I think it might have been a pen.

== Trasmitter History ==
It is unclear when the need to maintain the Trasmitter was first added to the constitution, but it was noted during a review in preparation for v2.0 of the constitution. The then Chief Engineer, [[Tom Haines]], was approached by [[Lloyd Wallis]] to ask what the Trasmitter is and how it was doing.

Worryingly, the Chief Engineer has never heard of such a device before, so was unable to provide a status report or maintenance history.

Some time later, he triumphantly returned from his quest to find this thing he was supposed to be maintaining. Holding it firmly in his hands, he presented the small object, on which the word "Trasmitter" had been written scruffily and hastily.

=== Demise of the Trasmitter ===
It was concluded that the Chief Engineer role is generally held by someone who is more capable at maintaining a "Transmitter" rather than a trasmitter. As a result the Constitutional responsibilities were updated - especially as it was noted that it turned out we hadn't noticed nobody ever looked after the transmitter.

Committee failed to find a replacement role in which to assign trasmitter maintenance; its location is no longer known.

Trasmitter

2016-10-01T09:41:33Z

7449: Created page with "Category:In-jokes The ```Trasmitter``` is a small object* for which the Technical/Engineering Team leads were principally responsible for maintaining until 2013[https://u..."

[[Category:In-jokes]]

The ```Trasmitter``` is a small object* for which the Technical/Engineering Team leads were principally responsible for maintaining until 2013[https://ury.org.uk/mediawiki/index.php?title=Constitution&oldid=17].

* I can't remember what object. Was it a pen? I think it might have been a pen.

== Trasmitter History ==
It is unclear when the need to maintain the Trasmitter was first added to the constitution, but it was noted during a review in preparation for v2.0 of the constitution. The then Chief Engineer, [[Tom Haines]], was approached by [[Lloyd Wallis]] to ask what the Trasmitter is and how it was doing.

Worryingly, the Chief Engineer has never heard of such a device before, so was unable to provide a status report or maintenance history.

Some time later, he triumphantly returned from his quest to find this thing he was supposed to be maintaining. Holding it firmly in his hands, he presented the small object, on which the word "Trasmitter" had been written scruffily and hastily.

=== Demise of the Trasmitter ===
It was concluded that the Chief Engineer role is generally held by someone who is more capable at maintaining a "Transmitter" rather than a trasmitter. As a result the Constitutional responsibilities were updated - especially as it was noted that it turned out we hadn't noticed nobody ever looked after the transmitter.

Committee failed to find a replacement role in which to assign trasmitter maintenance; its location is no longer known.

Miscellaneous History

2016-10-01T09:25:30Z

7449:

* [[Urinegate]]
* [[Less black and more graphics]]
* [[In all their]]

Miscellaneous History

2016-10-01T09:25:14Z

7449:

* [[Urinegate]]
* [[Less_black_and_more_graphics]
* [[In_all_their]]

URY History

2016-10-01T09:24:48Z

7449:

This is the main page of the URY '''history wiki project'''.

== Why a history wiki? ==

* YSTV have one.
* We don't.
* We really should.

== History Wiki Pages ==

<onlyinclude>We want to preserve as much of our station's interesting history as possible. Can you help with the following...?
* [[timeline|URY Timeline]]
* [[committees|Committees]]
* [[URYAs]]
* [[alumni|Alumni]]
* [[technology|URY Technology Through The Ages]]
* [[Website History]] (yes indeedy)
* [[Christmas Endeavours]]
* [[:Category:Incident Reports|Incident Reports]]
* [[Miscellaneous History]]
* [[SRAs|Student Radio Awards]]
</onlyinclude>

[[Category: URY History]]

URY History

2016-10-01T09:24:33Z

7449:

This is the main page of the URY '''history wiki project'''.

== Why a history wiki? ==

* YSTV have one.
* We don't.
* We really should.

== History Wiki Pages ==

<onlyinclude>We want to preserve as much of our station's interesting history as possible. Can you help with the following...?
* [[timeline|URY Timeline]]
* [[committees|Committees]]
* [[URYAs]]
* [[alumni|Alumni]]
* [[technology|URY Technology Through The Ages]]
* [[Website History]] (yes indeedy)
* [[Christmas Endeavours]]
* [[:Category:Incident Reports|Incident Reports]]
* [[Miscellaneous History]]
* [[SRAs:Student Radio Awards]]
</onlyinclude>

[[Category: URY History]]

URY History

2016-10-01T09:22:19Z

7449:

This is the main page of the URY '''history wiki project'''.

== Why a history wiki? ==

* YSTV have one.
* We don't.
* We really should.

== History Wiki Pages ==

<onlyinclude>We want to preserve as much of our station's interesting history as possible. Can you help with the following...?
* [[timeline|URY Timeline]]
* [[committees|Committees]]
* [[URYAs]]
* [[alumni|Alumni]]
* [[technology|URY Technology Through The Ages]]
* [[Website History]] (yes indeedy)
* [[Christmas Endeavours]]
* [[:Category:Incident Reports|Incident Reports]]
* [[Miscellaneous History]]
( [[SRAs:Student Radio Awards]]
</onlyinclude>

[[Category: URY History]]

Student Radio Awards

2016-10-01T09:21:43Z

7449:

The Student Radio Awards is an annual event hosted by the [[Student Radio Association]]. Every year, URY enters itself for several different awards, sometimes winning.

== Trivia ==
* URY regularly loses out to Best Station because [[URN]] claim to be better. The majority of the committee justify this with Nottingham being significantly larger, URN having a lot more money, and a part time staff member to run it.
* URY's very own [[Coco Cole]] was one of the Voices of the Awards in 2012. A small amount of gratification was to be had when she eventually had to read out URY's Best Technical Achievement submission name.
* In 2013, URY was joint first in Most Nominations with Fly FM, and Most Awarded with Fly FM and URN.
* Harry Whittaker was the first person in living Student Radio Association history that has received 3 nominations in a single year.

== Award History ==

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2014 SRAs|2014]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Journalistic Programming
| SCRATCH RADIO (Gold), '''River Safety: York’s Rising Problem - URY (Silver)''', URN (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2013 SRAs|2013]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Technical Achievement (Talkback)
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), URY: Show Planner (Silver), Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Technical Achievement (Show Planner)]]
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), '''URY: Show Planner (Silver)''', Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Bos Tones)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Ellie Wright's World Music)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Entertainment Show (The Harry Whittaker Show)
| The Morning Show with Giles Gear (Gold), Wake and Bake with Laurence and Gareth (Silver), '''The Harry Whittaker Show - ((URY)) (Bronze)'''
|-
| Best Male (Harry Whittaker)
| Pure FM: Glen Scott (Gold), Radio LaB: Danny Fullbrook (Silver), Spark FM: Jonny Chambers (Bronze)
|-
| Best Newcomer (Harry Whittaker)
| Ben Sheppard (Gold), '''Harry Whittaker - ((URY)) (Silver)''', Dom Stirling (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (The New World Order: Part 2: 1651)]]
| '''URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold)''', URY: Trimble (Silver), A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (Trimble)]]
| URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold), '''URY: Trimble (Silver)''', A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2012 SRAs|2012]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| [http://www.studentradioawards.co.uk/content/Awards/2012/Winners/pdf_w3s1i1.pdf Best Station]
| URN (Gold), '''URY (Silver)''', 107 Spark FM (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

[[Category: Awards]] [[Category: History]]

Licences Advice

2016-10-01T09:09:53Z

7449:

This page aims to put the various licences that URY follows into simple key points. It includes hard rules as well as tips and notes to make being legal easier.

== Ofcom Licence ==
This is the first one most people think of when "radio" and "licence" come to mind, but believe it or not, now we have a licence (It's a Community LPAM one, if you're interested), it's pretty straight forward. Once a year, we pay a licence fee, every 5 years we renew the agreement, and the only fixed legal requirements are that:

* We broadcast across campus on 1350AM within reasonable technical standards (i.e. we don't interfere with maritime broadcasts, as we once did a few decades ago.... whoops)
* We don't mention that on air that we can be potentially be heard elsewhere depending on various complicated science things
* We broadcast the station frequency (1350AM) and callsign (VERSITY or URY) once an hour
** Yes, playing the news in jingle or saying "Online at ury.org.uk and across campus on 1350AM, this is URY news" is a legal requirement!
* Our output is targetted for students and staff at the University of York
* Our transmitter is only on for 30 weeks a year, but is '''always on''' during this time (unless we suffer a prolonged power outage or an attack by terrorists or the Queen's enemies)

You were expecting more? That's all the legal bits. You thought swearing was against Ofcom rules? It's not. Everything else you hear about is in fact based on Ofcom ''guidelines''. Thick, boring documents giving you examples of what is good and bad and cases where broadcasters have done it right/wrong in the past. Our presenter contract is a conservative way of meeting all this while not boring presenters with detail. So if you want to know more about what content a show can have, it's useful to look at the [http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/broadcasting/guidance/ Ofcom Guidance pages] for more information.

== PRS/PPL Licencing ==
This is where it gets... fun. The big problem with radio is copyright - if we just played music on air and online we're being very very naughty. We have to pay the artists, publishers, distributors and so on their share every time you click "Play" in the studio. For this, we pay licences to two separate companies - PRS and PPL, each of which handle part of those payments.

=== PRS Webcaster Licence ===
This one's simple - we're small and non-profit so other than a licence fee every year we don't have to do anything.

=== PPL Webcaster Standard Licence ===
I've lost large parts of my life to these guys. Once a quarter, we have to send them a report of '''every''' track we've played, including the record label and distributor, as well as some complicated statistics involving listener-hours and performances by territory. The main thing you can do to help with this is do what your contract says - only play music via BAPS. In addition to this, there's lots of other annoying little requirements:

* During any 3 hour period:
** We can play no more than 3 tracks from any album (and no more than 2 consecutively).
** We can play no more than 4 tracks from any particular artist or compilation (and no more than 3 consecutively).
*** The [[Campus Jukebox]] does some magic to make sure it follows this, but for presenters, it's up to you to be aware of this!
* A Track may only be played once in any 1-hour period.
* We have to show what song we are playing on the website (and over AM if it ever becomes reasonable for us to financially) as we are playing them, and after we've played them '''but never before'''.
** For presenters, this just means using [[BAPS]] or manually [[Tracklisting]] as you go. Computing manage the rest.
** In addition, you cannot mention "We have Gaga coming up in 10 minutes". You can use vague things like "in the show". This is so people don't know what time to record our web stream if they still pirate music like that.
* We can store up to 20,000 Dubbed Tracks in our central filestore at any time.
** Computing manage this for you, too.
* Each show can only be advertised up to 4 times in a 2 week period.
** This clause is vague. We should clarify this, because I'm pretty sure we don't follow this sometimes.
* We can't knowingly make it sound like we're affiliated with any artist, copyright holder of product.
** Don't do that. This also includes playing tracks in a way that could "denigrate" artistic integrity.
* We have to take reasonable steps to prevent our listeners from pirating music play
** There's not much we can do, although talking or playing jingles of intros helps with this.
** Computing have to add DRM somehow if requested. Evil stuff.
* We can't play music that's pirated or we don't own.
** Yes, that includes that song you just downloaded from mp3skull or loaded up on YouTube.
* We can't edit or remix songs.
* We can't let members or (anyone) take copies of any of the data in our library.
* We can't use tracks as an intro to or during advertising, features or as a trademark or brand.
** This includes using them as beds for show adverts or consistently in features.

