MUSICMASTER PART 1 Greg Diamond – ByrnesMedia I’ve had a few people ask why I’ve never written about this scheduler. After all, I’ve done a couple of articles on Selector and Linker. I guess they’re right… fair is fair. Here, then, is my take on MusicMaster for Windows.
Layout
Like all software, the biggest immediate hurdle is navigation. Knowing where to find things is all-important and MMW is a pleasant surprise in this area. It’s a fairly compact program and this really works in the user’s favour, since the learning curve isn’t as steep as it is with some other schedulers. I especially like the Info Bar, which defaults to the left side of the screen, but can be moved elsewhere or even turned off altogether if need be. This bar makes category and clock access very straightforward and also allows you to pull up a day’s schedule in a few quick clicks. In addition, the more traditional pull-down menus are logically thought out and not overwhelming, which I find is one of the most appealing aspects of the program overall.
Another nice feature is at the bottom of the screen where all your open windows are on display in button form, so retrieving any of them is just a single mouse-click away.
MusicMaster for Windows looks like a windows program, so most users will feel quite comfortable with it immediately.
Categories
The ease of category creation and manipulation is impressive. The Category Editor is accessed through a pull-down menu. Here, you can quickly add, delete, name change, and reorder your entire category list. The ability to colour-code each category is also available here, but I must admit I’m not a fan of giving each category a separate colour, even though this is suggested in one of the program’s Start-up Tips. The use of multiple colours might be pretty, but it’s also very impractical elsewhere in the program. For instance, in clock construction too many colours will invariably cause a visual mish-mash in Pie View mode. You are better off colouring types of categories (e.g. currents, recurrents, and gold), which will then allow you to more easily ensure newer material is evenly spaced throughout an hour.
I really like that both Music and Non-Music categories (i.e. Imaging, Voice-Tracks, etc.) are created and housed in the same place in MusicMaster. It’s a simple matter of designating them as one or the other as they are created. If you are not currently handling your imaging through a music scheduler of any type, then I strongly urge you to do so. The same rules that apply to music categories to ensure proper plotting can also be used on non-musical elements. This greatly enhanced flexibility and will stretch the shelf-life of your ID’s.
This screen also lets the user create as many different Category Groups as desired. I suggest making up at least the following: Active, Inactive, Currents, Recurrents, Currents/Recurrents, Gold, Canadian (if in Canada, of course), International (again, if programming north of the 49th), and Specialty (if needed). These groups will let you pull up entire sections of your library, as opposed to accessing them one by one.
The Category Editor also allows for a ‘jump’ to the Scheduling Properties screen, which is actually located in the “Schedule” area of the program. Here is where you set the order in which the categories schedule (the Pass Order). You can also group certain categories so they schedule together. The Schedule Properties screen also allows for setup of other scheduling aspects like Search Depth. Like other schedulers, you have the option of setting the depth as either a specific number of songs (best for smaller Current and Recurrent categories) or as a percentage (better for larger Gold categories). A major error in many databases is a search depth that is just too high to keep things rotating effectively. Contrary to popular belief, if a music database is running at optimum you should have some Unscheduled Positions, each day. It is then up to the user to decide on an appropriate solution, which is normally not very difficult. If you are scheduling days and not generating any Unscheduled Positions, then you have a set of rules and controls that are likely too loose and your music is probably not plotting as well as it should. In addition to the Rule Tree, a key area to look at is Search Depth. By the way, in MusicMaster for Windows, leaving a Search Depth blank forces the program to use a 50% setting. If you have Currents in a set, “hard-wired” pattern, remember to give those categories a depth of 1.
As mentioned in the previous section, a list of your categories is easily accessible at all times via the Info Bar. Provided you have taken the time to lay out your categories logically, you should be able to find one and open it in seconds.
An open category can be viewed in either Grid or Song Card forms. This brings up another outstanding feature of the program – it is highly configurable. The Show/Hide Fields let you choose the ones you use, hide the ones you don’t and then save the setup for future use. In that respect, it’s really no different than other schedulers, but the kicker is the ability to highlight the data and copy it seamlessly into an Excel file. That alone is great, but it’s the reverse that’s of real value. All of a sudden, adding research scores or any other type of extraneous data becomes a simple matter of cut and paste. To allow for this, you would be wise to order MusicMaster with as many fields as possible, including a number of blank text fields. This, in turn will allow for a user-defined column addition to the Grid View to accommodate placement of the added data. Adding fields is not something that can be done by you. MusicMaster will add extra fields after the fact, but it is my understanding that the service comes at a price.
The Song Card view is also configurable and I suggest it be identical to that of the Grid View, with any rarely used fields added to the bottom.
There are also many great little features in the Mass Changer, which is available in either view. Do you have data that was entered by two or more people and some of it is in upper case and some is in title case? Just go to the field in question, position on the top song and right click to access a menu that contains numerous options including Move, Copy, Delete, Print, Library Analysis and the above-mentioned Mass Changer. Clicking on that, in turn, opens a window where various data manipulation options are offered like content appending and prepending, assigning sequential values, removing leading or trailing spaces, and converting names to last-first, upper case, lower case, mixed case, etc. Choosing one option will then allow for a total conversion of that column or you are also given the choice of accepting or rejecting changes on a song-by-song basis. Having overhauled and rebuilt many databases over the last few years, I can vouch for just how handy and time-saving this one little part of the program really is.
Next month we’ll take a look at some more of MusicMaster for Windows including the clocks and scheduler areas. In the meantime, if you wish to discuss any aspect of this program or any other music scheduler, please don’t hesitate to drop me a line at 1-866-332-1331. |