Grass Valley iTX Emergency Alert Service v.2.6 - Manual (Page 5)

1
Introducing the iTX Emergency Alert
Service
iTX provides support for the FCC Emergency Alert System (EAS) required at all United States
call letter stations. It currently supports the following EAS encoder/decoder devices, or
ENDECs:
• Trilithic EASyCast
• Monroe DASDEC-II*
* Must be purchased with the ‘DVS168 Communication Protocol’ option.
EAS control is provided by an EAS button on an iTX Desktop working with the iTX
Emergency Alert Service. The service runs on a backend server and receives EAS alert data
from a configured ENDEC.
On processing an EAS event, an ENDEC sends an audio (WAV) file and text (TXT) file via FTP
to the server where the iTX Emergency Alert Service is running. The audio file contains a
voice-over for the alert; the text file contains the text that is to be displayed in a CG crawl
while the voice-over is playing.
Once the files are transferred, the ENDEC opens a TCP/IP connection to the iTX Emergency
Alert Service and sends a notification message to the configured channel. The service
informs an EAS button on the iTX Desktop of the EAS event. The EAS button signals to the
operator that there is a pending emergency alert.
The operator selects a primary event in the schedule grid and clicks the EAS button. This
adds the current/last EAS event as a secondary event to the selected primary event with a
default 10 second offset (the offset time is configurable). When the schedule reaches the
EAS event, the voice-over and CG events playout over the video-clip or live event that is
currently or about to go on air.
Multiple ENDECs can be connected to the same iTX Emergency Alert Service and then
assigned to individual playout channels. An additional license can enable some EAS devices
to use SNMP traps to check connectivity to the iTX Emergency Alert Service.