==== Additional Technical Restrictions ====
* We can't provide a customised stream on a per-user basis.
* We can't add skip/pause/back functionality or the ability to let listeners record our service.
* We can only Dub entire Tracks, not partial ones.
* Tracks must be of a reasonable technical standard that the quality is reasonably preserved.
* Ensure the Central Database is as secured as possible, including providing reports on this to PPL if requested.
* Our web stream must only be accessible to the countries listed in the [http://www.ppluk.com/Documents/Member%20Services/Qualifying%20countries.pdf PPL Qualifying Territories] document.
* The Central Database cannot be removed from URY's premises (the Station and Stores) for any reason. Whether this includes backups is unclear.
* We cannot delete any archive Tracklisting data. PPL may ask for this data at any time.

Rob Stoneduck

2015-12-06T10:04:17Z

7449:

[[File:Rob Stoneduck.jpg|thumb|Rob Stoneduck, January 2014]]

Rob Stoneduck is the official URY mascot - and has been since he first appeared in the station in early 2012.

== Acquisition ==
One Red Paperclip[http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.co.uk/] is the story of a man who traded a red paperclip until he had up-traded all the way to a house. It's an exciting adventure that has expired many people. Not to be left out, in 2012 the RAG team wanted in too - they started with a red paperclip and wanted something that at the end they could sell and give the earnings to charity.

So, on a winter's morning, during an episode of what is suspected to be an unscheduled, unplanned episode of No Show Scheduled[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/11541/] (during that time it was broadcast at 1am), two lovely RAG representatives appeared at the station door, explained the situation, then asked what we would trade for two toy ducks. After some digging around, we offered them a pair of cool-looking sunglasses that had been lying abandoned on a shelf for some time. This makes Rob's birthday most likely to be between 30th January and 5th February 2012.

After discovering the fluffier duck could quack when we squeak it, he quickly became popular on many of URY's shows, and was dubbed "Rob Stoneduck", after the then-station manager of the same name[http://ury.org.uk/people/6978/].

The other duck has not been seen since.

== The Student Politics Phase ==
Rob Stoneduck briefly went on a road trip to outside YourSpace one day, as part of Refreshers' Fair 2013. As part of the "Where was Stoneduck?" game that featured on what had now become URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/12643/], Rob briefly ventured into the YUSU Sabbatical Office. [[Kallum Taylor]] was then a guest on the show, who needed to guess where Stoneduck was. After guessing correctly, Rob Stoneduck enjoyed his time so much, he left with Kallum to learn more about what goes on within YUSU.

Rob Stoneduck was rescued by [[Lloyd Wallis]] a week later, notable shaken up and with a collar and a bell around his neck. Rob does not speak about what happened whilst he was there, but [[Bob Hughes]] informs us that there was a lot of "getting thrown around".

== Rob Stoneduck in Popular Culture ==
''This area is in need of expansion. Have you seen or heard some of Rob Stoneduck's antics?''

* Rob Stoneduck was a key point in a game called "Where was Stoneduck?" in URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy. Each week, we'd send him out to somewhere on campus, ask where he was, and he would quack in response. Curious looks were often garnered from others, particularly when he started quacking in Costcutter. Guests or listeners would then need to guess where he was based on ambient noise (only presenters can speak duck, so his answer to "Where are you today?" was lost in translation for all but the instigators).
* Rob Stoneduck featured on the intro interstitial for the 2012 [[Christmas Single]]

[[Category:URY History]]

Christmas Endeavours

2015-12-05T16:15:59Z

7449:

Every year, towards the end of the Autumn Term, URY has this awful habit of doing two "festive" "things".

== URY Christmas Single ==
URY's Committee, Presenters and general happeners all get together on a Saturday (or other convenient time), to record a cute original music video for a popular song. Of course, this is then followed up with a studio recording of our wonderful voices singing - I can assure you it's an experience.

Usually, these songs are covers of traditional Christmas tunes. Although sometimes they will be parodies relevant to the University of York, or even completely original compositions. As of 2013, all of these are available in URY's Central Music Library.

{| class="wikitable mw-collapsible"
! Year
! Song
! Notes
|-
| 2015
| All I Want for Christmas is You
| Cover of Mariah Carey's Christmas hit
|-
| 2014
| Christmas is All Around
| Recreating the opening song to the movie ''Love Actually'' Which itself is a cover of the song "''Love is All Around''" but this has more christmas.[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWiOggaWkZU]

Cast (in approximate order of appearance): [[Andy Durant]], [[Alex Light]], [[Harry Whittaker]], ??, [[Jay Glover]], [[Adam Brain]], [[Joe Willis]], [[Naomi Gildert]], [[Mat Carrington-Mackenzie]], ??
|-
| 2013
| Fairytale of New York
| A nice traditional outright cover. Entirely produced by URY. [http://youtu.be/o22F27cOpGg]
|-
| 2013
| This is Hes East
| Part of the 2013 Christmas Panto. Yes, we know the panto version doesn't normally do "A Whole New World". [http://youtu.be/qEO9mYaIuTg]
|-
| 2012
| Merry Christmas Everyone
| There are rumours an alternate version consisting entirely of the URY Computing Team exists, but was never allowed to see daylight. Entirely produced by URY. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6m1Y0Uu6DE]

Cast (In approximate order of appearance): [[Rob Stoneduck]], [[Rachael Venables]], [[Ben Bason]], [[Will Chalk]], [[Kirsty Rogers]], [[Andy Durant]], [[Tom Haines]], [[Robyn Haycock]], [[Wil Bennett]], [[Stephen Clarke]], [[Tom Edwards]], [[Anthony Williams]], [[Matt Windsor]], [[Ellie Wright]], [[John Wakefield]], [[Rebecca Elson]], [[Charles Lewis]], [[Will Edwards]], [[Steffan Woodruff]], [[Lloyd Wallis]], [[Karl Bos]], [[George Lane]], [[Hannah Smith]]
|-
| 2011
| Black Christmas
| A parody of Rebecca Black's Friday. Due to lack of forward planning, was performed live on air by whoever was around at the time. Failed miserably.
|-
| 2010
| I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday
| Outright cover. The music video was produced by YSTV. We don't talk about it. [https://ystv.co.uk/watch/URYXmas/URYXmas2010/]
|-
| 2010?
| I Go To York Uni, It's True
| Little is known of this parody of All I Want For Christmas Is You - not even the source of the vocals. However, we can learn a valuable lesson - the only thing that has changed ever since is that you can't get olives in YUSU Bars anymore.
|-
| 2009
| Do They Know It's Christmas?
| The older tech we had back then is quite obvious. [https://ystv.co.uk/watch/URYXmas/URY-Christmas-single-2009/]
|-
| 2008
| Christmas On My Face (A Terrible Case of Xmas)
| This is original. Original! And also The Best Thing! [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVICvXorh-s]
|}

[[Category: URY History]]

== Christmas Panto ==
Of course, what radio station would be completely without a Christmas Panto? Featuring a "Celebrity" guest, each year we put our own spin on popular pantomimes.

{| class="wikitable mw-collapsible"
! Year
! Production
! Guest Star
! Notes
|-
| 2015
| Oliver Twist
| TBC
|
|-
| 2014
| Dick Whittington and His Cat [https://www.mixcloud.com/harrywhittaker2/the-ury-panto-2014-dick-whittington-his-cat-feat-cbbcs-raven/]
| CBBC's Raven
|
|-
| 2013
| Aladdin [https://ury.org.uk/uryplayer/podcasts/851/]
| Jon Lee (off of S Club 7)
| Someone talk about this.
|-
| 2012
| Rumplestiltskin [https://ury.org.uk/uryplayer/podcasts/723/]
| Alan Fletcher (Dr. Karl Raymond Marx Kennedy)
|
|}

Christmas Single

2015-12-05T16:14:17Z

7449: Redirected page to Christmas Endeavours

#REDIRECT [[Christmas_Endeavours]]

Christmas Single

2015-12-05T16:13:55Z

7449: Created page with "#REDIRECT Christmas_Endeavours"

#REDIRECT Christmas_Endeavours

Rob Stoneduck

2015-12-05T16:13:19Z

7449:

[[File:Rob Stoneduck.jpg|thumb|Rob Stoneduck, January 2014]]

Rob Stoneduck is the official URY mascot - and has been since he first appeared in the station in early 2012.

== Acquisition ==
One Red Paperclip[http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.co.uk/] is the story of a man who traded a red paperclip until he had up-traded all the way to a house. It's an exciting adventure that has expired many people. Not to be left out, in 2012 the RAG team wanted in too - they started with a red paperclip and wanted something that at the end they could sell and give the earnings to charity.

So, on a winter's morning, during an episode of No Show Scheduled[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/11541/], two lovely RAG representatives appeared at the station door, explained the situation, then asked what we would trade for two toy ducks. After some digging around, we offered them a pair of cool-looking sunglasses that had been lying abandoned on a shelf for some time. This makes Rob's birthday most likely to be 11th February 2012, somewhere between 1am and 2am.

After discovering the fluffier duck could quack when we squeak it, he quickly became popular on many of URY's shows, and was dubbed "Rob Stoneduck", after the then-station manager of the same name[http://ury.org.uk/people/6978/].

The other duck has not been seen since.

== The Student Politics Phase ==
Rob Stoneduck briefly went on a road trip to outside YourSpace one day, as part of Refreshers' Fair 2013. As part of the "Where was Stoneduck?" game that featured on what had now become URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/12643/], Rob briefly ventured into the YUSU Sabbatical Office. [[Kallum Taylor]] was then a guest on the show, who needed to guess where Stoneduck was. After guessing correctly, Rob Stoneduck enjoyed his time so much, he left with Kallum to learn more about what goes on within YUSU.

Rob Stoneduck was rescued by [[Lloyd Wallis]] a week later, notable shaken up and with a collar and a bell around his neck. Rob does not speak about what happened whilst he was there, but [[Bob Hughes]] informs us that there was a lot of "getting thrown around".

== Rob Stoneduck in Popular Culture ==
''This area is in need of expansion. Have you seen or heard some of Rob Stoneduck's antics?''

