Channel with an external source¶
A Catena channel pulls the stream itself: you say where it lives, and the streamer connects, watches the signal's health and reconnects after drops. This page takes a channel on air with a real source; the end-to-end example is an SRT contribution, the other protocols' fields are collected below.
Add a source¶
Create a channel if you have none yet, and open the Sources tab on its page. Press + Add Source and pick the protocol:
The form shows the fields of the chosen protocol. Fill them in and press Save — the streamer starts connecting as soon as central delivers the configuration.
End to end: an SRT contribution¶
Given: the on-site encoder serves the program as an SRT listener at 172.28.0.20:9710, the link is encrypted with a passphrase. In the source form:
- Host —
172.28.0.20: the listener's IP address. The streamer acts as the caller and initiates the connection itself. - Port —
9710. - Passphrase — the same key configured on the encoder (the SRT standard wants 10–79 characters). With a key the link is encrypted, and a listener with a key rejects unencrypted clients; an empty field means an unencrypted link.
- Stream ID — needed only when the listener tells several programs apart by it; otherwise leave empty.
- Handshake timeout (ms) and Peer timeout (ms) — how long to wait for the connection to establish and for a silent peer before reconnecting. Empty fields are sensible defaults.
After Save, the channel's status in the header turns green, and the source health card shows a live bitrate and tracks:
The channel is already watchable — in the built-in player on the basic settings tab, or at /streaming/v/<name>/index.m3u8.
The other protocols' fields¶
| Protocol | Fields |
|---|---|
| RTSP | URL like rtsp://login:password@host/path, peer timeout. The typical case is an IP camera |
| RTMP | URL rtmp://host/app/stream, peer timeout |
| HLS | Playlist URL http(s)://…/index.m3u8 |
| MPEG-TS/HTTP | Transport stream URL, peer timeout |
| MPEG-TS/UDP | Host — the multicast group address, Port — see Multicast source |
| File | Path to a file on the streamer's disk; the file loops |
| Synthetic | The built-in generator — SMPTE bars and a beep; walked through in the Quick start |
| M4F, M4S | URL and Cluster key — pulling a channel off a Flussonic Media Server, handy during migration |
| MBR | A container of several sources assembled into one multi-bitrate channel — see Transcoding and MBR |
A channel can have several sources — the list is ordered by priority, and the streamer runs off the highest-priority live one. How switching, degradation thresholds and returning to the primary are tuned — Input failover.
If the source did not come up¶
- The health card says Dead and the retry counter grows. The streamer cannot connect: address, port, firewall. Check reachability from the streamer's machine, not from yours — it is the one connecting.
- SRT does not connect: the handshake is rejected (Unauthorized). The passphrase does not match the other end.
- The channel is green but the player does not play. The source delivers codecs the player cannot read (raw frames, for example). The channel needs a transcoder — see Transcoding and MBR.
- The source flaps between alive and dead. Look at the thresholds and timeouts: Input failover.