MusicMaster Blog

by Dave Tyler

Ok, so the word “Traffic” has a negative connotation in most cases, but inside a radio or TV station, the more traffic the better! We’re talking about the spots that pay the bills and keep the tower pumping more wattage to the cottage and ohms to the homes! Money baby!

So, what does this have to do with Music Scheduling? Well, it depends on your needs. Some folks want to see their traffic spots in the Schedule Editor so they can time their hours out a little more precisely, while others have automation systems that require a single combined music/traffic log to be exported.

To keep things simple, let’s just go over bringing traffic into MusicMaster for timing purposes. I will also go over how to import other “.Def” files for library synchronization and reconciliation. Creating a “Def” definition file for any of these is a topic for another day, but great information can be found in our Help section with a simple search. Your dedicated MusicMaster Support rep can help you as well.

This feature is available in all versions of MusicMaster, but I’ll be demonstrating it in MusicMaster CS and the Web Client.

First things first, we need to import a “Def” file. To do this, click on the dropdown for the Schedule Calendar and select “Traffic System Interface”. Below is how this looks in our CS Desktop and Web versions:

Once selected, the Traffic System Interface box will pop up. There are a couple of things we need to do here, but first, let’s import our Traffic Definition file. This is the file written to import the information from the traffic log into our MusicMaster Schedule Editor. Once you locate your def file, click “Open”, and it will import into your station. Here are the dual looks from the desktop and Web clients:

Nice job! Now that it is imported, we’ll get to those other things I had mentioned we needed to knock out. We want to check the boxes for “Import Spot Information from Your Traffic System” and if you are exporting traffic from MusicMaster you may want to “Enable Editing of Spot Assignments”. If you’re like me, if I am going to export traffic along with music, then having the ability to edit the order of the spots to keep the same voice or a similar client away from each other would be important. If not, then leave this unchecked.

Alright, we are cookin’ with gas now! We have successfully imported the def file, so what’s left to do? We need to set up our clocks with “Traffic Merge” elements. It is important to note that these Traffic Merge points can be wider/longer than the actual stopset. Think of them as funnels that suck in the spots from the traffic log and place them where you want them in the music log. In my example, I have a 20:00 Break that is 3 minutes long. I make my Traffic Merge point a bit wider to make sure it grabs all the spots scheduled for this time. I set it to capture any spots sent from my Traffic Department between 20:00-25:00 after for this hour. It is necessary to know when your traffic is being sent. If your Traffic Director is sending your 20 break spots at 19:00 after and your merge is looking for spots between 20:00-25:00 this will result in a “Loose Spot(s)”, and you will not see it in the editor unless you right-click on the traffic merge and choose “View Loose Spots”. You want to be on the same page with your Traffic Director on this point. Here is what the Traffic Merge will look like in your clock(s).

You will need these positions in any clocks you want to see traffic in. Save your clock(s) and enter them in the desired assignment grid (unless they already are in there).

Now we want to do a little work in the editor layout, so open your Schedule Editor and then click “Modify Editor Layout”. Scroll down on the bottom right until you reach the “Grid” section. You want “Auto Expand Child” set to “True”. This will allow MusicMaster to display the spots when you open the editor. With it set to false, there would be a small dropdown arrow to the left of the Traffic Merge position that you could click to see the commercials. Once done, click OK and then save the layout by clicking the small “Save” icon to the right of the Modify Editor Layout button. If the other parts of the above setup have been done, this step is not necessary in the Web version.

We have finally arrived at the grand reveal! Let’s open the Schedule Editor to a date that we know the traffic logs have already been sent, and voila! Spots!

Before wrapping things up here let’s look at how we can import a reconciliation and/or a Library Sync def file. Reconciling will update your logs in MusicMaster with what aired in automation. This is helpful if you have extra songs at the end of each hour that often get bumped, or if jocks change songs out during their airshift. This also assures your BMI/ASCAP, CRTC, Sound Exchange etc. reports are accurate.

To import a reconciliation file, click on Schedule/Reconcile:

Now you can click the Browse button and find the def file you need and click OK.

You can reconcile your past logs by going to Schedule/Reconcile and selecting the dates you want to reconcile, make sure the box is checked for the def file, then click Start.

Moving on, let’s import a Library Sync file. Library Syncs are used to add or update metadata (song and song info) from your automation system into MusicMaster. Importing the Def is similar to both the traffic and reconciliation processes. Click on Library/Synchronize.

Click to select the Library Synchronization Definition file from the location where you saved it. Click Open.

Once selected, if the “Add” button is not available, you may need to click “Convert” first, then “Add”.

Now you can synchronize your library by going to Library/Synchronize and running the file.

And that, my friends, is how you can import your Traffic, Reconciliation & Library Synchronization definitions into MusicMaster, as demonstrated in our CS Desktop and Web versions. It is worth noting that it is not necessary to do this process in both the Desktop AND the Web clients. Doing it in one does it for the others because they all reference the same database.

As always, if you have any questions, please contact your dedicated MusicMaster Scheduling Consultant.

By Marianne Burkett

The first thing clients ask when a new version of MusicMaster is released is “What’s New”?

If you merge Spots into MusicMaster and export both Music and Spots together via MusicMaster you will LOVE this new feature!  (more…)