At the beginning of the Looking Local project both ntl: and Telewest provided PC based emulators (also known as an 'emmy') to allow content partners to test their content prior to publishing. The technical platform that is accessed by the emulator is called 'Liberate'.
For security reasons, ntl: took the decision to only make their emulator available to content partners with fixed IP addresses that had been registered with them. An IP (Internet Protocol) address is the technical location showing where you are accessing the Internet from.
Following the merger of ntl: and Telewest (now Virgin TV) a decision was taken to make the Telewest emulator available on the same basis. Most home Internet connections and some corporate connections use a different IP address for each Internet session making it impossible to use the emulator.
If you can confirm with your IT department that you do have a fixed IP address and would like to use the Liberate emulator you can follow these instructions. You will need to contact the DigiTV Technical Manager so that your IP address can be passed to Virgin for inclusion in their 'safe list'.
Instructions - Virgin TV (Liberate) Emulator
The Liberate emulator is a small application that runs on your PC. This emulator (emmy) is a developers tool and is not so user friendly but you will soon get used to its 'foibles'. The latest pre-configured emulator is available to download here.
Once you have downloaded and unzipped the file you can just double click on the Emmy.exe file or create a shortcut to the file on your desktop. This may require involvement from your IT infrastructure team as many corporate networks will not allow them to install software of any kind without their permission.
For the Telewest emulator in a corporate environment you may need to allow outbound connections: 80.0.233.132 on port 8080 and 80.0.233.132 on port 9093 before the emulator is allowed to connect to the Internet.
Once you are able to launch the emulator:
• The TV Emulator Console (a DOS type screen) will run in the background, once it has finished loading the emulator (which can take around a minute, even on a fast PC - so be patient).
• Goto 'Tools' and select 'TV Remote Control'
• Select 'Guide' on the remote control
• Select 'Settings' using the cursor move and 'enter' keys
• Select option 8 'Load URL 1' using the cursor move and 'enter' keys
• In the address box type in http://www.digitv.gov.uk/digitv/cds/LookingLocal/Virgin/home for the live service or http://www.digitv.gov.uk/digitv/cds/LookingLocal/Virgin/home?staging for QA'ing unpublished content. Note: You can navigate directly to your own microsite by substituting 'LookingLocal' for your own microsite URL extension such as 'HertsDirect', 'Kent', 'Merseyside' etc.
• Then press GO using the cursor move and 'enter' keys.
• Use 'Tools' and then 'TV Remote Control' to bring up the remote control, to navigate the site or you can use the cursor move and 'enter' keys.
One of the main areas to watch out for when carrying out a QA using this emulator is that you pages do not induce scrolling as this is not allowed on the Liberate platform. You should also test that menu items and screen titles are not so long that they 'wrap' or truncate'. For guidelines on content limitations take a look at our CMS [Quick Reference Guide].
