Key Features

As core of the enterprise wide systems landscape Hydrogen glues together all components of modern media production. With its open interfaces and helper applications it provides the most crucial functionality for media professionals. Its key features are:

User Interface

A user interface, developed in close cooperation with the users at a broadcaster, provides all users with a common interface to the data. This way everyone can access the content, independent of the heterogeneous list of applications. The layout of the interface is specific for each user's workflow, which means the user is presented with an interface designed specific for the way they work. Often this user interface is used in combination with client applications communicating directly with the Hydrogen Media Lifecycle Management system.

Media Management

Hydrogen effectively manages all essence and metadata. It allows extensive content sharing with user access control and rights management while recording a full audit trail. A customizable graphical front end provides a window into the system which allows queries, viewing metadata, keyframes and browsing. Being a web application it can be easily deployed, updated and fits into almost any corporate infrastructure.

Central Repository & Media Archive

Based on an Oracle database Hydrogen applies a unique data model which represents the logic to all possible workflows in the broadcast environment. Access control for users & groups, rights management and media tracking is guaranteed through a set of metadata that also provides a genealogy feature which shows where material has been used and where it refers to other material. 

Content sharing between NLEs or NLE workgroups is enabled through this central facility.

Search Engine

A powerful free text search is provided which can be combined with any keyed data. It supports filtering, paging, scoring and highlighting of results. The Google style interface allows drilling down to narrow the results. Thesauruses as well as combined searches of relational & free text are supported while the results are cached for quicker access so that topical or historical material can be easily found.

Workflows

In cooperation with experienced broadcast professionals our engineers developed a data model and the business logic that are the basis for the different workflows like

• Newsroom workflow
• Archivist workflow
• Programme Production workflow

These workflows are designed to reflect the business practice which makes them intuitive to use and therefore aid the business.