norsk-ctl

norsk-ctl turns a machine into a server for Norsk products. It is a single binary that manages the containers, the reverse proxy, TLS, and authentication — so you can register a product and have live media pipelines running without writing compose files or wiring up nginx yourself.

Say it “norsk control”.

The model is a three-level hierarchy:

norsk-ctl manages products — registered Norsk applications, each shipped as a container.
Products expose templates — a template defines what an instance runs: a workflow, plus any dashboards and sidecar containers alongside it.
Templates have instances — launching a template fills in the parts that vary case by case (SRT ingest details, CDN egress, and so on) and produces the running containers.

Norsk Studio is the flagship product — its templates launch media workflows, and its dev-mode template gives you the full Studio canvas for building and editing workflows of your own. It’s joined by other products coming online now: Norsk Probe (monitoring and quality), Norsk Playout, and Norsk Remote Commentary — all managed the same way. A level above sits Norsk Manager, which schedules jobs and channels across a fleet of norsk-ctl servers — on-prem, cloud, or hybrid.

norsk-ctl ships with a CLI, a web UI, and an MCP server over the same API. Pick whichever suits how you work. See Products & Templates for the model in detail.

Get started Install on a server

Prerequisites

Docker Desktop (macOS) or Docker Engine (Linux)
A Norsk Media license (trial licenses available at norsk.video)
Ubuntu 22.04 / 24.04 / 26.04 LTS, Debian 12, or Oracle Linux 9 for install.sh --server; any platform Docker supports for --local

Install

Run it bare and it asks which install you want, then only for what that install needs:

curl -fsSL https://norsk.video/install/ctl | bash

Naming the mode and its inputs up front skips every question — the form for cloud-init, CI, and anything else unattended:

# Server install — Ubuntu LTS / Debian / Oracle Linux, with systemd + TLS
curl -fsSL https://norsk.video/install/ctl | bash -s -- --server --license /tmp/license.json --ip auto --yes

# Local install — any platform, current user only
curl -fsSL https://norsk.video/install/ctl | bash -s -- --local

To install norsk-ctl and a product in one line, use the product’s own bootstrap instead — see the Quickstart.

Full walkthrough: Server install — overview.

Pick your path

Try it

Just evaluating? The Zero to Hero guide gets you from zero to a running pipeline.

Build with it

Building a product on Norsk? Start with a Zero to Hero guide, then Manage plugins for customer-supplied node packages.

Automate it

Wiring Norsk into CI, scripts, or an LLM-driven workflow? The CLI Reference, REST API, and MCP server are your reference material.

Operate it

Running Norsk in production? The Concepts section covers network modes, architecture, security, backup, and upgrade.