# Working with Conductor Live
AWS Elemental Conductor Live lets you create and manage channels on AWS Elemental Live and/or MPTSes on AWS Elemental Statmux. Each of the three products—Conductor Live, Elemental Live and Elemental Statmux—runs on its own node. Conductor Live is a *management node*. Elemental Live and Elemental Statmux node are each *worker nodes*.
All the nodes are organized in a *cluster.*
Broadly speaking, there are two ways to work with the Conductor Live suite of products:
+ Create and run events (which are called channels in Conductor Live). You use Conductor Live to create the channel on an Elemental Live node that is in the cluster. You use Conductor Live to start and control the channel.
For this scenario, the cluster includes Conductor Live and Elemental Live nodes.
+ Create and run MPTSes. You use Conductor Live to create an MPTS on an Elemental Statmux node that is in the cluster. You use the Conductor Live to add Elemental Live channels to the MPTS. You use Conductor Live to start and control the MPTS.
A cluster contains at least one Conductor Live node and one Elemental Live node. If you want to produce MPTSes, a cluster contains at least one Conductor Live node, one Elemental Live node, and one Elemental Statmux node.
**Topics**
+ [General information](cl3-general.md)
+ [Software versions](cl3-software-versions.md)
+ [Licenses](cl3-software-licenses.md)
+ [Centralized management](centralized-management.md)
+ [Redundancy and failover](redundancy-and-failover.md)
# General information
**Assumptions**
We assume that you are already familiar with Elemental Live. You know how to create an event using Elemental Live, and you are familiar with the various features of Elemental Live.
We don't make this assumption with AWS Elemental Statmux. Therefore, this guide explains everything you need to know to create and manage MPTSes using AWS Elemental Statmux. However, we do assume that you are familiar with SPTSes (single program transport streams) and MPTSes (multiple program transport streams). You should be familiar with the business uses of SPTS and MPTS, and you should be familiar with the SI/PSI tables used in these streams.
We also assume that you are know how to log into a Linux session, in order to work via the command line interface.
**Supported browsers**
Most browsers that are newer than two years old will support all the features of the AWS Elemental Conductor Live web interface. Supported browsers include the current versions of Firefox and Chrome. We recommend Firefox.
**JavaScript Warning**
JavaScript is required for the Conductor Live web interface. If JavaScript is disabled, the web interface presents a warning and provides general guidance to resolve the error.
**Related documentation**
For additional information about the configuration and use of Conductor Live and Elemental Live, see the following:
+ [AWS Elemental Conductor Live API Reference](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/elemental-cl3/latest/apireference/about-this-manual.html)
+ [AWS Elemental Conductor Live Configuration Guide](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/elemental-cl3/latest/configguide/)
+ [AWS Elemental Live API Reference](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/elemental-onprem/latest/pdf/live-api.pdf)
+ [AWS Elemental Live User Guide](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/elemental-live/latest/ug)
# Software versions
This guide applies to version 2.20.3 and later of Elemental Live and Elemental Statmux, and to version 3.20.3 and later of Conductor Live.
The AWS Elemental implementation of a statmux solution was relaunched in these versions. The earlier implementation is no longer supported.
# Licenses
+ You need the Statmux rate control add-on package for each Elemental Live node where you will produce SPTS programs that will go into the MPTS. For more information, see the section about add-on packages in the AWS Elemental Live user guide.
+ You don't need an add-on package for Elemental Statmux. The general license for Elemental Statmux is sufficient.
+ You don't need an add-on package for Conductor Live. The general license for Conductor Live is sufficient.
# Centralized management
Conductor Live lets you control both Elemental Live nodes and AWS Elemental Statmux nodes. These workers nodes must be in a Conductor Live cluster.
With Conductor Live, you do not work on each individual Elemental Live or AWS Elemental Statmux node. Instead, you work on all nodes from one centralized web interface on the Conductor Live.
**Conductor Live and Live Nodes**
Centralization via Conductor Live has several advantages for encoding work:
+ You create and run events (referred to as *channels*) from Conductor Live, specifying which node the channel is to run on. It is possible to move channels from one node to another.
+ You create profiles (which hold most of the data for channels) in Conductor Live. Any channel on any node can use the same profile. With Elemental Live as standalone, there is no profile sharing across nodes.
+ You can view the activity on all nodes in a cluster. The Elemental Live interface lets you view activity only for the individual standalone node.
+ You can start and stop channels on any node in the cluster. You can add or delete a channel on any node.
+ You can perform some changes on several channels at once, even if those channels are not on the same node. For example, if several channels (distributed across several nodes) all use the same profile, you can change all those channels so that they use a new profile (that is a revised version of the original profile).
**Conductor Live and AWS Elemental Statmux**
Centralization via the Conductor Live also has several advantages for creation of an MPTS:
+ You can create an MPTS and add channels to that MPTS from Conductor Live.
+ You can start and stop an MPTS.
+ You can add or remove a channel on any AWS Elemental Statmux node.
+ You can change properties of an MPTS in order to change the behavior of the MPTS.
+ You can view the activity on all AWS Elemental Statmux nodes in a cluster
# Redundancy and failover
Running Elemental Live events and Elemental Statmux MPTSes in Conductor Live lets you implement several resiliency features. These features help reduce outages in your workflows.
To clarify the terms:
+ *Resiliency *refers to the ability to continue when errors occur.
+ *Redundancy *refers to duplication of hardware or software components to protect against single points of failure. Therefore, redundancy is one way to achieve resiliency.
Conductor Live offers resiliency solutions in all areas of the workflow:
+ Node redundancy for Conductor Live nodes, Elemental Live nodes, and Elemental Statmux nodes. This redundancy protects against failure of an entire node.
Node redundancy is the foundation for some resiliency options within the worker nodes. For example, within Elemental Live, there are some resiliency options that only work with specific types of redundancy. Keep this fact in mind when planning node redundancy.
When you first deploy your Conductor Live cluster, you should plan redundancy for the nodes in the cluster.
After your initial deployment, you should review your node redundancy design when you add more nodes or when your workflows change dramatically.
For more information about planning node redundancy, see [Setup: Planning resiliency in a cluster](cl3-resiliency.md).
+ Resiliency features in different types of workflows:
+ Encoding workflows: workflows that involve only Elemental Live.
+ MPTS workflows: workflows that involve Elemental Live and Elemental Statmux.
As part of the design procedure for a workflow, decide which resiliency features you want to implement. An encoding workflow and in an MPTS workflow have slightly different resiliency options.
For more information about resiliency features, see [Resiliency features in Elemental Statmux](worker-nodes-other-resiliency.md).