Each station operates using two vital components that consistently produce a signal broadcasted by the station: The AutoDJ, also known as the “Broadcasting Backend,” is a software piece (in AzuraCast’s case, Liquidsoap) that compiles media from different sources, various playlists, and live inputs. It then merges that input into a single output stream, which the AutoDJ transcodes into different formats. However, listeners do not connect directly to the AutoDJ to listen to the station, since it is optimized for creating the broadcast rather than serving it to a larger audience.
The Broadcasting Software, also called the “Broadcasting Frontend,” is a lightweight software piece (either Icecast or SHOUTcast) whose primary function is to take the signal generated by the AutoDJ and send it out to hundreds or thousands of listeners. This software is specifically designed to support a large number of concurrent incoming connections with minimal impact on system performance. AzuraCast’s role is to ensure that both of these processes are configured correctly, automatically started, and running in the background. When using an AzuraCast installation, there is no need to manually start either of these services for any station. Additionally, with the exception of specific changes requiring a brief restart, there is no need to directly modify them for configuration changes in AzuraCast to take effect.