Getting Started

Open Live is a cloud-based, browser-native live production tool built for modern broadcast workflows. It provides a collaborative environment where production teams can manage and control live productions directly from the browser, with no installed software required.

First time setting up Open Live? Follow the Open Live Setup Guide for a full walkthrough that covers all dependencies, local development, and Stream Deck control.

Prerequisites

Before creating an Open Live instance you need two running services:

  • Apache CouchDB — create a CouchDB instance and a database named open-live inside it. Note the instance URL and your admin password.
  • Strom — create a Strom instance and note its URL and access token. Strom handles the media pipeline: video mixing and audio routing.

Step 1: Create an Open Live instance

Navigate to the Open Live service and click Create open-live.

Fill in the configuration fields:

Field Description Example
Name A name for your Open Live instance myprod
DatabaseUrl CouchDB connection URL including credentials and database name https://admin:mypassword@myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io/open-live
StromUrl URL of your Strom instance (URL from your Strom instance)
StromAccessToken Access token for your Strom instance (token from your Strom instance)
CorsOrigin Allowed CORS origin for the Studio frontend *

DatabaseUrl format

The DatabaseUrl field must follow this exact format:

https://{user}:{password}@{hostname}/{database-name}

Where:

  • {user} is your CouchDB admin username (typically admin)
  • {password} is the admin password
  • {hostname} is the CouchDB instance hostname, without the https:// prefix
  • {database-name} is the database you created inside CouchDB (for example open-live)

Example: If your CouchDB URL is https://myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io, then your DatabaseUrl should be:

https://admin:mypassword@myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io/open-live

Troubleshooting

If you run into issues, the OSC AI assistant can help diagnose your instance — describe your problem and it will inspect your configuration and logs.

Instance fails to start

The most common cause of startup failure is an incorrectly formatted DatabaseUrl.

Check 1: No double https:// prefix

# Wrong — double https:// prefix
https://admin:mypassword@https://myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io/open-live

# Correct — hostname only, no https:// inside the credentials section
https://admin:mypassword@myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io/open-live

Check 2: Database name included in the path

# Wrong — no database path
https://admin:mypassword@myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io

# Correct — database name included
https://admin:mypassword@myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io/open-live

Check 3: The database exists in CouchDB

The database named in the URL must exist inside your CouchDB instance. Open the CouchDB admin panel (Fauxton) at your CouchDB URL, log in, and create the database if it does not exist.

Check 4: Alphanumeric password

Passwords containing @, :, /, or # break URL parsing. Use only letters and numbers.

Summary of correct DatabaseUrl format

Element Example
Scheme https://
Username admin
Password mypassword
Hostname myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io
Database open-live
Full URL https://admin:mypassword@myname.apache-couchdb.auto.prod.osaas.io/open-live

Additional Reading