►Argus Timing Checks

The Argus, Argentem’s playlist automation, incorporates the television automation industry’s most automatic schedule timing checks. 

Hours of tedious detailed checking of schedules is eliminated because in just a matter of seconds an operator can step through a full-day schedule, jumping from one Argus-identified potential problem to the next by merely pressing an arrow button, and then reading the message on the Argus status line.

Durations of individual events between two hard clock time events are added, and compared to the difference between the two clock times surrounding those events.   For example, there should be a total of 60 minutes worth of events between 10:00 pm and 11:00 pm.  Any timing errors are presented to the operator.

Operators have the ability to instantly adjust the timing tolerance, specified in TV frames, that separates an acceptable timing difference from an unacceptable timing error.

When there is a timing error, the second of the pair of hard clock time events is highlighted and the status line shows what the calculated hard time should be, along with the difference between the calculated time and the scheduled time.

At the same time, any missing clip names (House Names) are highlighted, as are missing durations and invalid source names.

All of these checks are initiated simply by the operator pressing a clock icon on the task bar.  To the right of the clock face are arrows which step forward or reverse in the schedule to the next or the preceding error.

To further help analyze the playlist timing, there is the cursor timing balloon which automatically sums the duration times of selected events.  To perform this operation, the operator places the cursor over a line number in the leftmost column of the playlist, holds down the left mouse button, and moves the cursor up or down.  The balloon then appears attached to the cursor and shows the sum of the highlighted durations.

These interactive real-time checks are just what the operators need to catch any scheduling errors in the playlists, either before or during on-air operations.