# Switcher (Command Center Only)

Switcher is a switcher control command for owners of our ChannelCaster switcher packages, such as the ChannelCaster 4™, the ChannelCaster 8™, and the ChannelCaster 16™. It is used to switch among different inputs and outputs on the Broadcast Tools line of switcher boxes to put channels on the air. Regardless of which of the switcher boxes came in your ChannelCaster package, the syntax you use is the same.

Switcher differs from the # Route-For command in one important way. In addition to switching audio channels, it also take responsibility for listening to a relay channel for signals from the network. When the Switcher event is completed, it automatically stops listening to the relay. In that way, Switcher can often be used in place of not only Route-For, but also the # Listen and # Ignore commands.

If you don't need to listen to a relay, and simply wish to broadcast a certain input to a certain output for a given length of time, use Route-For instead.

EXAMPLE 1: # Switcher 00:20:00 Input 2 to Output 1 Listen 12 "Network Music Segment One"
EXAMPLE 2: # Switcher 00:07:00 Input 3 to Output 1 Listen 3 "Blab Show Segment 3"

In Example 1, a segment of network music will run for 20 minutes, while monitoring relay #12. In the second example, a syndicated talk show segment will run for seven minutes, while monitoring relay #3. The phrase in quotation marks will appear in Command Center as the label entry for this event.

As with most other programming elements, Switcher events are subject to the same universal overlap settings as the rest of your Command Center programming. That means it's wise to add one second (or whatever duration you have universal overlap set to in System Preferences) to the length of your Switcher event.


THINGS TO KNOW

An automated switcher event can be manually "killed," just the same as a live event, a commercial, or a song. Just click on its blue button to take it off the air. Bear in mind that if your log includes an Interrupt later in the hour, as described in the scenario above, and Command Center is in auto mode at Interrupt time, you will still experience that Interrupt when the time comes, so hang loose! Whatever is on the air will be taken off, and whatever follows the Interrupt will be played, once the Interrupt time is reached.

Currently, there are no provisions for fade-ins or fade-outs in switcher events, so even if an Interrupt specifies a fade time, it will not be observed.



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