addstation

Adding Stations to the Database

There are 3 ways to add stations. First way is using https://www.reciva.com/addstation. (you reach this also if you search for any station and then click on "Click here to add it"). Second way is to sent an email is stations@reciva.com . An alternative method is to post a request on the forum in the "Radio Stations" section quoting, station name, location, genre, website and stream address details and a database maintainer will investigate and add the station if at all possible. Don't forget that My Streams can be utilised for listening to stations on the radio that do not appear on the Reciva database.

For the first method the process is roughly as follows:-

a. User searches for the station on either reciva.com or radios.reciva.com
b. The search engine returns possible matches and at the foot of the list is the link "Can't find the station you're looking for? Click here to add it"
c. Since the default search only looks for stations marked as "Passed" ... choose "Advanced" and include "All" (online and offline) stations
d. If the station that you want is already in the system but marked as "Failed" then do not request an "Add" - ask for it to be updated via the forum.

Step 1

READ THIS WHOLE DOCUMENT BEFORE SELECTING THE LINKS AS THIS WILL SAVE YOU WASTED TIME AND WILL ENSURE YOUR SUBMISSION IS MORE LIKELY TO MAKE IT TO, AND REMAIN ON, THE DATABASE.

Clicking the link "Can't find the station you're looking for? Click here to add it" following the search results, will take you to the add new station form.

The first screen requests both a Station name and a stream URL.

The Station Name. Ensure correct spelling, correct capitalisation and that the name is as close to the station name as possible. Avoid including station slogans such as “The best hits in Town” or “Halifax's Hit Music factory” for example. Avoid very brief station names such as “WDEF” or “95.7” or “Hot 89” as that doesn’t tell the radio user, (who could be located anywhere in the World) anything about the station. Remember that you may be familiar with the station but someone outside of your town, City, State, County or Country, may not. If the station is also broadcasting on the AM/FM dial then state whether it is an AM or FM station and what the frequency is & specify, where possible, which Town or City it is located - not a list of all the places in which it can be heard! All of this information will help identify the station to the searcher. For example, a suitable station name would be something such as:
KBLE-AM 1050 (Sacred Heart Radio) Seattle, WA

Stream URL: This must be the direct streaming URL. Do not input webpage addresses, flash player addresses, home pages etc as these will fail step 3. Always try and submit the highest bitrated stream that is available. Only submit one bit rate per station ! Where possible submit an address that does not include the streams IP address. IP addresses change regularly and stations will fail to play immediately when they do. Stream addresses that use DNS names and/or reference asx, pls, ram, m3u files are much more likely to remain available if the broadcaster takes down servers for maintenance or changes IP address on a regular basis. Addresses should also be added with consideration for non radio users. If a pls, m3u,ram, ogg or asx file is available (such as "listen.pls" with a Shoutcast station) then including that file in the address will ensure that it plays from the Reciva website as well as on a radio. Always avoid URLs that contain tokens as these will expire within minutes or hours rendering the database entry useless. See the stream extraction wiki pages for more information on obtaining stream URLs.

If you select “I don’t know the stream URL”, you will be dumped out of the form to locate a stream address.

Step 2

Assuming you input a station name and a stream URL, you will be taken to the next screen which will show you stations of the same or similar names that already exist as working stations on the database. It is quite possible that the station you’re trying to add is already in the database and will appear in this list. In this case, there is no need to proceed with your addition.

Select the appropriate radio button based on whether you found your chosen station or not.

Step 3

If you chose “No I didn’t find my station” your stream URL will now be tested to ensure that it is a working address that radios will be capable of playing. If the address is not a valid stream URL, or is in a protocol that the radio cannot play (such as RTMP), or a codec that is not supported (such as some AAC+ streams or others such as WMP 10 Pro or WMP 9 Voice) then your submission will fail the stream test and you will not be allowed to proceed. The stream test can take several seconds to complete during which time you will see the egg timer or your OS’s equivalent.

Step 4

Assuming your address is valid and passes the stream test, you will be taken to a screen that allows you to specify the stations' country of origin and it's genre(s). You can specify multiple genres by holding down the Ctrl key whilst making selections.

Once complete, you will be presented with a summary screen. If everything is correct you can confirm the submission.

Notes:-

Only logged in users can submit a new station request. Each submission contains the registered email address of the requester. Therefore be aware that submissions are not anonymous.

Successfully submitting a request does not guarantee that it will appear, or remain, on the database. Reciva have a number of further checks and mechanisms in place.

Reciva and their database maintainers have the ability to amend any of the details entered and the ability to remove database entries entirely.

Stations that are successfully processed can take upto 24 hours before they appear as searchable on the website. Be aware that it can take several days before they appear as searchable on users radios around the World. Therefore, users submitting stations should not expect the station to be available on their radios under 'location' or 'genre' within minutes or hours of submission, even if they can see the station listed on the Reciva website. Submitting multiple tickets is not necessary and only results in wasted time by the submitter.

However, If a newly submitted station is displayed on the website, either in the list of recent additions or following a website search, then It can be added Immediately to the radio by clicking the 'Add to My Stations' link where it will appear inside the My Stuff > My Stations menu. This functionality requires the radio to have been previously registered with Reciva. Click the links for further information concerning registration and the My Stuff menu.

Furthermore, newly added stations can be played directly from the Reciva "recent additions" RSS feed. Users should place the following address into My Podcasts.
http://rss.reciva.com/stations.rss where you will subsequently be presented with the last 50 database additions.

Reciva make available a personal database to each registered user, called My Streams. Therefore if you know of, or locate, a station that is not on the database, you do not have to add it to the database to listen to it on your radio. You can just locate the direct streaming URL and then add that to “My Streams” whereupon it will appear immediately on your radio in the My Stuff > My Streams menu.

Still cannot work out how to do it? Then go to the Reciva Refuge forum and the old Reciva forum and use the search function to see if this particular station is already reported as being impossible to resolve. If no-one else has mentioned it (try a few variations on the name) then start a new thread and give it a relevent title - such as 'help requested for stationX in countryY' and explain what you have tried. To make it easier for someone else to help do include the URL of the station, the proposed name and, if not an English web page try to include the URL of the web page that starts the stream.