* Rob Stoneduck was a key point in a game called "Where was Stoneduck?" in URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy. Each week, we'd send him out to somewhere on campus, ask where he was, and he would quack in response. Curious looks were often garnered from others, particularly when he started quacking in Costcutter. Guests or listeners would then need to guess where he was based on ambient noise (only presenters can speak duck, so his answer to "Where are you today?" was lost in translation for all but the instigators).
* Rob Stoneduck featured on the intro interstitial for the 2012 [[Christmas Single]]

[[Category:URY History]]

Christmas Endeavours

2015-12-05T16:04:47Z

7449:

Every year, towards the end of the Autumn Term, URY has this awful habit of doing two "festive" "things".

== URY Christmas Single ==
URY's Committee, Presenters and general happeners all get together on a Saturday (or other convenient time), to record a cute original music video for a popular song. Of course, this is then followed up with a studio recording of our wonderful voices singing - I can assure you it's an experience.

Usually, these songs are covers of traditional Christmas tunes. Although sometimes they will be parodies relevant to the University of York, or even completely original compositions. As of 2013, all of these are available in URY's Central Music Library.

{| class="wikitable mw-collapsible"
! Year
! Song
! Notes
|-
| 2015
| All I Want for Christmas is You
| Cover of Mariah Carey's Christmas hit
|-
| 2014
| Christmas is All Around
| Recreating the opening song to the movie ''Love Actually'' Which itself is a cover of the song "''Love is All Around''" but this has more christmas.[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWiOggaWkZU]

Cast (in approximate order of appearance): [[Andy Durant]], [[Alex Light]], [[Harry Whittaker]], ??, [[Jay Glover]], [[Adam Brain]], [[Joe Willis]], [[Naomi Gildert]], [[Mat Carrington-Mackenzie]], ??
|-
| 2013
| Fairytale of New York
| A nice traditional outright cover. Entirely produced by URY. [http://youtu.be/o22F27cOpGg]
|-
| 2013
| This is Hes East
| Part of the 2013 Christmas Panto. Yes, we know the panto version doesn't normally do "A Whole New World". [http://youtu.be/qEO9mYaIuTg]
|-
| 2012
| Merry Christmas Everyone
| There are rumours an alternate version consisting entirely of the URY Computing Team exists, but was never allowed to see daylight. Entirely produced by URY. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6m1Y0Uu6DE]

Cast (In approximate order of appearance): [[Rob Stoneduck]], [[Rachael Venables]], [[Ben Bason]], [[Will Chalk]], [[Kirsty Rogers]], [[Andy Durant]], [[Tom Haines]], [[Robyn Haycock]], [[Wil Bennett]], [[Stephen Clarke]], [[Tom Edwards]], [[Anthony Williams]], [[Matt Windsor]], [[Ellie Wright]], [[John Wakefield]], [[Rebecca Elson]], [[Charles Lewis]], [[Will Edwards]], [[Steffan Woodruff]], [[Lloyd Wallis]], [[Karl Bos]], [[George Lane]], [[Hannah Smith]]
|-
| 2011
| Black Christmas
| A parody of Rebecca Black's Friday. Due to lack of forward planning, was performed live on air by whoever was around at the time. Failed miserably.
|-
| 2010
| I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday
| Outright cover. The music video was produced by YSTV. We don't talk about it. [https://ystv.co.uk/watch/URYXmas/URYXmas2010/]
|-
| 2010
| I Go To York Uni, It's True
| Little is known of this parody of All I Want For Christmas Is You - not even the source of the vocals. However, we can learn a valuable lesson - the only thing that has changed ever since is that you can't get olives in YUSU Bars anymore.
|-
| 2009
| Do They Know It's Christmas?
| The older tech we had back then is quite obvious. [https://ystv.co.uk/watch/URYXmas/URY-Christmas-single-2009/]
|-
| 2008
| Christmas On My Face (A Terrible Case of Xmas)
| This is original. Original! And also The Best Thing! [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVICvXorh-s]
|}

[[Category: URY History]]

== Christmas Panto ==
Of course, what radio station would be completely without a Christmas Panto? Featuring a "Celebrity" guest, each year we put our own spin on popular pantomimes.

{| class="wikitable mw-collapsible"
! Year
! Production
! Guest Star
! Notes
|-
| 2015
| Oliver Twist
| TBC
|
|-
| 2014
| Dick Whittington and His Cat [https://www.mixcloud.com/harrywhittaker2/the-ury-panto-2014-dick-whittington-his-cat-feat-cbbcs-raven/]
| CBBC's Raven
|
|-
| 2013
| Aladdin [https://ury.org.uk/uryplayer/podcasts/851/]
| Jon Lee (off of S Club 7)
| Someone talk about this.
|-
| 2012
| Rumplestiltskin [https://ury.org.uk/uryplayer/podcasts/723/]
| Alan Fletcher (Dr. Karl Raymond Marx Kennedy)
|
|}

Christmas Endeavours

2015-12-05T15:43:06Z

7449:

Every year, towards the end of the Autumn Term, URY has this awful habit of doing two "festive" "things".

== URY Christmas Single ==
URY's Committee, Presenters and general happeners all get together on a Saturday (or other convenient time), to record a cute original music video for a popular song. Of course, this is then followed up with a studio recording of our wonderful voices singing - I can assure you it's an experience.

Usually, these songs are covers of traditional Christmas tunes. Although sometimes they will be parodies relevant to the University of York, or even completely original compositions. As of 2013, all of these are available in URY's Central Music Library.

{| class="wikitable mw-collapsible"
! Year
! Song
! Notes
|-
| 2015
| All I Want for Christmas is You
| Cover of Mariah Carey's Christmas hit
|-
| 2014
| Christmas is All Around
| Recreating the opening song to the movie ''Love Actually'' Which itself is a cover of the song "''Love is All Around''" but this has more christmas.[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWiOggaWkZU]
|-
| 2013
| Fairytale of New York
| A nice traditional outright cover. Entirely produced by URY. [http://youtu.be/o22F27cOpGg]
|-
| 2013
| This is Hes East
| Part of the 2013 Christmas Panto. Yes, we know the panto version doesn't normally do "A Whole New World". [http://youtu.be/qEO9mYaIuTg]
|-
| 2012
| Merry Christmas Everyone
| There are rumours an alternate version consisting entirely of the URY Computing Team exists, but was never allowed to see daylight. Entirely produced by URY. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6m1Y0Uu6DE]
|-
| 2011
| Black Christmas
| A parody of Rebecca Black's Friday. Due to lack of forward planning, was performed live on air by whoever was around at the time. Failed miserably.
|-
| 2010
| I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday
| Outright cover. The music video was produced by YSTV. We don't talk about it. [https://ystv.co.uk/watch/URYXmas/URYXmas2010/]
|-
| 2010
| I Go To York Uni, It's True
| Little is known of this parody of All I Want For Christmas Is You - not even the source of the vocals. However, we can learn a valuable lesson - the only thing that has changed ever since is that you can't get olives in YUSU Bars anymore.
|-
| 2009
| Do They Know It's Christmas?
| The older tech we had back then is quite obvious. [https://ystv.co.uk/watch/URYXmas/URY-Christmas-single-2009/]
|-
| 2008
| Christmas On My Face (A Terrible Case of Xmas)
| This is original. Original! And also The Best Thing! [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVICvXorh-s]
|}

[[Category: URY History]]

== Christmas Panto ==
Of course, what radio station would be completely without a Christmas Panto? Featuring a "Celebrity" guest, each year we put our own spin on popular pantomimes.

{| class="wikitable mw-collapsible"
! Year
! Production
! Guest Star
! Notes
|-
| 2015
| Oliver Twist
| TBC
|
|-
| 2014
| Dick Whittington and His Cat [https://www.mixcloud.com/harrywhittaker2/the-ury-panto-2014-dick-whittington-his-cat-feat-cbbcs-raven/]
| CBBC's Raven
|
|-
| 2013
| Aladdin [https://ury.org.uk/uryplayer/podcasts/851/]
| Jon Lee (off of S Club 7)
| Someone talk about this.
|-
| 2012
| Rumplestiltskin [https://ury.org.uk/uryplayer/podcasts/723/]
| Alan Fletcher (Dr. Karl Raymond Marx Kennedy)
|
|}

Rob Stoneduck

2015-12-05T15:22:22Z

7449:

[[File:Rob Stoneduck.jpg|thumb|Rob Stoneduck, January 2014]]

Rob Stoneduck is the official URY mascot - and has been since he first appeared in the station in early 2012.

== Acquisition ==
One Red Paperclip[http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.co.uk/] is the story of a man who traded a red paperclip until he had up-traded all the way to a house. It's an exciting adventure that has expired many people. Not to be left out, in 2012 the RAG team wanted in too - they started with a red paperclip and wanted something that at the end they could sell and give the earnings to charity.

So, on a winter's morning, during an episode of No Show Scheduled[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/11541/], two lovely RAG representatives appeared at the station door, explained the situation, then asked what we would trade for two toy ducks. After some digging around, we offered them a pair of cool-looking sunglasses that had been lying abandoned on a shelf for some time. This makes Rob's birthday most likely to be 11th February 2012, somewhere between 1am and 2am.

After discovering the fluffier duck could quack when we squeak it, he quickly became popular on many of URY's shows, and was dubbed "Rob Stoneduck", after the then-station manager of the same name[http://ury.org.uk/people/6978/].

The other duck has not been seen since.

== The Student Politics Phase ==
Rob Stoneduck briefly went on a road trip to outside YourSpace one day, as part of Refreshers' Fair 2013. As part of the "Where was Stoneduck?" game that featured on what had now become URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/12643/], Rob briefly ventured into the YUSU Sabbatical Office. [[Kallum Taylor]] was then a guest on the show, who needed to guess where Stoneduck was. After guessing correctly, Rob Stoneduck enjoyed his time so much, he left with Kallum to learn more about what goes on within YUSU.

Rob Stoneduck was rescued by [[Lloyd Wallis]] a week later, notable shaken up and with a collar and a bell around his neck. Rob does not speak about what happened whilst he was there, but [[Bob Hughes]] informs us that there was a lot of "getting thrown around".

== Rob Stoneduck in Popular Culture ==
''This area is in need of expansion. Have you seen or heard some of Rob Stoneduck's antics?''

* Rob Stoneduck was a key point in a game called "Where was Stoneduck?" in URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy. Each week, we'd send him out to somewhere on campus, ask where he was, and he would quack in response. Curious looks were often garnered from others, particularly when he started quacking in Costcutter. Guests or listeners would then need to guess where he was based on ambient noise (only presenters can speak duck, so his answer to "Where are you today?" was lost in translation for all but the instigators).

[[Category:URY History]]

Rob Stoneduck

2015-12-05T15:19:13Z

7449:

[[File:Rob Stoneduck.jpg|thumb|Rob Stoneduck, January 2014]]

Rob Stoneduck is the official URY mascot - and has been since he first appeared in the station in early 2012.

