Announce : BBC Sounds Plugin

[expectingtofly]

Release 2.29.0

• Added "Play all" for curated playlists ("Back to Back sounds")

BBC sounds has the concept of a "curation". This is a collection of programmes/tracks that are collected together in a playlist and are meant to played in order. There are music and speech curations and you will usually find them in the "Back to Back sounds" section in the music or podcast section.
Up until now, the plugin has just handled them the same as any other programme container and you couldn't really play them as they are meant to be used : all in one go and played in order.
To fix this I've added a "Play all" option in the context menu if it is a "curation". This will add all the items as a playlist and initiate play.

On material, press the 3 dots to get the menu. On the radio/jive you press the "+" on the item. Other controllers work in different ways.

It's available from the beta repository now and will be available from the main 3rd party plugin repository at the next refresh later today.

[Paul Webster]

Reported elsewhere that the message below has just gone out to internet radio device suppliers from BBC.

note the dates and the comment about having a Distribution Agreement in place (with BBC).
This might be the confirmation of a comment I made a while back that a key might be needed to access the BBC Sounds content … which makes things hard for open software.

Subject: BBC SWITCH OFF OF SHOUTCAST LIVE RADIO STREAMS : MAY 2023 - 3RD PARTY DEVICE MANUFACTURERS



Dear all



Following our previous correspondence to you in January we are writing to confirm that the BBC Shoutcast live radio streams will be switched off on 15th June. We have asked radio aggregators to be in a position to implement HLS / DASH streams by the end of May which will give us a two week window to deal with any last minute requirements and/or technical issues. The barker message will be increased to play out every hour from 31st May to midnight on 15th June. Please note that BBC HLS / DASH streams will continue to be made available to 3rd parties that are able to meet the BBC Distribution Policy requirements and have a Distribution Agreement in place. There will be no publicly available feeds after the end of May. Please contact your appointed radio aggregator directly if you need to check any further details on their timeline.


An FAQ can be found at https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/help/qu...utcast-closure

[slartibartfast]

Reported elsewhere that the message below has just gone out to internet radio device suppliers from BBC.

note the dates and the comment about having a Distribution Agreement in place (with BBC).
This might be the confirmation of a comment I made a while back that a key might be needed to access the BBC Sounds content … which makes things hard for open software.

I still think the BBC Sounds plugin will be OK. After all we do still sign in using a BBC login similar to the BBC Sounds app. The BBC are funded by us, we should be able to access their radio stations anyway we choose 😀

[jophill]

Re the BBC's "Please note that BBC HLS / DASH streams will continue to be made available to 3rd parties that are able to meet the BBC Distribution Policy requirements and have a Distribution Agreement in place."

I am sure expectingtofly knows the BBC distribution policy and its documents (here I think - but largely focussed on TV, it appears to me, not radio). I am also certain the BBC Sounds plugin meets the appropriate policy requirements. This has already been been addressed on this channel by the author, who made it clear that he would make sure the BBC Sounds plugin did so.

But an issue could be the distribution agreement mentioned above, and a contract as in the BBC documents, where we see: "To protect the interests of licence fee payers and provide legal certainty, the BBC requires a contractual agreement with partners for the carriage of its services."

The open source route to accessing BBC Sounds is clearly a positive benefit when it comes to meeting the objectives of the BBC distribution policy as set out. However, contracts are I think a potentially difficult matter in this context. I do hope the BBC sees the advantages to its licence fee payers and has the flexibility to maintain that benefit. But I do note that the licence fee model is one that has been questioned over the years and there seems to be a degree of pressure for a more commercial BBC model. If that ever happens it might be a bigger obstacle.

[bpa]

But an issue could be the distribution agreement mentioned above, and a contract as in the BBC documents, where we see: "To protect the interests of licence fee payers and provide legal certainty, the BBC requires a contractual agreement with partners for the carriage of its services."

I think LMS is not considered a distribution service which does "carriage of its services". I think the 3rd parties BBC refer are operators like Cable TV (e.g. Virgin) which relay BBC radio to a proprietary player for a fee.
LMS is acting as a player for a private non-commercial use and behave similar to a mobile phone and Airplay/Bluetooth/Chromecast speakers.

[expectingtofly]

It's all a bit unknown at the moment. Unfortunately the BBC won't engage with individuals on the specifics, and especially they won't contractually engage with individuals.

Having said that, this plugin is essentially behaving as an app, like their own app and website.
They essentially want 2 things:

1. Individual and aggregated usage statistics
2. Editorial control over the prominence of content and on the way content is accessed.

The plugin does both of those, and clearly the plugin has positive intent. It is providing access to the content, as it was meant to be accessed, by people who should be able to access it.
Also, the plugin is not going through the distribution route meant for 3rd parties (as bpa mentions) , so I fully expect the plugin to carry on working in the short term. I just don't see them putting the effort in to make changes in the area that would stop this plugin working, as that is not what they are referring to when they are mentioning 3rd party distribution. However, I could easily be wrong. We'll see.

[expectingtofly]

Release 2.29.1

This release is a minor maintenance release that adds some changes to enforce sending signin/session data when getting live radio audio feeds. This is in an attempt to second guess/pre-empt some possible changes that might be required at the end of the month.

It's available from the beta repository now and will be available from the main repository later today.

