Syncing your podcasts...

12-05-05, 09:46 PM

Anyone have any good tips/tricks on syncing podcasts? I currently listen to a few hours of podcasts a day (I'm hooked) and move about 10-15 podcasts every couple days, so I'd love to have an easy way to sync them up to my Axim. It can be difficult to figure out which ones I've listened to, make sure those are deleted, add the new ones, etc... So I'm curious as to what methods others have out there.

I've tried FeederReader which would keep them all contained on my Axim to begin with, and it is a great program, but it just wasn't working exactly how I'd want a podcast downloader to work. I am using Yahoo Music Engine's podcast plugin to monitor my feeds and download my files, and that does have sync support, problem is it will sync the rest of my music, which I don't want it to do.

I'm convinced at this point there is no real seamless way to do the syncing, so I'll probably have to rely on something more like a method. Currently Yahoo downloads all my podcasts to it's directory, I then do a quick search for all mp3s in that directory and sort by date. I then the new ones since my last sync to a temporary folder, delete the originals. Copy the temporary folders contents to my axim, then delete the temporary folder. Once they are on my axim, I listen to them, and delete the show after I listen to it. I'd like that deletion to be reflected on a folder on my computer during sync. Basically during sync what I'm looking for is new ones are added from the pc to pda, and shows deleted on pda are deleted on PC. ActiveSync won't sync to a storage card, right?

Anyone using a technique that involves a card reader? That seems like it might be useful considering you get an actual drive letter for your SD card where you don't with ActiveSync.

Thanks. =)

12-05-05, 10:27 PM

I'm very curious to know how you would like FeederReader to download and play your podcasts. FeederReader is very flexible and you can set it up in several different ways. You can set it up to automatically download overnight. There is a new option to retry enclosure downloads. Then as you play the podcasts, one tap on the Enclosure Toolbar will delete the last podcast and play the next podcast. Have you posted your request on how you want it to work on the FeederReader forums?

Greg Smith
Author, FeederReader - Pocket PC *direct* RSS text, audio, video, podcasts
www.FeederReader.com - Download on the Road

12-05-05, 11:41 PM

Originally Posted by MobileSmith

I'm very curious to know how you would like FeederReader to download and play your podcasts. FeederReader is very flexible and you can set it up in several different ways. You can set it up to automatically download overnight. There is a new option to retry enclosure downloads. Then as you play the podcasts, one tap on the Enclosure Toolbar will delete the last podcast and play the next podcast. Have you posted your request on how you want it to work on the FeederReader forums?

Greg Smith
Author, FeederReader - Pocket PC *direct* RSS text, audio, video, podcasts
www.FeederReader.com - Download on the Road

Haha... I was wondering how quickly you would show up as I know how often you are looking for feedback and help our users having difficulty with you program. That's the sign of a good developer.

I went with FeederReader for a few weeks and it just didn't suit me. The main problem I had was having to use FeederReader to open my podcasts. All I really want out of a PDA Podcatcher is to grab the files, and stick them on my storage card in a flat directory structure so I can easily navigate through them with WMP. With FR, it wasn't possible to navigate around the enclosures directories easily to find items to play.

I dunno, I could be the unique one here, while news feeds and Podcast feeds travel over the same medium (RSS), I really don't look at them the same. I'd like one program to grab the podcasts, and a seperate one to read my newsfeeds. Of course, that is twice the work, and I see why enclosure support is included into FR as opposed to them being seperate applications. However, from a UI & useability standpoint, FR is a bit confusing. What needs to be changed with it? I don't know. How come I don't know? I think we are pretty similiar. I'm a web programmer, and all of my interfaces and system desgins drive some people crazy because I leave them open, flexible, and with lots of features, just like FR. But for people not familiar with it, they are often times confused and don't quite grasp how everything works. It makes perfect sense in my head, but that is obviously because I'm the one who designed it. And plus... UIs are not my thing. I'd offer suggestions if I could, but I wouldn't know where to begin. All I really do know is that what I want out of podcasting and my axim is files delivered straight to one flat directory on my storage card and that's about it.

