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shiny hockey guy
Joined: 17 Jan 2006
Posts: 2
Location: The Crappy Town Where I am a Hero
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 Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:09 am Post subject: technical issues |
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OK I am new to the forum and new to podcasting... everyone has to start sometime right?? But I have been a browncoat for a long time- own the series and the movie- recruited at least 5 browncoats who are now deep into the 'verse. I need some help. I have a video iPod and iTunes. When I "subscribe" subscribe to the podcast it will only download the most recent Christmas Special. Even when I use the link from teh website saying it is a collection of all the episodes, all I get is the one episode???? What am I doing wrong- please help..
Thanks and stay shiny! |
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kbachelder
Joined: 10 Jun 2005
Posts: 511
Location: South of Boston, MA
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Companion Kate
Joined: 27 Jan 2005
Posts: 2014
Location: UK
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:43 am Post subject: |
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It's okay - this is an easy one to solve. Basically iTunes is just awful (in my humble opinion), but it can be done. I don't actually use it, but from memory, in the Podcasts folder, find the Signal, and there should be a microscopic blue triangle which you can click on, which enables you to see all the episode names. Once there, there are other microscopic symbols you can click on to download them.
(Oh, by the way, Kevin's advice above is only relevant if you haven't actually managed to subscribe, which I suspect you have)
I'm surprised you got the solstice special part 3 through. I would have expected the Jan bonus show (the latest show) to be the one it offered you.
If that doesn't work, we'll need an iTunes user to weigh in!
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dougom
Joined: 27 Dec 2005
Posts: 165
Location: Austin, TX, where we remain weird
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 3:30 pm Post subject: |
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Well, I don't think iTunes is either wonderful or awful; it's just very Apple, if you know what I mean. I switch between iTunes and Napster all the time, and they seem pretty equivalent to me. I think it's really a preference, like vi vs. emacs, but that may just be me.
In any event, it's not that hard once you get it installed. You can install iTunes by going to http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/. Once you have it installed, fire it up, click the "Podcasts" item in the "Source" pane on the left, then click the "Podcast directory" item in the lower left-hand corner. From there you can either search on podcasts by name, browse by type, or whatever you like.
Once you have subscribed to a podcast, any new episodes are automatically downloaded every time you open up iTunes. The podcast files are written to your hard disk in a podcast directory under the iTunes directory that you created when you installed iTunes. It's been a while since I set it up, but I believe that these files are MP3 by default (and if not, you can set an option in iTunes so that they are saved as MP3), and so you can copy them to your MP3 player pretty easily.
Apple also has a primer on podcasting, which you can access at http://www.apple.com/itunes/podcasts/. A link to podcast information available through Apple also appears when you pull up the "Podcast directory" as described above.
I personally downloaded all The Signal episodes, as well as other podcasts, in this manner. It's been no big. But I'm a nerd, so Your Milage May Vary. |
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jeremy
Site Admin
Joined: 24 Apr 2004
Posts: 997
Location: Utah
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| Posted: Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:22 pm Post subject: |
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To be contrarian... I love iTunes. (But then I guess I would since my license plate was "MACINTSH" up until a year ago when I changed it to "SEREN T")
Anyway, the triangle Jill speaks of is called a twirly arrow and is a standard user interface element on the Mac an all it's software. It works like the plus button in Windows, but just looks cleaner. The instructions above should set you straight. But to be more specific. Search for the podcast, then subscribe to it, then twirl down the arrow and press the "Get" button next to each of the episodes you want to download. You can then transfer them to your ipod by just dragging within iTunes.
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Vector
Joined: 02 Dec 2005
Posts: 95
Location: Germany
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| Posted: Wed Jan 18, 2006 1:35 pm Post subject: |
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Actually, I find iTunes rather easy to use, too. As all those programs, it has "preferences" somewhere, and under Podcasts, you can choose how often it looks for new episodes (default is "daily"), and what to do if it detects new ones. In the latter case, the default is "download the most recent one", indeed. You can choose "all", but... that will take some time. 