== Acquisition ==
One Red Paperclip[http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.co.uk/] is the story of a man who traded a red paperclip until he had up-traded all the way to a house. It's an exciting adventure that has expired many people. Not to be left out, in 2012 the RAG team wanted in too - they started with a red paperclip and wanted something that at the end they could sell and give the earnings to charity.

So, on a winter's morning, during an episode of No Show Scheduled[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/11541/], two lovely RAG representatives appeared at the station door, explained the situation, then asked what we would trade for two toy ducks. After some digging around, we offered them a pair of cool-looking sunglasses that had been lying abandoned on a shelf for some time. This makes Rob's birthday most likely to be 11th February 2012, somewhere between 1am and 2am.

After discovering the fluffier duck could quack when we squeak it, he quickly became popular on many of URY's shows, and was dubbed "Rob Stoneduck", after the then-station manager of the same name[http://ury.org.uk/people/6978/].

The other duck has not been seen since.

== The Student Politics Phase ==
Rob Stoneduck briefly went on a road trip to outside YourSpace one day, as part of Refreshers' Fair 2013. As part of the "Where was Stoneduck?" game that featured on what had now become URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/12643/], Rob briefly ventured into the YUSU Sabbatical Office. [[Kallum Taylor]] was then a guest on the show, who needed to guess where Stoneduck was. After guessing correctly, Rob Stoneduck enjoyed his time so much, he left with Kallum to learn more about what goes on within YUSU.

Rob Stoneduck was rescued by [[Lloyd Wallis]] a week later, notable shaken up and with a collar and a bell around his neck. Rob does not speak about what happened whilst he was there, but [[Bob Hughes]] informs us that there was a lot of "getting thrown around".

== Rob Stoneduck in Popular Culture ==
* Rob Stoneduck was a key point in a game called "Where was Stoneduck?" in URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy. Each week, we'd send him out to somewhere on campus, ask where he was, and he would quack in response. Curious looks were often garnered from others, particularly when he started quacking in Costcutter. Guests or listeners would then need to guess where he was based on ambient noise (only presenters can speak duck, so his answer to "Where are you today?" was lost in translation for all but the instigators).

[[Category:URY History]]

Rob Stoneduck

2015-12-05T15:14:21Z

7449:

[[File:Rob Stoneduck.jpg|thumb|Rob Stoneduck, January 2014]]

Rob Stoneduck is the official URY mascot - and has been since he first appeared in the station in early 2012.

== Acquisition ==
One Red Paperclip[http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.co.uk/] is the story of a man who traded a red paperclip until he had up-traded all the way to a house. It's an exciting adventure that has expired many people. Not to be left out, in 2012 the RAG team wanted in too - they started with a red paperclip and wanted something that at the end they could sell and give the earnings to charity.

So, on a winter's morning, during an episode of No Show Scheduled[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/11541/], two lovely RAG representatives appeared at the station door, explained the situation, then asked what we would trade for two toy ducks. After some digging around, we offered them a pair of cool-looking sunglasses that had been lying abandoned on a shelf for some time.

After discovering the fluffier duck could quack when we squeak it, he quickly became popular on many of URY's shows, and was dubbed "Rob Stoneduck", after the then-station manager of the same name[http://ury.org.uk/people/6978/].

The other duck has not been seen since.

== The Student Politics Phase ==
Rob Stoneduck briefly went on a road trip to outside YourSpace one day, as part of Refreshers' Fair 2013. As part of the "Where was Stoneduck?" game that featured on what had now become URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy[http://ury.org.uk/schedule/shows/12643/], Rob briefly ventured into the YUSU Sabbatical Office. [[Kallum Taylor]] was then a guest on the show, who needed to guess where Stoneduck was. After guessing correctly, Rob Stoneduck enjoyed his time so much, he left with Kallum to learn more about what goes on within YUSU.

Rob Stoneduck was rescued by [[Lloyd Wallis]] a week later, notable shaken up and with a collar and a bell around his neck. Rob does not speak about what happened whilst he was there, but [[Bob Hughes]] informs us that there was a lot of "getting thrown around".

== Rob Stoneduck in Popular Culture ==
* Rob Stoneduck was a key point in a game called "Where was Stoneduck?" in URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy. Each week, we'd send him out to somewhere on campus, ask where he was, and he would quack in response. Curious looks were often garnered from others, particularly when he started quacking in Costcutter. Guests or listeners would then need to guess where he was based on ambient noise (only presenters can speak duck, so his answer to "Where are you today?" was lost in translation for all but the instigators).

[[Category:URY History]]

User:7449

2015-10-22T23:21:28Z

7449:

Lloyd Wallis is a URY member principally known for his involvements in the [[Computing]] Team. Whilst he formally left all committee involvement and responsibilities in Autumn 2013, he spent the rest of his final academic year tidying up unfinished projects, documenting systems, and occasionally being woken up after 3 hours sleep by the Chief Engineer because he plugged something in the wrong hole. He may have also gotten heavily involved with another campus broadcast media outlet.

He was the instigator of the first ever ground-up rewrite of URY's Constitution in 2013, which made him the last ever Head of Training. Before this, the constitution held licencing decisions were to be made at a meeting of a University Committee. The committee that replaced the committee that replaced the committee that replaced this committee last met in 1993.

{{Member
|name=Lloyd Wallis
|start=October 2011
|end=June 2014
|shows=No Show Scheduled I'm on the Radio! URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy URY:PM with Lloyd and Adam
|positions=Assistant Head of Computing (Oct 2011-May 2013), Head of Training (May 2013-Nov 2013)
|lastknown=Software Engineer, BBC Future Media
}}

{{User HeadOfTeam|team=Training|start=May 2013|end=Nov 2013}}
{{User Officer|position=Assistant Head of Computing|start=2011|end=2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented No Show Scheduled}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY:PM with Lloyd and Adam}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY:PM with Lloyd or Cadan}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Biggest Blunder - Silver in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Most Likely to Fail Degree Because of URY - Gold in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Technical Achievement - Bronze in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Behind the Scenes Contribution - Silver in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Technical Achievement - Silver in Student Radio Awards 2013}}

User:7449

2015-10-22T23:19:50Z

7449:

Lloyd Wallis is a URY member principally known for his involvements in the [[Computing]] Team. Whilst he formally left all committee involvement and responsibilities in Autumn 2013, he spent the rest of his final academic year tidying up unfinished projects, documenting systems, and occasionally being woken up after 3 hours sleep by the Chief Engineer because he plugged something in the wrong hole. He may have also gotten heavily involved with another campus broadcast media outlet.

He was the instigator of the first ever ground-up rewrite of URY's Constitution in 2013, which made him the last ever Head of Training.

{{Member
|name=Lloyd Wallis
|start=October 2011
|end=June 2014
|shows=No Show Scheduled I'm on the Radio! URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy URY:PM with Lloyd and Adam
|positions=Assistant Head of Computing (Oct 2011-May 2013), Head of Training (May 2013-Nov 2013)
|lastknown=Software Engineer, BBC Digital
}}

{{User HeadOfTeam|team=Training|start=May 2013|end=Nov 2013}}
{{User Officer|position=Assistant Head of Computing|start=2011|end=2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented No Show Scheduled}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY:PM with Lloyd and Adam}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY:PM with Lloyd or Cadan}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Biggest Blunder - Silver in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Most Likely to Fail Degree Because of URY - Gold in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Technical Achievement - Bronze in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Behind the Scenes Contribution - Silver in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Technical Achievement - Silver in Student Radio Awards 2013}}

Incident Report: 20140202

2014-12-13T14:17:26Z

7449:

{{Incident
|brief=A segmentation fault on our web server caused cascading failures on all URY Computing Services
|severity=Critical
|impact=High (Complete failure of many URY Computing Services for 37+ minutes)
|start=02/02/2014 23:00
|end=02/02/2014 23:49
|mitigation=Multiple actions required to prevent recurrence.
|leader=[[Anthony Williams]] <anthony@ury.org.uk>
|others=[[Andrew Durant]] <aj@ury.org.uk>
}}

An at-the-time regular failure of PHP5 APC package caused many of URY's Computing Services to be unavailable for a period of time on Sunday 2nd of February.

Due to a system issue under active investigation, PHP's APC module, which underpins the [[MyRadio]] caching system, the ability to service some PHP requests currently regularly fails due to a segmentation fault. This issue breaks member-facing services, not public facing, and due to monitoring systems is usually restored within 5 minutes of failing. Investigation currently involves increasing levels of debug compile options being enabled to locate the root cause of the segmentation fault. It was also at the time not clear whether or not this was related to another issue, where some Apache modules would fail after a log rotate due to not updating file pointers correctly.

From approximately 18:25 until 18:35 on 2nd February, The University of York's connection to Janet briefly failed for reasons currently unknown (src: "''gavinatkinson doesn't actually know what happened with the offsite glitch''"). Several monitoring IRC robots that often provide useful information, including ''xymon-bsod'', our service monitoring bot, dropped off from Freenode and failed to reconnect once access was restored.

Due to xymon-bsod being offline, none of us were aware of the failure of myradio_daemon, one of our backend services, and the increasing load averages on our web server, which would have notified us when the initial segmentation fault appeared at 23:00 and load gradually increased.

At 23:12, Pyramid, the framework that our website is based on, started to report failures with some of its backend requests which are based on the MyRadio API or certain parts of the database. At this point, xymon-bsod would have likely picked up HTTP response alerts too.

At 23:27, Pyramid started completely timing out processing new requests. At this point, Apache's wsgi handlers also started queueing up waiting for responses from Pyramid, retrying several times before themselves timing out.

At 23:28, the first user report was received, via a private Facebook message to [[Lloyd Wallis]]. Lloyd was unavailable at the time and the message went unnoticed. Four more users reported the failure in this way over the next few minutes.

At 23:33, our PostgreSQL database reported that service had reached the maximum number of allowed active connections and stopped serving new requests. At this time, services such as our Jukebox Scheduler, Tracklisting and BAPS all stopped working, significantly hampering broadcast capabilities.

At 23:34 the scale of the outage finally led to phone calls and other notifications drawing attention of the issue to the actual URY Computing Team. At this point the load on our web server was over 90. The database is diagnosed as the cause of many issues and a restart was requested at 23:38, but was delayed waiting for the idle connections to terminate. The restart of this service was completed at 23:42 and services required for broadcast recovered.

Apache was then stopped at 23:48 to allow the web server to calm down and recover to a regular load average. It was restarted at 23:49, at which point all URY Computing Services were once again operating normally.

== Causes ==
* The segmentation fault that causes MyRadio to fail is still under investigation to identify the root cause.
* The stage of processing that MyRadio appears to be in at the time of segfault means that a database connection is opened, but does not get cleanly closed due to the crash. This left idle connections on the database which over time cause other systems to fail.

