MusicMaster Blog

by Paul Ziino

The Results Bar in your Schedule Editor can be set up to show a variety of information about the active song in the log. Today we review the various options.

To turn on the Results Bar, click the pulldown on the right side of the wrench icon (Toggle Toolbars) then check “Results Bar.”

The first time you turn on the Results Bar it may be empty, or it may populate with a few items right away. Either way, you can customize it by right-clicking within and selecting Customize. You will be presented with a Customize Results Bar window that looks like this.

You will see available panels for any Keyword field’s Separation and Nearest Plays, Current Date and Hour Displays, Hour Rotation Map, Multi-Station Separation, Nearest Play Yesterday/Same Hour/Same Shift, Shift Hour Rotation, Shift Rotation Map, Song Segue Nearest Plays and Separation, Song Failure Alerts, as well as Song Nearest Plays/Rotation and Separation. Following is a breakdown of each and what they mean.

Current Date Display and Current Hour Display

This tells you where your cursor is, on the date and hour.

Hour Rotation, Shift Hour Rotation, and Shift Rotation

Hour Rotation shows the song plays leading up to the play where your cursor sits.

Shift Hour Rotation shows the plays of this song within the same shift and indicates what shift that is.

Shift Rotation shows the shift sequence in which the current song has played, with dashes on either side of the current play selected.

Song Segue Nearest Plays and Song Segue Separation

Both these panels tell you similar information. Note that the segues are looking at the song where the cursor resides and the song that played before it. Song Segue: Nearest Plays looks back and ahead to when these two songs last played together (in either order), and when they will play together next (in either order). Song Segue: Separation displays this same info, but as a total of Days/Hours/Minutes.

Song Fail Alert, Nearest Plays, Rotation, and Rest

Song Fail Alert will display in Red if the active song violates an unbreakable rule, yellow if the rule is breakable, or blank if no rules are violated.

Nearest Plays tells you the date and time when that song was last scheduled or scheduled next time.

Song Rotation is a mini snapshot of the last 8 days of a song’s play history.

Song Rest tells you the amount of time back and ahead of a song’s play history.

Keyword Nearest Plays and Separation

Keyword Nearest Plays will show you the last/next time a keyword is scheduled.

Keyword Separation will show you the amount of time back and ahead that keyword is scheduled.

You will have a Nearest Plays and a Separation panel available for each keyword field in your database.

Favorites?

Of course I have my favorites—the panels I like to have in my display include Current Hour, Nearest Plays in Same hour and shift, Artist Keywords Separation, Song Separation, and Song Rotation.

Try the different panels out to figure out which work best for you and your station!

By Jerry Butler

Roughly 80 percent of people have already given up on their New Year’s Resolutions.  Here’s one you can easily keep:  updating the look of your MusicMaster.  MusicMaster has always been known for allowing users to customize the database, views and more.  In MusicMaster Version 7, we have added additional themes/display options and added category coloring options to freshen up your look.

Click on Tools, Options and Themes / Display Options.  You can select various themes including Back in Black, Paint it Black, Purple Rain, Silver Bells, Song Sung Blue or Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White.

To update your category color scheme, go to Library, Categories and selecting Color Schemes.

Not only are there numerous different pre-set color schemes, note you can apply one color set to your music and a different one to your non-music.

These options ensure you’ll keep at least one New Year’s Resolution in 2019!

If you have any questions, please contact your Music Scheduling Consultant.

By Marianne Burkett

As I’m digging deeper into Version 7, I’m seeing things I’ve always dreamed of as a programmer.

First go to Tools/Options/Display Colors and set up this feature that has been in the program for some time.  You can select colors you’d like to see for various elements in the clocks.  In the capture below, I made Stopsets Deep Red and Lognotes Pale Yellow.

When building clocks, I love our “Pie” view.   If you color your categories with various colors, it makes it simple to distribute the categories evenly through the clock.

Check out the default view in Pies which we’ve always had.

In Version 7, with a quick visit to Tools/Options/Additional Properties you can put the number “1” in “PieClockLabels” in the Clocks Section, and you get category code and element information in the pie view as well.