I prefer to download them when I want to listen to them.
| dougom wrote: | | I switch between iTunes and Napster all the time, and they seem pretty equivalent to me. I think it's really a preference, like vi vs. emacs, but that may just be me. |
I like that comparison! Others might want to ask "fine, but what are vi and emacs?!", though, and I'm really looking forward to that particular explanation!  |
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dougom
Joined: 27 Dec 2005
Posts: 165
Location: Austin, TX, where we remain weird
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| Posted: Wed Jan 18, 2006 11:31 pm Post subject: |
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| Vector wrote: | | dougom wrote: | | I switch between iTunes and Napster all the time, and they seem pretty equivalent to me. I think it's really a preference, like vi vs. emacs, but that may just be me. |
I like that comparison! Others might want to ask "fine, but what are vi and emacs?!", though, and I'm really looking forward to that particular explanation! |
Text editors primarily used on UNIX boxes.
See? Weren't so hard! [laughter] And now we return to our regularly-scheduled, interesting discussion. We really really don't want to start talking about emacs and vi here! |
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Companion Kate
Joined: 27 Jan 2005
Posts: 2014
Location: UK
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| Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 12:15 am Post subject: |
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| Vector wrote: | Actually, I find iTunes rather easy to use, too. As all those programs, it has "preferences" somewhere, and under Podcasts, you can choose how often it looks for new episodes (default is "daily"), and what to do if it detects new ones. In the latter case, the default is "download the most recent one", indeed. You can choose "all", but... that will take some time.
I prefer to download them when I want to listen to them. |
The question was about how to get hold of old (existing) episodes, not new (not-yet-published) ones. There is nothing in iTunes preferences which addresses that issue. I strongly suspect that the orignal poster was bright enough to have tried playing with Preferences. They posted here because that didn't work.
The "All" option does not apply to back issues. It applies only to future issues. If you think that's counter-intuitive, then that's what I'm talking about when I say its interface is not friendly.
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dougom
Joined: 27 Dec 2005
Posts: 165
Location: Austin, TX, where we remain weird
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| Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 12:58 am Post subject: |
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| Companion Kate wrote: | The question was about how to get hold of old (existing) episodes, not new (not-yet-published) ones. There is nothing in iTunes preferences which addresses that issue. I strongly suspect that the orignal poster was bright enough to have tried playing with Preferences. They posted here because that didn't work.
The "All" option does not apply to back issues. It applies only to future issues. If you think that's counter-intuitive, then that's what I'm talking about when I say its interface is not friendly. |
Can't speak to all the idiosyncracies of the interface, but when I subscribed to The Signal via iTunes, all episodes were listed, with a button next to them labelled "Get." When you click on the "Get" button, it downloads the episode to your hard disk in your iTunes location. All new episodes are automatically downloaded, by you have to "Get" the back episodes by hand (as it were). |
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Companion Kate
Joined: 27 Jan 2005
Posts: 2014
Location: UK
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| Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 1:11 am Post subject: |
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| dougom wrote: | | All new episodes are automatically downloaded, by you have to "Get" the back episodes by hand (as it were). |
Exactly. That's the point. And if you're not familiar with the UI, figuring out how to do that can be frustrating.
Jeremy says that iTunes has a fairly standard Mac UI. What I don't understand is why they didn't give it a Mac interface on a Mac, and a Windows interface on Windows. That would have made it so much nicer. But a Mac interface on Windows? Huh? It doesn't even look like a proper window.
Give me iPodder any day.
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Pake Boy
Joined: 18 Jan 2006
Posts: 2
Location: 21° 20' N 157° 55' W
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| Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 3:57 am Post subject: |
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I recently received an iPod for XMas and it took me about 10 minutes to figure out how to navigate the screen. Hey, I'm a point and click kind of guy.
Anyway I already had some of the podcasts as mp3 downloads so I decided to use iTunes to pull the rest of the podcasts down. I couldn't get iTunes/Pod Casts to list all the back episodes so I went to "Music Store" to pull down the older podcasts one by one.
Glad to say I have all the podcasts literally in my hand now. Great job with the podcasts. Keep 'em coming.
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lhoward
Joined: 10 Jun 2005
Posts: 271
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| Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 6:08 am Post subject: |
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I have two main problems with the iTunes podcatching client.
1. The default settings do not work well for podcasts that publish more than once a day (this may have been fixed in the latest version, but I did not check and am not sure).
2. You have to run the whole (heavyweight) iTunes client just to download podcasts. I don't want a program that big & bulky running. iTunes should come with a lightweight podcatcher process that should run in the background and take care of only the podcast downloads so you don't have to have the whole thing running.
I also don't like how iTunes organizes (and doesn't let me change) the downloaded podcasts on disk & how it doesn't work for syncing with a non-ipod mp3 player (of course, no other podcatcher I've used has done a good job of that either).