== Work Required ==
* A review of the MyRadio code is required to ensure that any steps possible are taken to cleanly terminate database connections after a failure.
* A review of PostgreSQL is required to see if it can have reduced idle timeouts or better handling of broken connections.
* The root cause of the APC Segmentation Faults needs to be discovered and rectified, replacing APC with another solution if necessary.
* Monitoring of system failures of this nature needs to be reviewed and improved, including automated reconnection of IRC bots and email reporting.
* A behaviour change of URY members is required to ensure that problems are reported through the correct channels. Lloyd Wallis is not a correct channel for reporting problems.

[[Category:Incident Reports]]

Computing

2014-12-13T13:34:51Z

7449: /* What we use */

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/15 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (the BAPS server), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using the Radio API Daemon (RAPID) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface to define a range of pre-defined playlist schedules and some automated playlist generation. Its scheduler is part of the MyRadio framework and integrates with the telnet interface of a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyRadio framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

During initial development, it went through several names - BAPSWeb 2, BAPS Planner and NIPSWeb, before eventually being named the more simple Show Planner. It replaced BAPSWeb, a single several-thousand line PHP file and a Comic-Sans interface which were developed around the same time as BAPS itself.

Version 1 was featured as part of our Less Black and More Graphics entry in the Student Radio Awards 2012, but was replaced by the MyRadio integrated version over the next year.

Version 2 of this little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

Version 3 is current near-completion, the client-side complete rewritten as part of MyRadio's move to Bootstrap.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

URY membership is £7 if you make a regular habit of poking our systems, but anyone is free to come and have a go. The team often has meetings at on Wednesdays in VBar around 7pm.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===
* ''2014-present'': [[Anthony Williams]]
* ''2011-2014'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Qumarth Jash]]
* [[Charles Pigott]]
* [[Sam Willcocks]]
* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]] (2011-2014, still an active alumnus)
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Computing

2014-12-13T13:34:14Z

7449: /* Prospective members */

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/15 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (the BAPS server), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using the Radio API Daemon (RAPID) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface to define a range of pre-defined playlist schedules and some automated playlist generation. Its scheduler is part of the MyRadio framework and integrates with the telnet interface of a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyRadio framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

During initial development, it went through several names - BAPSWeb 2, BAPS Planner and NIPSWeb, before eventually being named the more simple Show Planner. It replaced BAPSWeb, a single several-thousand line PHP file and a Comic-Sans interface which were developed around the same time as BAPS itself.

Version 1 was featured as part of our Less Black and More Graphics entry in the Student Radio Awards 2012, but was replaced by the MyRadio integrated version over the next year.

Version 2 of this little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

Version 3 is current near-completion, the client-side complete rewritten as part of MyRadio's move to Bootstrap.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

URY membership is £7 if you make a regular habit of poking our systems, but anyone is free to come and have a go. The team often has meetings at on Wednesdays in VBar around 7pm.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===
* ''2014-present'': [[Anthony Williams]]
* ''2011-2014'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Qumarth Jash]]
* [[Charles Pigott]]
* [[Sam Willcocks]]
* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]] (2011-2014, still an active alumnus)
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Computing

2014-12-13T13:32:46Z

7449: /* Show Planner */

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/15 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (the BAPS server), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using the Radio API Daemon (RAPID) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface to define a range of pre-defined playlist schedules and some automated playlist generation. Its scheduler is part of the MyRadio framework and integrates with the telnet interface of a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyRadio framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

During initial development, it went through several names - BAPSWeb 2, BAPS Planner and NIPSWeb, before eventually being named the more simple Show Planner. It replaced BAPSWeb, a single several-thousand line PHP file and a Comic-Sans interface which were developed around the same time as BAPS itself.

Version 1 was featured as part of our Less Black and More Graphics entry in the Student Radio Awards 2012, but was replaced by the MyRadio integrated version over the next year.

Version 2 of this little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

Version 3 is current near-completion, the client-side complete rewritten as part of MyRadio's move to Bootstrap.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

You will need to be a member of URY (and thus pay URY membership dues) in order to run for a position or gain elevated access on URY systems. However, we allow non-members to "shadow" the team, attend team meetings and contribute to our public code repositories, so you can certainly try us out or get involved with no obligation to pay up-front.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===
* ''2014-present'': [[Anthony Williams]]
* ''2011-2014'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Qumarth Jash]]
* [[Charles Pigott]]
* [[Sam Willcocks]]
* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]] (2011-2014, still an active alumnus)
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Computing

2014-12-13T13:28:01Z

7449:

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/15 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (the BAPS server), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using the Radio API Daemon (RAPID) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface to define a range of pre-defined playlist schedules and some automated playlist generation. Its scheduler is part of the MyRadio framework and integrates with the telnet interface of a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyURY framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

This little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

You will need to be a member of URY (and thus pay URY membership dues) in order to run for a position or gain elevated access on URY systems. However, we allow non-members to "shadow" the team, attend team meetings and contribute to our public code repositories, so you can certainly try us out or get involved with no obligation to pay up-front.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===
* ''2014-present'': [[Anthony Williams]]
* ''2011-2014'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Qumarth Jash]]
* [[Charles Pigott]]
* [[Sam Willcocks]]
* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]] (2011-2014, still an active alumnus)
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Computing

2014-12-13T13:26:26Z

7449:

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/15 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (the BAPS server), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using the Radio API Daemon (RAPID) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface which is marked to soon become part of the MyURY framework. It uses PHP, telnet and a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyURY framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

This little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

You will need to be a member of URY (and thus pay URY membership dues) in order to run for a position or gain elevated access on URY systems. However, we allow non-members to "shadow" the team, attend team meetings and contribute to our public code repositories, so you can certainly try us out or get involved with no obligation to pay up-front.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===
* ''2014-present'': [[Anthony Williams]]
* ''2011-2014'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Qumarth Jash]]
* [[Charles Pigott]]
* [[Sam Willcocks]]
* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]] (2011-2014, still an active alumnus)
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Student Radio Awards

2014-12-09T20:58:06Z

7449:

The Student Radio Awards is an annual event hosted by the [[Student Radio Association]]. Every year, URY enters itself for several different awards, sometimes winning.

== Trivia ==
* URY regularly loses out to Best Station because [[URN]] claim to be better. The majority of the committee justify this with Nottingham being significantly larger, URN having a lot more money, and a part time staff member to run it.
* URY's very own [[Coco Cole]] was one of the Voices of the Awards in 2012. A small amount of gratification was to be had when she eventually had to read out URY's Best Technical Achievement submission name.
* In 2013, URY was joint first in Most Nominations with Fly FM, and Most Awarded with Fly FM and URN.
* Harry Whittaker was the first person in living Student Radio Association history that has received 3 nominations in a single year.

== Award History ==

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2014 SRAs|2014]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Journalistic Programming
| SCRATCH RADIO (Gold), '''River Safety: York’s Rising Problem - URY (Silver)''', URN (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2013 SRAs|2013]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Technical Achievement (Talkback)
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), URY: Show Planner (Silver), Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Technical Achievement (Show Planner)]]
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), '''URY: Show Planner (Silver)''', Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Bos Tones)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Ellie Wright's World Music)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Entertainment Show (The Harry Whittaker Show)
| The Morning Show with Giles Gear (Gold), Wake and Bake with Laurence and Gareth (Silver), '''The Harry Whittaker Show - ((URY)) (Bronze)'''
|-
| Best Male (Harry Whittaker)
| Pure FM: Glen Scott (Gold), Radio LaB: Danny Fullbrook (Silver), Spark FM: Jonny Chambers (Bronze)
|-
| Best Newcomer (Harry Whittaker)
| Ben Sheppard (Gold), '''Harry Whittaker - ((URY)) (Silver)''', Dom Stirling (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (The New World Order: Part 2: 1651)]]
| '''URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold)''', URY: Trimble (Silver), A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (Trimble)]]
| URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold), '''URY: Trimble (Silver)''', A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2012 SRAs|2012]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| [http://www.studentradioawards.co.uk/content/Awards/2012/Winners/pdf_w3s1i1.pdf Best Station]
| URN (Gold), '''URY (Silver)''', 107 Spark FM (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

[[Category: Awards]]

Student Radio Awards

2014-12-09T20:57:21Z

7449:

The Student Radio Awards is an annual event hosted by the [[Student Radio Association]]. Every year, URY enters itself for several different awards, sometimes winning.

== Trivia ==
* URY regularly loses out to Best Station because [[URN]] claim to be better. The majority of the committee justify this with Nottingham being significantly larger, URN having a lot more money, and a part time staff member to run it.
* URY's very own [[Coco Cole]] was one of the Voices of the Awards in 2012. A small amount of gratification was to be had when she eventually had to read out URY's Best Technical Achievement submission name.
* In 2013, URY was joint first in Most Nominations with Fly FM, and Most Awarded with Fly FM and URN.
* Harry Whittaker was the first person in living Student Radio Association history that has received 3 nominations in a single year.

== Award History ==

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2013 SRAs|2013]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Technical Achievement (Talkback)
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), URY: Show Planner (Silver), Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Technical Achievement (Show Planner)]]
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), '''URY: Show Planner (Silver)''', Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Bos Tones)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Ellie Wright's World Music)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Entertainment Show (The Harry Whittaker Show)
| The Morning Show with Giles Gear (Gold), Wake and Bake with Laurence and Gareth (Silver), '''The Harry Whittaker Show - ((URY)) (Bronze)'''
|-
| Best Male (Harry Whittaker)
| Pure FM: Glen Scott (Gold), Radio LaB: Danny Fullbrook (Silver), Spark FM: Jonny Chambers (Bronze)
|-
| Best Newcomer (Harry Whittaker)
| Ben Sheppard (Gold), '''Harry Whittaker - ((URY)) (Silver)''', Dom Stirling (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (The New World Order: Part 2: 1651)]]
| '''URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold)''', URY: Trimble (Silver), A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (Trimble)]]
| URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold), '''URY: Trimble (Silver)''', A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2012 SRAs|2012]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| [http://www.studentradioawards.co.uk/content/Awards/2012/Winners/pdf_w3s1i1.pdf Best Station]
| URN (Gold), '''URY (Silver)''', 107 Spark FM (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| 107 Spark FM: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

[[Category: Awards]]

Student Radio Awards

2014-12-09T20:55:17Z

7449:

The Student Radio Awards is an annual event hosted by the [[Student Radio Association]]. Every year, URY enters itself for several different awards, sometimes winning.

== Trivia ==
* URY regularly loses out to Best Station because [[URN]] claim to be better. The majority of the committee justify this with Nottingham being significantly larger, URN having a lot more money, and a part time staff member to run it.
* URY's very own [[Coco Cole]] was one of the Voices of the Awards in 2012. A small amount of gratification was to be had when she eventually had to read out URY's Best Technical Achievement submission name.
* In 2013, URY was joint first in Most Nominations with Fly FM, and Most Awarded with Fly FM and URN.
* Harry Whittaker was the first person in living Student Radio Association history that has received 3 nominations in a single year.

