Channel Pictures, Logos and Badges

Switch Streams to grid view and video channels start filling in with a real picture: a frame captured from the live feed itself, refreshed while you browse. FastMediaSorter keeps that frame on the phone, so the next time you open Streams the channel already shows it instead of a blank tile while a fresh one is captured in the background.

Every tile in the grid fills in at once when the screen opens, rather than one picture trickling in after another while you wait.

Not every channel has a frame to show - radio has no picture at all, and a video channel only gets one after it has been reachable. For those, FastMediaSorter tries a fixed order of pictures, stopping at the first one it can supply:

1. A tile from the downloadable Channel preview atlas - a still picture for a video channel, shown before you have watched it even once.
2. The channel's own station logo, from the downloadable Station logos pack - this is the only picture a radio station can get, since it has no video to capture from.
3. A small favicon - the site icon for that channel, bundled with the channel catalog itself, no separate download needed.
4. The channel's country flag, when none of the above is available.
5. A plain audio or video icon, when even the country is unknown.

So a logo means the station has its own artwork in the pack; a flag means FastMediaSorter knows the channel's country but has no picture for it; a plain icon means neither is available yet. Every tier keeps trying quietly in the background, so a tile that starts as a flag can still turn into a proper logo moments later.

Switch to list view and each row keeps a small leading icon instead of a full tile. It shows the channel's favicon when the catalog has one, or the country flag in the same spot when it does not - the row never collapses or leaves an empty gap either way. A channel with neither shows the plain audio or video icon, same as in grid view.

Favicons in list view come from the same bundle as the catalog itself, so they are already there the moment you import channels - no extra download needed for this one.

Every grid tile carries a small dot in the bottom-left corner: a hollow ring means the channel has not been played yet, a check mark means it played back fine last time, and an exclamation mark means the last attempt failed. Shape and color both change, so the meaning still comes through in black and white.

Tap the three-dot button in the top-right corner of a tile to open its menu - the same commands as the list row's overflow menu, including editing, sharing the link and removing the channel.

Some channels in the catalog carry a badge next to their name in list view. A Region-locked badge means the channel answered with an access error during the catalog's own checks and may not play from your location - it is kept in the catalog because it can still work for someone in its home region. A Restricted badge covers any other access limit the catalog found, without naming a specific reason.

Neither badge means the channel is broken everywhere - only that it is worth trying with that in mind. Tap the channel to open About this channel for the same information spelled out in full.

The Channel preview atlas and Station logos are downloadable picture packs, not part of the app itself - they are extensions, like the channel catalog they ride along with. After a catalog refresh finds new channels, FastMediaSorter offers each pack by name, states its download size in megabytes up front, and lets you say Download or Later.

New pictures reach an installed pack as soon as they are published on the server - you do not have to wait for an app update to see them. If the pack you already have is out of date, the next catalog refresh offers a smaller update instead of the whole pack again.

You can also manage both packs by hand any time from the Downloadable Extensions screen - see Downloadable extensions for how to install, update and delete them there.

Watching a video channel updates its own tile: the frame you were just looking at becomes its thumbnail, so the grid shows what you actually saw last, not an older capture. This works whether you stop by pressing Back or by leaving the fullscreen player.

An unreachable channel is not hammered with repeated capture attempts - FastMediaSorter backs off and tries it less often instead, and a status change repaints only the dot, so scrolling the grid never flickers. None of this needs a network connection to stay calm: with no connectivity the grid simply waits rather than timing out every visible tile, and previews pick back up on their own once the connection returns.

The pictures themselves are kept in a small on-disk cache with its own size budget, cleared out automatically as needed - there is nothing to configure or clean up by hand.