CruiseOne Radio: The Technical Stuff

Player: Up next in the player

Fri, 06 Nov 2026 13:40:00 +0000

The full-screen player, the pop-out and the app now say which program is up next. It shares one quiet line with Missed a program? Listen again: every 15 seconds one fades out and the other in, slowly. In the last 10 minutes before a program it just counts down: Coming up in 8 min.

Audio Processing Change

Fri, 06 Nov 2026 11:52:00 +0000

Slightly cleaner sound but maybe not quite as loud.

We've made a change to the final stage of our audio processor so that it limits rather than clips. A clip physically changes the waveform to ensure it stays within a preset level. This has it's own sound and can sound very loud and competitive. It's not bad. Just different. A limiter looks ahead and reduces the level coming out of the multi-band processor.

Both are fine but limit is common on a compressed stream so we'll give it a try and see if we like it.

If you like how we sound, get in touch and let us know.

Website: A calmer home page

Fri, 06 Nov 2026 11:18:00 +0000

Recently played shows the last 8 songs and Later today the next 4 programs, so both columns end level and the page is shorter, especially on a phone. The rest is a click away: What Was That Song? and Programs.

Player: The pop-out player as an app

Fri, 06 Nov 2026 10:46:00 +0000

Install the pop-out player (the icon at the end of its address bar in Chrome, Edge or Vivaldi, or File > Add to Dock in Safari) and it becomes an app of its own: no address bar, no browser tab needed, and macOS's Now Playing and your keyboard's play key work with it.

Website: The directories on Ways to Listen

Fri, 06 Nov 2026 00:27:00 +0000

Ways to Listen lists the directories that carry the station as a row of buttons: radio.net, Streema, Internet Radio, LiveRadio UK and Ireland, Online Radio Box and the Icecast directory.

Website: On this day, hearts and song pages

Thu, 05 Nov 2026 14:09:00 +0000

The home page has On this day: a year from the last 50, its UK number one and a headline from Wikipedia. Every song has a heart (anonymous, once per song per browser), the Music page has Most loved this week, and Share gives a song a page of its own.

Player: Pop out the player

Thu, 05 Nov 2026 00:55:00 +0000

On a computer, the small button at the end of the player bar opens the player in a window of its own, which plays on when you close the site's tab. It takes over what the tab was playing, rewound place and all, with no gap and never two streams at once.

Website: A contact form, and the site as an app

Thu, 05 Nov 2026 00:55:00 +0000

The Contact page has a form of its own: messages are kept for 90 days and your email is used only to reply. And the whole site can be installed as an app on a phone or computer (Ways to Listen says how).

Music: Covers on the Music page

Thu, 05 Nov 2026 00:55:00 +0000

Each genre card on the Music page shows four covers of its songs played in the six hours before, picked again at midnight, 6:00, 12:00 and 18:00. Each one opens the song's card.

Player: Back and forward 30 seconds

Wed, 04 Nov 2026 23:35:00 +0000

In a program with rewind on, or a Listen Again episode, round buttons either side of Play skip back or forward 30 seconds. Forward goes back to live once you're within 20 seconds of it.

Website: A new look

Tue, 03 Nov 2026 17:07:00 +0000

After about 14 years of gold on black: light, the station's red and one typeface, Archivo, at real weights and widths, with Recently played as a chart rundown. The song's colour stays in the player. The new logo followed the same evening.

Stream: Live through strict office networks

Tue, 03 Nov 2026 11:54:00 +0000

Some office networks (Zscaler, for one) scan every download before passing it on, and a live stream never finishes downloading. Where the stream hasn't started within 6 seconds, the player now plays live from the server's copy in 10-second pieces, which those networks let through.

Player: Song titles when you hear them

Mon, 02 Nov 2026 12:00:00 +0000

While live plays, the title changes when the song does in your ears, not 10 seconds early, and the hourly station ID (on air for about 8 seconds) now always shows. The player checks every 3 seconds and holds each title back by the stream's delay.

Website: News as a timeline

Mon, 02 Nov 2026 12:00:00 +0000

News became a timeline by month. Posts are made of blocks (songs, programs, Listen again buttons, pictures), and each week the songs played on CruiseOne for the first time get an entry of their own.

Programs: The Programs page

Sun, 01 Nov 2026 12:00:00 +0000

A new Programs page, as a roller: on now in the middle, what's been on above and what's coming below, in your own time. Listen Again says when each program is next on and what played in it, with a link to share an episode.

Player: More covers, from MusicBrainz

Sun, 01 Nov 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Songs that neither iTunes nor Deezer has now get their sleeve from MusicBrainz and the Cover Art Archive, matched strictly: a missing cover is better than a wrong one.

Player: The lock screen keeps up

Sat, 31 Oct 2026 12:00:00 +0000

On a locked phone, the title and cover on the lock screen now follow the songs while the player is on, instead of waiting until you open the browser again.

Stream: Every browser starts at once

Fri, 30 Oct 2026 23:36:00 +0000

A new listener now gets 10 seconds of audio straight away (Icecast's burst on connect), so Chrome starts in about half a second and Safari in under a second, where they used to wait 3 to 7. Everyone hears the same moment, and the hourly ID still lands on the hour.

Programs: Listen Again

Fri, 30 Oct 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Programs can be kept after they end, on the Listen Again page, for between 6 hours and 14 days. An episode is the same 10-second pieces as rewind, hard-linked on the server, so keeping one copies nothing.

Programs: Rewind, for programs

Fri, 30 Oct 2026 00:37:00 +0000

During a program with rewind on, you can scrub back to its start, Restart it, and go back to live. It plays from a copy the server keeps of the last hours of the stream, cut into 10-second pieces (HLS) with the 256k MP3 untouched. Outside programs it's live only: radio, not Spotify.

Website: Song cards

Wed, 28 Oct 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Every song in Recently played opens a card: its cover, album and year, when it played, and a sentence or two from its Wikipedia article, credited and linked. A day later: a link to search Genius when Wikipedia has nothing.

Player: Now playing, colour and a real visualiser

Tue, 27 Oct 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Tap the cover or title in the player bar and the song on air opens big, with its album and 32 bars of visualiser. The player takes its colour from the cover on air, and its bars follow the music itself, bass to treble (Chrome, Edge and Android; a gentle stand-in elsewhere).

Player: Cover art

Tue, 27 Oct 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Every song gets its cover, looked up on iTunes and then Deezer, never a compilation or soundtrack, so it's the song's own sleeve. Until one is found, a tile coloured from the artist's name.

Website: Ways to Listen, and What Was That Song?

Tue, 27 Oct 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Ways to Listen has the playlist files for VLC, Apple Music and other players, and both stream addresses: HTTPS, and plain HTTP on port 8000 for older internet radios. What Was That Song? finds any song by day and time.