== Award History ==

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2014 SRAs|2014]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Journalistic Programming
| SCRATCH RADIO (Gold), '''River Safety: York’s Rising Problem - URY (Silver)''', URN (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2013 SRAs|2013]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Technical Achievement (Talkback)
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), URY: Show Planner (Silver), Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Technical Achievement (Show Planner)]]
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), '''URY: Show Planner (Silver)''', Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Bos Tones)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Ellie Wright's World Music)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Entertainment Show (The Harry Whittaker Show)
| The Morning Show with Giles Gear (Gold), Wake and Bake with Laurence and Gareth (Silver), '''The Harry Whittaker Show - ((URY)) (Bronze)'''
|-
| Best Male (Harry Whittaker)
| Pure FM: Glen Scott (Gold), Radio LaB: Danny Fullbrook (Silver), Spark FM: Jonny Chambers (Bronze)
|-
| Best Newcomer (Harry Whittaker)
| Ben Sheppard (Gold), '''Harry Whittaker - ((URY)) (Silver)''', Dom Stirling (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (The New World Order: Part 2: 1651)]]
| '''URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold)''', URY: Trimble (Silver), A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (Trimble)]]
| URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold), '''URY: Trimble (Silver)''', A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
|}

''In addition, '''URY: Trimble''' won the Silver Kevin Greening Award for Creativity, which is selected from all entrants.''

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2012 SRAs|2012]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| [http://www.studentradioawards.co.uk/content/Awards/2012/Winners/pdf_w3s1i1.pdf Best Station]
| URN (Gold), '''URY (Silver)''', 107 Spark FM (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

[[Category: Awards]]

Student Radio Awards

2014-12-09T20:55:01Z

7449:

The Student Radio Awards is an annual event hosted by the [[Student Radio Association]]. Every year, URY enters itself for several different awards, sometimes winning.

== Trivia ==
* URY regularly loses out to Best Station because [[URN]] claim to be better. The majority of the committee justify this with Nottingham being significantly larger, URN having a lot more money, and a part time staff member to run it.
* URY's very own [[Coco Cole]] was one of the Voices of the Awards in 2012. A small amount of gratification was to be had when she eventually had to read out URY's Best Technical Achievement submission name.
* In 2013, URY was joint first in Most Nominations with Fly FM, and Most Awarded with Fly FM and URN.
* Harry Whittaker was the first person in living Student Radio Association history that has received 3 nominations in a single year.

== Award History ==

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2014 SRAs|2012]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Journalistic Programming
| SCRATCH RADIO (Gold), '''River Safety: York’s Rising Problem - URY (Silver)''', URN (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2013 SRAs|2013]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| Best Technical Achievement (Talkback)
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), URY: Show Planner (Silver), Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Technical Achievement (Show Planner)]]
| 1449AM URYB's UK Radioplayer Console & Unified Station Management Application (Gold), '''URY: Show Planner (Silver)''', Shock Radio: New Broadcast Architecture (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Bos Tones)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming (Ellie Wright's World Music)
| Will Metcalf (Gold), Monster FM: Roya's Celtic Show (Silver), Fly FM: The Urban Swift with Temi Jonah (Bronze)
|-
| Best Entertainment Show (The Harry Whittaker Show)
| The Morning Show with Giles Gear (Gold), Wake and Bake with Laurence and Gareth (Silver), '''The Harry Whittaker Show - ((URY)) (Bronze)'''
|-
| Best Male (Harry Whittaker)
| Pure FM: Glen Scott (Gold), Radio LaB: Danny Fullbrook (Silver), Spark FM: Jonny Chambers (Bronze)
|-
| Best Newcomer (Harry Whittaker)
| Ben Sheppard (Gold), '''Harry Whittaker - ((URY)) (Silver)''', Dom Stirling (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (The New World Order: Part 2: 1651)]]
| '''URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold)''', URY: Trimble (Silver), A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
| [[Best Speech Programming (Trimble)]]
| URY: The New World Order: Part 2: 1651 (Gold), '''URY: Trimble (Silver)''', A Seaside Town (Bronze)
|-
|}

''In addition, '''URY: Trimble''' won the Silver Kevin Greening Award for Creativity, which is selected from all entrants.''

{| class="wikitable"
|+[[2012 SRAs|2012]]
|-
! Nominations
! Winner
|-
| [http://www.studentradioawards.co.uk/content/Awards/2012/Winners/pdf_w3s1i1.pdf Best Station]
| URN (Gold), '''URY (Silver)''', 107 Spark FM (Bronze)
|-
| Best Specialist Music Programming
| ???: Dance Revolution (Gold), LSRFM: Mim Shaikh Presents The Shaikh World Show (Silver), '''URY: Coco Electro (Bronze)'''
|}

[[Category: Awards]]

Timeline

2014-12-09T20:48:59Z

7449:

This is the general '''URY timeline''', arranged by decade.

== 60s ==

* ''1960: The UK's first student radio station is founded as Crush Radio (but it doesn't legally broadcast for a while)''.
* '''1967''': URY is founded as the UK's first ''legal'' independent broadcasting radio station, as Radio York under a test licence from the BBC.
* '''1969''': Radio York is refounded as University Radio York and opened with a guest broadcast by John Peel.

== 70s ==

* '''1976''': URY hosted the National Association of Students broadcasters 5th Annual College, Goodricke College, Saturday 31st of January to Sunday 1st of February.

== 80s ==

== 90s ==
*'''1998''' URY celebrates its 30th birthday by a Restricted Service Licence (RSL), broadcasting on FM for four weeks to the city of York as well as campus.

*'''1999''' URY moves from an induction loop system on campus to a Low Powered AM licence (LPAM) enabling a stronger signal on campus and more listeners.

*'''1999''' To celebrate the turn of the millenium URY compiles the "Ultimate Student Chart" with "Bohemian Rhapsody" named the No.1 song. The station also organised its first gig featuring local and national bands called "Spark".

== 00s ==

* '''2005''': URY wins the SRA Award for Best Student Station.

*'''2008''': URY celebrates its 40th birthday with a 2 week FM broadcast in May.

== 10s ==

* '''2011''': URY joins the UK Radioplayer service as one of the first stations to do so.
* '''2012''': URY moves to a larger webcaster licence. At the same time, Tom Whitehouse ends his long tenure as Honorary President and is replaced.
* '''2013''': URY wins 7 Student Radio Awards out of 9 nominations.
* '''2014''': URY wins Best Journalistic Programming at the Student Radio Awards with its coverage or river safety.

[[Category:URY History]]

User:7449

2014-10-14T23:33:04Z

7449:

Lloyd Wallis is a URY member principally known for his involvements in the [[Computing]] Team. Whilst he formally left all committee involvement and responsibilities in Autumn 2013, he spent the rest of his final academic year tidying up unfinished projects, documenting systems, and occasionally being woken up after 3 hours sleep by the Chief Engineer because he plugged something in the wrong hole. He may have also gotten heavily involved with another campus broadcast media outlet.

He was the instigator of the first ever ground-up rewrite of URY's Constitution in 2013, which made him the last ever Head of Training.

{{Member
|name=Lloyd Wallis
|start=October 2011
|end=June 2014
|shows=No Show Scheduled I'm on the Radio! URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy URY:PM with Lloyd and Adam
|positions=Assistant Head of Computing (Oct 2011-May 2013), Head of Training (May 2013-Nov 2013)
|lastknown=Software Engineer, BBC Future Media
}}

{{User HeadOfTeam|team=Training|start=May 2013|end=Nov 2013}}
{{User Officer|position=Assistant Head of Computing|start=2011|end=2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented No Show Scheduled}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY:PM with Lloyd and Adam}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY:PM with Lloyd or Cadan}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Biggest Blunder - Silver in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Most Likely to Fail Degree Because of URY - Gold in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Technical Achievement - Bronze in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Behind the Scenes Contribution - Silver in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Technical Achievement - Silver in Student Radio Awards 2013}}

Computing

2014-10-14T23:30:52Z

7449: /* Heads of Teams */

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/14 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (also known as the Streaming Library of URY Tracks), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using BAPS Ruby Abstraction (BRA) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface which is marked to soon become part of the MyURY framework. It uses PHP, telnet and a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyURY framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

This little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

You will need to be a member of URY (and thus pay URY membership dues) in order to run for a position or gain elevated access on URY systems. However, we allow non-members to "shadow" the team, attend team meetings and contribute to our public code repositories, so you can certainly try us out or get involved with no obligation to pay up-front.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===
* ''2014-present'': [[Anthony Williams]]
* ''2011-2014'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Charles Pigott]]
* [[Sam Willcocks]]
* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]] (2011-2014, still an active alumnus)
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Computing

2014-10-14T23:30:37Z

7449: /* Other Members */

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/14 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (also known as the Streaming Library of URY Tracks), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using BAPS Ruby Abstraction (BRA) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface which is marked to soon become part of the MyURY framework. It uses PHP, telnet and a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyURY framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

This little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

You will need to be a member of URY (and thus pay URY membership dues) in order to run for a position or gain elevated access on URY systems. However, we allow non-members to "shadow" the team, attend team meetings and contribute to our public code repositories, so you can certainly try us out or get involved with no obligation to pay up-front.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===
* ''2014-present': [[Anthony Williams]]
* ''2011-2014'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Charles Pigott]]
* [[Sam Willcocks]]
* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]] (2011-2014, still an active alumnus)
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Computing

2014-10-14T23:29:21Z

7449: /* Heads of Teams */

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/14 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (also known as the Streaming Library of URY Tracks), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using BAPS Ruby Abstraction (BRA) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface which is marked to soon become part of the MyURY framework. It uses PHP, telnet and a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyURY framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

This little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

You will need to be a member of URY (and thus pay URY membership dues) in order to run for a position or gain elevated access on URY systems. However, we allow non-members to "shadow" the team, attend team meetings and contribute to our public code repositories, so you can certainly try us out or get involved with no obligation to pay up-front.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===
* ''2014-present': [[Anthony Williams]]
* ''2011-2014'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]]
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Computing

2014-10-14T23:24:40Z

7449: /* What do we do? */

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Nginx''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Apache'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/14 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (also known as the Streaming Library of URY Tracks), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using BAPS Ruby Abstraction (BRA) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface which is marked to soon become part of the MyURY framework. It uses PHP, telnet and a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyURY framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

This little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

You will need to be a member of URY (and thus pay URY membership dues) in order to run for a position or gain elevated access on URY systems. However, we allow non-members to "shadow" the team, attend team meetings and contribute to our public code repositories, so you can certainly try us out or get involved with no obligation to pay up-front.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===

* ''2011-present'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]]
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

User:7449

2014-06-26T15:51:37Z

7449:

Lloyd Wallis is a URY member principally known for his involvements in the [[Computing]] Team. Whilst he formally left all committee involvement and responsibilities in Autumn 2013, he spends the rest of the academic year tidying up unfinished projects, documenting systems, and occasionally being woken up after 3 hours sleep by the Chief Engineer because he plugged something in the wrong hole.