A problem that I have with Mac tools in general is that they almost force you to work the way they want you to work. I think that in general the default work flows of Mac tools are better than the default work flows of applications for other platforms, but if you want to use the tool in a way other than how it wants to be used by default it can cause you a lot of pain.
...and just in case anyone wants to know, I am definitely a "vi" man and have been since 1990.
L
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http://signal.serenityfirefly.com/ |
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Vector
Joined: 02 Dec 2005
Posts: 95
Location: Germany
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| Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 2:09 pm Post subject: |
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| Companion Kate wrote: | | The "All" option does not apply to back issues. It applies only to future issues. If you think that's counter-intuitive, then that's what I'm talking about when I say its interface is not friendly. |
I didn't want to believe that, but it's true: "all" just means "all since the last download". If iTunes checks daily (default!), that's hardly different from "most recent since download". I'm sorry! I didn't think they could mean that. And "counter-intuitive" is putting it mildly, then.
But I have to add that I don't use iTunes for Podcasts alone (actually, I'm subscribing only to one podcast, so far, only "The Signal"), and iTunes is running most of the time, anyway (playing music), so... I can bear with its peculiarities. 
It's true that the Windows version of a program should have a Windows UI. But since I've never had anything Microsoft at home, that's only a problem at work... where it's the problem of my boss. For me, it's paid time.  |
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shiny hockey guy
Joined: 17 Jan 2006
Posts: 2
Location: The Crappy Town Where I am a Hero
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| Posted: Mon Jan 23, 2006 5:27 am Post subject: Got 'em |
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| Well thanks for everyone's help I was able to get 'em all. It wasn't that difficult.. just need to know that the silly blue triangle act the same as the "plus" sign in windows I probably should have tried that first, but was hurried when I first tried to subscribe and the web site has said the address they had listed was to an archive of all the podcasts.. Now that I am learning more about the whole podcasting phenomenon, iTunes seems like it will serve my needs- Thanks again all! |
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CaptainTish
Joined: 18 Jan 2007
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 12:33 am Post subject: Where did Season 2 go on iTunes? |
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| Hi! I'm a relatively new Browncoat, and I've been getting caught up on all the old podcasts. I just finished Season One, but I haven't listened to all of Season 2 yet. Today I logged on to my ITunes, and saw the first episode of Season 3 (Yay!) but Season 2 is nowhere to be found -- even tried putting in the RSS feed. I'm not sure I'm doing it right. Please help! |
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Companion Kate
Joined: 27 Jan 2005
Posts: 2014
Location: UK
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| Posted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 1:01 am Post subject: |
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Season two, like season one, has been archived.
The correct way to get season two is to go to our website and take it from there. Find the bit where it says "The Signal Season #2" in big letters, and click on the link marked "Complete Listing". I'm not sure how we could make things any simpler. Over on the linked season 2 page, as well as links to all the episodes, you'll also find the URL of the RSS feed for the season two archive.
But just for you, here's the quick way. Copy/paste this into your podcatcher: http://signal.serenityfirefly.com/season2/podcast.xml
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CaptainTish
Joined: 18 Jan 2007
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 12:56 pm Post subject: |
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Okay, thanks! Since I'm having trouble doing the copy/paste bit with iTunes, I guess I'll just have to download from the site. Stupid iTunes.  Never had a problem with them until this! Season 1 is on there no problem, but when I type in Season 2 -- nothing. Oh well.
Thanks again! |
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BrownCoat_Tabz
Joined: 06 Dec 2006
Posts: 411
Location: San Pedro, CA
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CaptainTish
Joined: 18 Jan 2007
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 1:25 pm Post subject: |
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I did it!  I was pasting into the wrong place, silly me.
Thanks for all the help, everyone. Off I go to get all caught up on Season 2! |
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Companion Kate
Joined: 27 Jan 2005
Posts: 2014
Location: UK
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| Posted: Thu Jan 18, 2007 9:56 pm Post subject: |
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That won't work on all browsers. In fact, security-consious people such as myself simply refuse to allow browsers to launch applications, period.
We could change the website to give iTunes-specific links, but I'm not greatly in favor of supporting one podcatcher over another. The RSS URL, on the other hand, is completely portable and works with all podcatchers, even though it does require copy/paste, rather than just point and click.
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