Newsroom displays and stream routing
Celesti
A channel inventory and display-management platform with service-controlled playback clients.
I designed and built this project independently, using my own resources.
01 / Context
The problem behind the project
A newsroom with several displays needs a shared channel inventory and a way to direct playback without configuring every screen independently.
Celesti is the channel and device-management layer for a newsroom display setup. It connects an inventory of streams with actual screens and playback clients, rather than asking each television to maintain a separate, manually curated list.
The operating model includes remote single-stream, quad, and emergency modes, plus channels that are television, radio, or automatically classified by the service.
02 / Implementation
Design and implementation
I build the routing service and television client workflows used to manage those displays.
I built the shared channel/device service and native-client workflows, including M3U inventory, command delivery, device identity, and playback telemetry. Clients receive the authoritative channel order and stream properties instead of inventing their own catalog.
The system has platform-specific players and presentation libraries while sharing service contracts. Atlantide supplies the Apple TV application; Android television clients use the same broader routing and display-management model.
Viewing attribution and operational health remain different signals. A command requesting playback does not prove that media advanced, and an app in the background should not silently accrue foreground viewing time.
03 / Architecture
Architecture and workflow
Manage inventory
Import and organize source channels and expose ordered groups to clients.
Register screens
Associate a device with its identity and receive its real operational state.
Deliver commands
Send playback/display changes through the service contract while the client owns native execution.
Observe the result
Use engine activity and device telemetry to distinguish requested output from actual playback.
04 / Approach
Engineering decisions
One inventory, multiple clients
The service manages channels and sends playback commands to television clients through an event-driven interface.
Platform-specific playback
Android TV and Apple TV clients have their own implementations instead of claiming a universal player.
05 / Evidence
Evidence and outcomes
The existing operating history includes using Celesti on a five-screen newsroom setup and checking the client’s foreground playback activity. That is concrete device use, distinct from a claim about external customer adoption.
The public Atlantide architecture provides a detailed consumer-side record of paged channel browsing, source-switch guards, quad attribution, and durable viewing delivery without exposing the private service implementation.
06 / Current scope
Where it stands
The core platform source is private. Atlantide, its tvOS client, has a separate public repository.
Playback capabilities depend on platform decoders, stream formats, network reachability, and the current client. One successful screen does not establish all-device or all-format parity.
The private service and client implementation links are intentionally omitted; the related Atlantide page documents its public native consumer.