He was the instigator of the first ever ground-up rewrite of URY's Constitution in 2013, which made him the last ever Head of Training.

{{Member
|name=Lloyd Wallis
|start=October 2011
|end=June 2013
|shows=No Show Scheduled I'm on the Radio! URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy URY:PM with Lloyd and Adam
|positions=Assistant Head of Computing (Oct 2011-May 2013), Head of Training (May 2013-Nov 2013)
|lastknown=Software Engineer, BBC Future Media
}}

{{User HeadOfTeam|team=Training|start=May 2013|end=Nov 2013}}
{{User Officer|position=Assistant Head of Computing|start=2011|end=2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented No Show Scheduled}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY Lunch with Lloyd and Andy}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY:PM with Lloyd and Adam}}
{{Userbox|content=Presented URY:PM with Lloyd or Cadan}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Biggest Blunder - Silver in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Most Likely to Fail Degree Because of URY - Gold in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Technical Achievement - Bronze in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Behind the Scenes Contribution - Silver in URYAs 2013}}
{{Userbox|content=Won Best Technical Achievement - Silver in Student Radio Awards 2013}}

Template:Member

2014-06-26T15:51:17Z

7449:

<includeonly><div style="float: right">
{| class="wikitable" style="width: 350px;"
! colspan=2 style="background-color: #800000; color: white;"| Member
|-
| colspan=2 style="text-align: center;" | ''{{{name|Mr Website}}}''
|-
| colspan=2 style="background-color: #800000" |
|-
! colspan=2 | Summary
|-
! style="text-align: left;" | Joined
| {{{start|''Unknown''}}}
|-
! style="text-align: left;" | Left
| {{{end|''Current Member''}}}
|-
! style="text-align: left;" | Last Known Activities
| {{{lastknown|''Martyr''}}}
|-
| colspan=2 style="background-color: #800000" |
|-
! colspan=2 | URY Activities
|-
! style="text-align: left;" | Shows
| {{{shows|''None''}}}
|-
! style="text-align: left;" | Committee Positions
| {{{positions|''None''}}}
|}

</div></includeonly>
<noinclude>
Use this on User pages.
{{Member
|name=Tom Whitehouse
|start=No Records Available.
|end=Active Alumnus
|shows=No Records Available.
|positions=Honorary President (???-2012)
}}
</noinclude>

First Generation Computing Loggers

2014-06-26T15:47:01Z

7449:

The First Generation Computing Loggers, more formally known back in their prime as logger1.ury.york.ac.uk and logger2.ury.york.ac.uk, are two servers known as achieving amazing feats during their time in production, the most notable of which being that they were first put into use in the 2000-2001 academic year by a team including [[Mat Fortune]], [[Alan Raison]] and [[Gavin Atkinson]].

== Pre-Computing Loggers ==
Before we implemented a digital log recording system using hard disks, all our output was logged using VHS tapes that were changed every 12 hours by a dedicated committee position. The name of this position is currently difficult to retrieve due to it being before the days of digital committee management, but it is well known that [[James Brookes]] held the position for some time.

Multiple boxes of these tapes still exist in URY's [[stores]], although playback of any of these has not been attempted in living history. With the increasing proliferation of "Computers" in everyday life, it was decided that maybe there was a way of automating this historic task.

== Introducing logger[12] ==
When specifying the hardware specification of the loggers, with advice from [[Tom Whitehouse]] (serious, try and find a wiki page *without* his name on it), two systems were build with similar overall power, but with hardware sources as different as possible to reduce the possibility of a design flaw in one causing a failure in another.

=== Specifications of logger1 ===
* Operating System: FreeBSD 5.2-RC (Installed 2003)
* Processor: AMD-K6 3D (350.80MHz)
* Cores: 1
* Architecture: i386
* Memory: 27MB available (32MB installed)
* PSU: xxW AT power supply
* HDD: 40GB (8379 Power-On Hours)

''Last known updating advice for this server: "Don't update this server. It works just fine."''

=== Specifications of logger2 ===
* Operating System: Debian 2.4.18-1-k6 (Installed 2004)
* Processor: AMD-K6 3D (350.80MHz)
* Cores: 1
* Architecture: i386
* Memory: 29.8MB available (32MB installed)
* PSU: xxW AT power supply
* HDD: 40GB

''Last known updating advice for this server: "Don't update this server. It works just fine."''

== The Second Coming of Digital Logging ==
In Summer 2012, a plan was devised to start decommissioning these then 12-year-old devices. Due to the need for something that was provably highly stable (at least 42 days continuous service runtime), it took the next two academic years to reach a point where the replacement devices, uryred and uryblue (see [[Second Generation Computing Loggers]]), were considered stable enough to prepare turning off loggers 1 and 2.

A date was set for Friday, Week 10 of the Summer Term 2013/4, as it was the end of an academic year and also team veteran [[Lloyd Wallis]]'s last day in York (and birthday). It would be a ceremonial event where the loggers would be considered no longer mission-critical to our operations. However, as this was a short time before many components reached 10 years uptime, it was decided that they would likely be kept running (albeit not necessarily doing much) until that milestone was reached.

On Wednesday, Week 10 (25/06/2014), it was discovered that logger1 was not as healthy as was hoped - his PSU fan had failed and he was running hot. As a result, the decommissioning was brought forward to that evening.

== Trivia ==
* In Summer 2011/12, an eighth birthday cake was made for logger2's disk installation date. It was enjoyed at a station meeting, and a poem was written in a birthday card for him. Someone should transcribe this.

[[Category:Computing]]

First Generation Computing Loggers

2014-06-25T13:43:39Z

7449:

The First Generation Computing Loggers, more formally known back in their prime as logger1.ury.york.ac.uk and logger2.ury.york.ac.uk, are two servers known as achieving amazing feats during their time in production, the most notable of which being that they were first put into use in the 2000-2001 academic year by a team including [[Mat Fortune]], [[Alan Raison]] and [[Gavin Atkinson]].

== Pre-Computing Loggers ==
Before we implemented a digital log recording system using hard disks, all our output was logged using VHS tapes that were changed every 12 hours by a dedicated committee position. The name of this position is currently difficult to retrieve due to it being before the days of digital committee management, but it is well known that [[James Brookes]] held the position for some time.

Multiple boxes of these tapes still exist in URY's [[stores]], although playback of any of these has not been attempted in living history. With the increasing proliferation of "Computers" in everyday life, it was decided that maybe there was a way of automating this historic task.

== Introducing logger[12] ==
When specifying the hardware specification of the loggers, with advice from [[Tom Whitehouse]] (serious, try and find a wiki page *without* his name on it), two systems were build with similar overall power, but with hardware sources as different as possible to reduce the possibility of a design flaw in one causing a failure in another.

=== Specifications of logger1 ===
* Operating System: FreeBSD 5.2-RC (Installed 2003)
* Processor: AMD-K6 3D (350.80MHz)
* Cores: 1
* Architecture: i386
* Memory: 27MB available (32MB installed)
* PSU: xxW AT power supply
* HDD: 40GB (8379 Power-On Hours)

''Last known updating advice for this server: "Don't update this server. It works just fine."''

=== Specifications of logger2 ===
* Operating System: Debian 2.4.18-1-k6 (Installed 2004)
* Processor: AMD-K6 3D (350.80MHz)
* Cores: 1
* Architecture: i386
* Memory: 29.8MB available (32MB installed)
* PSU: xxW AT power supply
* HDD: 40GB

''Last known updating advice for this server: "Don't update this server. It works just fine."''

== The Second Coming of Digital Logging ==
In Summer 2012, a plan was devised to start decommissioning these then 12-year-old devices. Due to the need for something that was provably highly stable (at least 42 days continuous service runtime), it took the next two academic years to reach a point where the replacement devices, uryred and uryblue (see [[Second Generation Computing Loggers]]), were considered stable enough to prepare turning off loggers 1 and 2.

A date was set for Friday, Week 10 of the Summer Term 2013/4, as it was the end of an academic year and also team veteran [[Lloyd Wallis]]'s last day in York (and birthday). It would be a ceremonial event where the loggers would be considered no longer mission-critical to our operations. However, as this was a short time before many components reached 10 years uptime, it was decided that they would likely be kept running (albeit not necessarily doing much) until that milestone was reached.

On Wednesday, Week 10 (25/06/2014), it was discovered that logger1 was not as healthy as was hoped - his PSU fan had failed and he was running hot. As a result, the decommissioning was brought forward to that evening.

== Trivia ==
* In Summer 2011/12, a tenth birthday cake was made for logger2's disk installation date. It was enjoyed at a station meeting, and a poem was written in a birthday card for him. Someone should transcribe this.

[[Category:Computing]]

First Generation Computing Loggers

2014-06-25T13:35:52Z

7449: Created page with "The First Generation Computing Loggers, more formally known back in their prime as logger1.ury.york.ac.uk and logger2.ury.york.ac.uk, are two servers known as achieving amazin..."

Computing

2014-06-25T13:17:16Z

7449:

{{Team
|tstyle={{Teamstyle Computing}}
|name=Computing Team
|logo=[[File:Ctlogo.png]]
|brief=Maintains URY's computer systems, both hardware and software. Keeps the URY streams and website running.
|csec=[[Constitution#Computing_Team|Here]]
|roles=[[Head of Computing]] [[Assistant Head of Computing]] [[Webmaster]] [[Computing Officer]] (multiple)
|teammail=computing@ury.org.uk
|freshermail=computing@ury.org.uk
|hotmail=head.of.computing@ury.org.uk
}}
'''Computing Team''' is the URY [[team]] responsible for maintaining URY's computer ordinance, both hardware and software.

== What do we do? ==

We like to think of ourselves as the ''everything'' team, because while we're limited to poking anything that involves computers, we actually do an incredible amount of stuff:

=== Website ===

We look after the URY website, revamp or replace it when it gets old (about twice a year), and make sure that other teams are able to keep it full of content.

The website is written in Pyramid, which is a '''Python''' web framework. Coincidentally, computer science students at time of writing now learn Python as an introductory programming language. We also have some Web systems written in '''PHP''' and '''Ruby'''.

Our website runs on the '''Apache''' web server, with some of our backend systems using bits of '''Nginx'''.

=== Servers ===

We run our own physical servers, which involves a lot of nipping into our server shed to turn things off and on, swap cables around and shout at power supplies. If you like pulling things out of racks, staring at them, sticking RAM in them and putting them back in racks, then we offer one of the finest physical server admin experiences available to York students.