[agbagb]

Just want to chip in a big Thank You! to those here who work this stuff! It's all way beyond my techical paygrade: but - Heavens! - I'm glad you guys pay attention!

[darrell]

expectingtofly, I've found a bug. After the plug-in is initialised with an empty user search history, it does not show the user's subsequent search history until re-initialised (eg by restarting LMS).

I traced this to `BBCSoundsFeeder::_getCachedMenu`, and corrected the behaviour by bypassing it. But obviously this is not the ideal fix!

Steps to reproduce:

1. Clear BBC Sounds search history if you have one.
2. Restart LMS.
3. Go to the BBC Sounds search option (Material Skin shows a pop-up search box, Default Skin shows a search field in the menu entry, not a clickable search option)
4. Search for something
5. Go back to the main LMS menu
6. Go to BBC Sounds search again - search history is not available (Material/Default interfaces show as in 3 above)

If you now restart LMS, it works as expected: Material shows the search entry field as well as the history in the left hand pane, Default Skin shows the clickable search icon which takes you to the sub-page containing your history.

But restart LMS after clearing search history and the bug is back.

[slartibartfast]

expectingtofly, I've found a bug. After the plug-in is initialised with an empty user search history, it does not show the user's subsequent search history until re-initialised (eg by restarting LMS).

I traced this to `BBCSoundsFeeder::_getCachedMenu`, and corrected the behaviour by bypassing it. But obviously this is not the ideal fix!

Steps to reproduce:

1. Clear BBC Sounds search history if you have one.
2. Restart LMS.
3. Go to the BBC Sounds search option (Material Skin shows a pop-up search box, Default Skin shows a search field in the menu entry, not a clickable search option)
4. Search for something
5. Go back to the main LMS menu
6. Go to BBC Sounds search again - search history is not available (Material/Default interfaces show as in 3 above)

If you now restart LMS, it works as expected: Material shows the search entry field as well as the history in the left hand pane, Default Skin shows the clickable search icon which takes you to the sub-page containing your history.

But restart LMS after clearing search history and the bug is back.

I followed your steps and first time the search history was available for me. I tried a second time and this time the search history was not available. I returned to the main LMS menu then back to Sounds to search again and after the second search the search history appeared containing both search items. Strange.

[expectingtofly]

expectingtofly, I've found a bug. After the plug-in is initialised with an empty user search history, it does not show the user's subsequent search history until re-initialised (eg by restarting LMS).

I traced this to `BBCSoundsFeeder::_getCachedMenu`, and corrected the behaviour by bypassing it. But obviously this is not the ideal fix!

Steps to reproduce:

1. Clear BBC Sounds search history if you have one.
2. Restart LMS.
3. Go to the BBC Sounds search option (Material Skin shows a pop-up search box, Default Skin shows a search field in the menu entry, not a clickable search option)
4. Search for something
5. Go back to the main LMS menu
6. Go to BBC Sounds search again - search history is not available (Material/Default interfaces show as in 3 above)

If you now restart LMS, it works as expected: Material shows the search entry field as well as the history in the left hand pane, Default Skin shows the clickable search icon which takes you to the sub-page containing your history.

But restart LMS after clearing search history and the bug is back.

Yes, you are right, it caches the top menu for around 8 minutes, and as you pointed out, the menu structure is a bit different if you don't have a search history. It would correct itself if you waited a few minutes once the cache expires and regenerates the top menu and show that a sub menu is available.
It could probably do with a tweak to fix. I'll add it in the next release.

[furnace]

BBC Sounds is not working for me this morning. Was fine yesterday. Anyone else got this problem, or shall I sleuth my own installation for issues?

EDIT - It appears I had become 'signed out'. In the plugin's Settings, my username and password were displayed, but the 'Sign In' button was highlighted. I clicked it, waited about 20 secs, saved the settings and all is now good.

THANKS - To all who keep this fab plugin up and running. It's greatly appreciated

[AdamClover]

Hi there,

Will the plugin run on lms 8.0 on Readynas duo arm processor?

I can't find an lms version beyond 8.0 so think I'm stuck on it.

I don't see BBC Sounds in the third party add-ons. Is there a URL I can use to put in the custom 3rd party repositories box?

Thanks for any advice

Adam

[expectingtofly]

Hi there,

Will the plugin run on lms 8.0 on Readynas duo arm processor?

I can't find an lms version beyond 8.0 so think I'm stuck on it.

I don't see BBC Sounds in the third party add-ons. Is there a URL I can use to put in the custom 3rd party repositories box?

Thanks for any advice

Adam

Yes, the plugin works on 7.9 and above (7.9.3 recommended as a minimum).

There may be a reason your server can't reach the 3rd party repository list. Are there any errors in the log? What the version of your IO::Socket:SSL if you look at settings->information tab of your LMS?




There is an url you can put in your 3rd party repositories box, but that shouldn't be necessary and just points to the same plugin in the main 3rd party repository : http://plugins.expectingtofly.co.uk/stablerepo.xml

[darrell]

SSL was the reason I had to stop using my Readynas Duo - the OS is just too old now, it can't handle current SSL security protocols. If this is your situation, even if you do manage to get BBC Sounds installed, it will refuse to connect to the BBC web service because of this.