Programme Service
Eight characters. The static name on the receiver — your call, your brand, nothing longer than the window.
RDS technology powered by
Radio Data System (RDS)
Software a station runs to drive its RDS encoder. Programme Service, Dynamic PS and RadioText on FM — the hub decides the fields, the unit on the transmitter path puts them on the wire.
What RDS is
An FM transmitter already carries the programme as sound. Beside that audio, a quiet digital channel can ride the same carrier. Car radios, kitchen sets and phone tuners decode that channel as the name on the faceplate, a now-playing line, a clock, a traffic lamp — the station’s identity and a few service flags, not a second show.
That channel is Radio Data System. Plants air it every day. Europe named the family RDS; North American transmitters ship the same idea as RBDS. A modern receiver treats the two as close siblings. We do not make you pick a camp.
The name in the window
Programme Service (PS) is eight characters. That is the brand a dashboard radio has room to print as “who you are.” Dynamic PS keeps that same eight-character window and cycles it — a slogan, a title, a now-playing fragment, then back to the call. RadioText is the longer sentence: the scroll a set shows when it has a second line.
PS · 8 characters
Dynamic PS
RadioText
Clock time
Programme type
Traffic flags
Alternative frequencies
Dynamic PS
The same eight-character slot, used as a short loop so titles and slogans can share the faceplate.
RadioText
The longer line. Now-playing, a promo, a sentence the set can hold when it has room to scroll.
Clock time
A time-and-date packet in the same stream. A receiver that trusts the station can set its own clock from it.
Programme type
PTY is a short category — news, sport, pop — so a set can hunt by kind, not only by frequency.
Traffic programme / announcement
TP says this service will carry road news. TA lights when that news is on air now. Two flags, one stream.
Other frequencies, same service
Where a network occupies more than one frequency, the stream can list alternatives. A moving receiver may retune and keep the same programme. That is a network idea at the encoder — keep the service when the frequency changes — not a second product.
The unit on the transmitter path
None of this leaves the plant as software alone. An RDS encoder — the RDS unit — sits in the studio-to-transmitter chain and injects the data as a subcarrier on the FM signal. This product is the software that owns on-air state and feeds that unit. Operators set the fields; the hub pushes the box; the encoder puts the bits on the wire.
A later generation, RDS2, widens the pipe — more capacity, long station names, UTF-8 text. Most plants still run classic RDS. We speak the fields you already air, and the room that next generation opened, without a standards binder.
Hub → encoder
The server owns on-air state and talks to the RDS unit. Operators set PS, Dynamic PS and RadioText once; the hub pushes the encoder. What the server holds is what goes on the wire.
Windows studio Link
The desktop app, named Radio Data System (RDS), sits next to playout. It watches the now-playing file and keeps the studio encoder in step with the hub.
Playout ingest
Now-playing from automation — file, URL or webhook — becomes the text on air, without a second copy of the truth.
Station console
Operators open one console for this encoder path: PS, Dynamic PS, RadioText, programme type, clock and traffic flags. The console is for the station that runs the unit.
On studio PCs
Install Radio Data System (RDS) beside the playout machine. It is the Link: ingest from automation and relay to the encoder.
Support & contact
Need help with RDS (Radio Data System) Monitor on iPhone, iPad, Mac or Android, or with the station console? Visit our Support page.