Of course, it isn't all about the hardware. We also do a lot of system administration on the software side, making sure that all the processes that keep URY running stay up and don't tie themselves in knots. We run '''FreeBSD''' and '''Debian GNU/Linux''', with a '''Windows Server''' domain controller for the desktop systems.

=== Desktops ===

Each studio has a few computers, typically running '''Windows''', that are used by presenters for playing out sound, connecting to the Internet, and using our Studio Information Service. These have to be maintained, of course, and it's us that rise to the challenge.

=== Software ===

Compteam develop and maintain most of our software in-house, a fact that we are very proud of - know of any other society at the university that can say that? Know of any other student radio station that can say that? We don't. We've listed some of our things below, and linked to our ''Ceedox'' wiki which keeps all our technical documentation and secrets. You have to have a URY account to see those pages, I'm afraid, but York students can get one instantly by going to [https://ury.org.uk/getinvolved].

==== LoggerNG ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:loggerng Ceedox Documentation]

LoggerNG is our new-for-2013 output logging system. Our Ofcom licence means we have to have a log of 42 days of output at all times - if we aren't recording, we aren't broadcasting. The old logger system runs on some vintage desktop hardware from around 2001, so we needed something new.

LoggerNG includes two dedicated servers, a ''sox''-based recording program, 65 days of FLAC files and a HTML5 download interface on a third server. It's a big thing, and needs to work 100% of the time, all the time (well, term time).

==== Broadcasting and Presenting Suite (BAPS) ====
This is another one of our older systems. Written around 2003 in Managed C++, at the time it was seen as everything a presenter would need to do a show - on a computer. Of course, the original designers did not plan for a decade in the future, where social media, HTML5 and APIs are the way of the future, so it is now starting to seem somewhat dated.

The server side of the system manages the ability to play out different audio to different sound cards. It lacks lots of functionality, but is in fact very very good at what it does.

Our 2013/14 roadmap is all about keeping this stable background service (also known as the Streaming Library of URY Tracks), but refresh the way users can interact with it, using BAPS Ruby Abstraction (BRA) and extending the existing capabilities of our Show Planner (HTML5/JS).

==== If No Show, I Do an Instantly Organised, Unending Show - Totally Outrageous Non-stop Entertainment System (insidious Tones (iTones)) ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:insidioustones Ceedox Documentation]

Publically known as URY's Campus Jukebox, this is the system that plays songs when there's not a presenter on air. It's another of our mission critical things as we can't broadcast silence, but it also has lots of neat tricks in the form of a web interface which is marked to soon become part of the MyURY framework. It uses PHP, telnet and a little-known thing called Liquidsoap (a Savonet project). Trust us when we say it is very powerful and a lot of fun to play with.

==== MyRadio ====
This magical little thing is designed to be the glue for URY's services. Written in PHP, Twig and HTML5, this is essentially our intranet. Here's some of the things it pulls together:

* Presenter Training
* Show Scheduling
* URYPlayer Podcasts
* Show Resources (beds, jingles etc.)
* Show Planning
* In-Studio Information (live messages, news & stats)
* Chart & Playlists
* Central Music Library
* iTones
* Mailing Lists
* Webcams (and archives)
* Show Monitoring
* Statistics

All of this is also exposed using an API [https://ury.org.uk/api/] which provides us with easy control and remote access to all of the above as well as Users, Committees, Images, Tracklists and our Studio Selector.

This API is then in turn used by a range of our resources, including our RadioPlayer page, E-mail service, MixCloud uploader, Presenter website pages, IRC bot and more. Put simply, this bundle of PHP holds our station together.

Oh, did I mention we're trying to generalise it so other stations can learn what we do under the hood? It's open sourced at [https://github.com/UniversityRadioYork/MyRadio]!

==== Show Planner ====
[https://ury.org.uk/ceedox/computing:software:in-house:myury:nipsweb Ceedox Documentation]

Built upon the MyURY framework, Show Planner is a HTML5 version of the in-studio BAPS client, but in a web browser. It allows anyone to plan shows, upload files and do lots of other neat stuff. If you like lots of pretty client side stuff, with a multi-user editable backend, then you'll love this.

This little gizmo won us a Silver Best Technical Achievement at the Student Radio Awards 2013.

=== Fun ===

Though Compteam have the burden of a lot of responsibility for critical systems most of the time, really most of us are here to '''have fun'''.

Being in and around a student radio station gives people who want to play around with new ideas in an existing context a real jumpstart, and as a consequence whenever we're not fixing stuff we're often in URY working on making new things. Here are a few examples:

* BAPS, URY's very own custom playout system (Matt Fortune, 20??/??)
* The studio clock system (Lloyd Wallis, 2011/12)

== Prospective members ==

Computing Team is always looking for new members, so if you're interested by what we do, send us an email (see the infobox on the right hand side)!

You will need to be a member of URY (and thus pay URY membership dues) in order to run for a position or gain elevated access on URY systems. However, we allow non-members to "shadow" the team, attend team meetings and contribute to our public code repositories, so you can certainly try us out or get involved with no obligation to pay up-front.

=== What we use ===

As Computing Team's goals involve education and development just as much as professionalism and dependability, there is no requirement for prior knowledge. That being said, some knowledge of any of the following would be a great start:

* Administration of Unix-style systems, especially Debian GNU/Linux and FreeBSD
* Administration of Windows client systems, Active Directory and Windows Server
* Python 2, especially Django
* SQL, especially PostgreSQL
* PHP
* Network administration (hardware and software)
* Continuous integration - Jenkins/Hudson, Travis
* Shell scripting
* Systems programming - C, Go, etc.

It'd be great if you're:
* Ready to learn and develop "on the job"
* Able to work both independently and as a team member
* Willing to investigate the way things are done and experiment with new ideas
* Willing to ask questions in order to get a better understanding
* Able to balance course and URY work, and not overly prioritise the latter over the former

== History ==

* Computing Team was formed by separation from the [[Technical]] Team as URY's dependency on computer systems increased during the late 90s and early 2000s.
* URY's longest ever serving servers (heh) were the [[First Generation Computing Loggers]], in production for 14 years and with 10 years of HDD runtime hours each.

== Members (past and present) ==

=== Heads of Teams ===

* ''2011-present'': [[Matt Windsor]]
* ''2010-2011'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* ''2009-2010'': [[Alex Williams]]
* ''2008-2009'': [[Gareth Andrew Lloyd]]
* (More to be inserted here)

=== Other Members ===

In a rough reverse chronological order.

* [[Adam Taylor]]
* [[Andrei-Costin Zisu]]
* [[Vivan Jayant]] (Webmaster, 2012)
* [[Sam Gamble]] (2011-12)
* [[Anthony Williams]]
* [[Danny Bell]]
* [[Donal Cahill]]
* [[Lloyd Wallis]]
* [[Andy Durant]] (as a "computerneer")
* (Expand this list!)

== Big Updates ==
During breaks between terms, CompTeam will often update or upgrade a large number of services. We like to post a list of changes toward the end of the break.

* [[Computing Updates: Christmas 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Summer 2013]]
* [[Computing Updates: Easter 2013]]

Incident Report: 20140202

2014-02-03T12:40:03Z

7449:

{{Incident
|brief=A segmentation fault on our web server caused cascading failures on all URY Computing Services
|severity=Critical
|impact=High (Complete failure of many URY Computing Services for 37+ minutes)
|start=02/02/2014 23:00
|end=02/02/2014 23:49
|mitigation=Multiple actions required to prevent recurrence.
|leader=[[Anthony Williams]] <lpw@ury.org.uk>
|others=[[Andrew Durant]] <aj@ury.org.uk>
}}

An at-the-time regular failure of PHP5 APC package caused many of URY's Computing Services to be unavailable for a period of time on Sunday 2nd of February.

Due to a system issue under active investigation, PHP's APC module, which underpins the [[MyRadio]] caching system, the ability to service some PHP requests currently regularly fails due to a segmentation fault. This issue breaks member-facing services, not public facing, and due to monitoring systems is usually restored within 5 minutes of failing. Investigation currently involves increasing levels of debug compile options being enabled to locate the root cause of the segmentation fault. It was also at the time not clear whether or not this was related to another issue, where some Apache modules would fail after a log rotate due to not updating file pointers correctly.

From approximately 18:25 until 18:35 on 2nd February, The University of York's connection to Janet briefly failed for reasons currently unknown (src: "''gavinatkinson doesn't actually know what happened with the offsite glitch''"). Several monitoring IRC robots that often provide useful information, including ''xymon-bsod'', our service monitoring bot, dropped off from Freenode and failed to reconnect once access was restored.

Due to xymon-bsod being offline, none of us were aware of the failure of myradio_daemon, one of our backend services, and the increasing load averages on our web server, which would have notified us when the initial segmentation fault appeared at 23:00 and load gradually increased.

At 23:12, Pyramid, the framework that our website is based on, started to report failures with some of its backend requests which are based on the MyRadio API or certain parts of the database. At this point, xymon-bsod would have likely picked up HTTP response alerts too.

At 23:27, Pyramid started completely timing out processing new requests. At this point, Apache's wsgi handlers also started queueing up waiting for responses from Pyramid, retrying several times before themselves timing out.

At 23:28, the first user report was received, via a private Facebook message to [[Lloyd Wallis]]. Lloyd was unavailable at the time and the message went unnoticed. Five more users reported the failure in this way over the next few minutes.

At 23:33, our PostgreSQL database reported that service had reached the maximum number of allowed active connections and stopped serving new requests. At this time, services such as our Jukebox Scheduler, Tracklisting and BAPS all stopped working, significantly hampering broadcast capabilities.

At 23:34 the scale of the outage finally led to phone calls and other notifications drawing attention of the issue to the actual URY Computing Team. At this point the load on our web server was over 90. The database is diagnosed as the cause of many issues and a restart was requested at 23:38, but was delayed waiting for the idle connections to terminate. The restart of this service was completed at 23:42 and services required for broadcast recovered.

Apache was then stopped at 23:48 to allow the web server to calm down and recover to a regular load average. It was restarted at 23:49, at which point all URY Computing Services were once again operating normally.

== Causes ==
* The segmentation fault that causes MyRadio to fail is still under investigation to identify the root cause.
* The stage of processing that MyRadio appears to be in at the time of segfault means that a database connection is opened, but does not get cleanly closed due to the crash. This left idle connections on the database which over time cause other systems to fail.

== Work Required ==
* A review of the MyRadio code is required to ensure that any steps possible are taken to cleanly terminate database connections after a failure.
* A review of PostgreSQL is required to see if it can have reduced idle timeouts or better handling of broken connections.
* The root cause of the APC Segmentation Faults needs to be discovered and rectified, replacing APC with another solution if necessary.
* Monitoring of system failures of this nature needs to be reviewed and improved, including automated reconnection of IRC bots and email reporting.
* A behaviour change of URY members is required to ensure that problems are reported through the correct channels. Lloyd Wallis is not a correct channel for reporting problems.

[[Category:Incident Reports]]