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BBC Programme Identifier

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A BBC Programme Identifier (PID) is an alphanumeric, persistent, unique identifier for a television or radio programme brand, a season or series, or an individual episode, used by the BBC in their web URLs, iPlayer viewers, and internal databases.[1][2]

All PIDs consist of a lower-case letter, followed by seven[3] other characters which may be lower case letters, or digits. Vowels (a, e, i, o, u) are not used, so that offensive words cannot be generated inadvertently. The first letter "b" means the content reference identifier (CRID) authority is Red Bee; a "p" means that the authority is the BBC database, PIPS, and "s" is for miscellaneous partners and suppliers. Other sources, denoted by different opening letters, could potentially be introduced.

For example, the PID for the series The Life Scientific is b015sqc7[4] while the PID for the individual episode of that show first broadcast on 8 July 2014 is b048l0g3 which is used in its URL, http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b048l0g3.[5] An example in the "p" range is the PID for the Desert Island Discs episode featuring Ada Cherryp009y95q.[6]

PIDs have been created retrospectively, for some programmes from the pre-digital era.Cite error: A <ref> tag is missing the closing </ref> (see the help page).

References

  1. ^ Ferne, Tristan (18 August 2009). "BBC - Radio Labs: Machine tagging the BBC". BBC. Retrieved 15 July 2014.
  2. ^ "BBC - Commissioning Radio - Glossary". BBC Online. Retrieved 15 July 2014. - this source erroneously expands the acronym as "Packet Identification number"
  3. ^ As of 2014, all PIDs have eight-characters, but longer PIDs could be introduced
  4. ^ "BBC Radio 4 - The Life Scientific - Available now". BBC Online. Retrieved 15 July 2014.
  5. ^ "BBC Radio 4 - The Life Scientific, Zoe Shipton". BBC Online. Retrieved 15 July 2014.
  6. ^ "BBC Radio 4 - Desert Island Discs, Ada Cherry Kearton". BBC Online. Retrieved 16 July 2014.
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