FR is a great program and I still use it for newsreading, so thanks for a wonderful program. But at this point in it's development, or at least to my knowledge of it's features, it is just not quite what I'm looking for out of a podcatcher. Simplicity and transparency (I'd probably like to not even know it is there) are keys in my book. Podcasting is all about having the content delivered to you, without you having to do anything. It is odd because I'm a linux guy, I like things complicated, but I guess complication is just not part of the podcasting experience, at least for me. Podcasting is about feeding the user the content, and anything more that one to two clicks is too much. With TV, Power button on... channel #... press enter... done. That's all listening to podcasts should be in my book. Like I said initially, I might just be the weird or picky one here. With as much as I listen to podcasts on my axim, the less thinking and time I spend in between listening to podcasts queueing up the next one, the better.

Now that I think about it... going back to my last post and the card reader (I knew I was on to something), I could use iPodder (or any other podcatcher) on manual download only. Stick my SD card into the reader whenever I'm ready for a sync. Click the "Scan feeds" (or whatever) button, the files are downloaded directly to the card, put the card back in my axim, and done. Seems easy enough to me. Only downside is I can't listen while sync'ing and it isn't a mobile solution. Hmmmm....

Damn that was a long post.

12-06-05, 12:03 AM

I appreciate your post. It helps me see where FeederReader needs help or where the documentation needs help!

To set up FeederReader for two-tap access to podcasts, turn on "Download Enclosures on Update". This will automatically download the new enclosures every time you update feeds. Then to play the Audio, tap Do | Play | Audio.

There! Two taps. If an enclosure/podcast fails to completely download, tap Do | Update All Enclosures.

To play the next podcast, tap the "Delete & Play Next" icon and FeederReader will delete the podcast you just listened to and start playing the next one. One tap file management.

Any questions? ;-)

Oh! And to play a particular downloaded podcast, tap Do | Play | List, then tap the podcast you want to hear.

With FeederReader, listening and reading are separated. You can read news and listen to podcasts without losing your place in your news reading. To me, that is one of the biggest reasons to want to use separate programs. FeederReader is very flexible and once you understand how that part works, you may not care to have separate programs.

I understand, though. It is a little difficult to get your head around someone else's UI, especially if you're a deep thinker. As you continue to use FeederReader for news, when you think of any suggestions, I'd love to hear them. If you have any questions, post them here or in the FeederReader Forums!

Greg Smith
Author, FeederReader - Pocket PC *direct* RSS text, audio, video, podcasts
www.FeederReader.com - Download on the Road

SolSie · 12-08-05, 09:35 AM

Personally, I'd like to aggregate on my PC first using Juice (iPodder) overnight then use the free utility MobSync to automatically sync to my storage card on my X50v/WM5

As far as playback, I am using PocketMusic for the its bookmarking capability and since I have tons of Podcasts downloaded during the night.
In the morning just pickup my Axim and go. On PocketMusic, just go to playlist, remove + add, select the main podcast directory (w/all the sub directories for each podcast), select sort by date creation and reverse order. So PocketMusic will play from the latest ones to the oldest...

10-25-06, 08:23 PM

I too tried Juice, until the newest version of iTunes came out that does pretty good with podcasts.
I just copy them to my CF card via a cardreader, seems the simplest to me, on the X5 copying lagre files (like podcasts) doesn't always work right and sometimes (at least for me) Active Sync to disconnect.

-I tried the MibiSync things, but had the same disconnect problems. Not sure if it is AS, or just the X5 or some other conflict. Copying to the CF works fine for me.

What I'm looking for is something to get podcasts to my PC, that TOTALLY does not include iTunes (like Juice and using iTunes itself).
-iTunes seems to be a system hog, and I'd like to try something that doesn't involve it.