When you hover over anything in the pie you also get details about lognotes, music and non music descriptions below the pie.  In the sample screen shot, my cursor was on a P2 Power 2000 category.

If you made a lot of clock changes and use the pie, this new feature can help in making sure they’re spaced out correctly.

If you’d like the video tour of new core features in Version 7, click the link below.

https://www.musicmaster.com/version7.php

Any questions, call your Music Scheduling Consultant!

By Jerry Butler

In a time when many program directors are programming multiple stations, it can be really frustrating to find you have made changes in one database, when intending to make those changes in a different database.  MusicMaster gives you the ability to customize multiple settings throughout the software for a different feel and look for each database.  Many programmers have cloned databases to create a new station.  This works great, but copies everything including your categories and category colors over to the new database, making it difficult to tell them apart.   A very easy way to customize each database is by using a station logo or sweeper when you open the database.  Here is how you can set up these features.

Click on Tools, Options and Dataset Identification.  In the first field, you can change the name that you see on the top left of the screen when you have the database open.  This can differ from what the actual database file is called when opening up MusicMaster.

The next field allows you to set up an Audio Logo (Sweeper, Liner, Favorite Movie Drop).  Click on the button to the right of the audio logo field to search your computer for an audio file you would like to play when opening the database.

The next field allows you to show a Graphic Logo file.  Click on the button to the right of the field to find a file on your computer that you would like to show in the main window of MusicMaster upon launch.

Once the file is selected, you need to click display the graphic logo file check box.  You can also adjust the position of the logo with the dropdown selection and choose to have the background as transparent.  There are also settings for a background color with or without using a logo.

When you open the database you will now see your logo and hear the audio you selected.

Play with the setting and get the database customized the way you want it.  Happy Scheduling from MusicMaster!

By Paul Ziino

You can really make your Schedule Editor look just about any way you want.  You can add and subtract fields via the Modify Editor Layout icon.

Here you can also change the font, size, colors, and grid attributes.

Click the Toggle Toolbars icon and you can turn on the Test Results panel, Instant Analysis, and more.

Once you’ve turned on the Results Bar, right-click on any panel and select Customize to see all the different items available for review.

And with other icons you can toggle the history graph on and off, as well as the Info bar.

With Show/Hide Elements you can hide different elements from view.

You can turn off lognotes, only display the unscheduled items, hide specific categories, display hour and day counters, and more!

Get it all set up just the way you want it, and you have a completely customized workspace!

And with a few clicks and drags you can rearrange the whole thing and some color adjustments, you have a whole new look!!

Customization of your Schedule Editor is just one of the ways you can make your MusicMaster yours!  Have any questions?  Contact your Music Scheduling Consultant for help.

By Dave Tyler

I will be the first to admit that I am a bit of an “Info-Geek”! I like having the tools I need and the information I need at my fingertips when I need it. MusicMaster has a couple displays that I now take for granted but when I run across a database that is not using them it drives me crazy! Over in your Info Bar where your categories live there is a big blank area…dead space that could, in my Info-Geek mind be filled with something useful to me.

Well if you are using MusicMaster 5.0 or later then you already can fill that space and you have 3 options to choose from Song Count, Average Run Time & Slot Count.

These options are pretty straight forward. Song Count is literally how many songs are in that category. Average Run Time is just that, the average length of the songs within that particular category. Finally Slot Count denotes how many “Slots” are in that particular category. Slot Count can be important to you if you use a lot of packets. You will note in the above example in Category B there are 117 songs in the category (Song Count) but only 108 Slots (Slot Count) because 9 of those songs are packeted in some form or another. These option give you a quick reference to information that may be specifically important to you.

Ok so now I’ve shown something cool now let me show you how to make the magic happen in your Info Bar. Start by going to Tools/Options.

Then go to Library Editor Options and you will see the drop down box with your available options below the heading of “Show Extra Category Information”.

Choose which one of these will be of the most value to you, click Apply then OK and it is done! This additional information is just another great function of MusicMaster that puts the important information you need at your fingertips.

To find out about other time saving functions, if you have any questions or are on an earlier version and want to upgrade your version of MusicMaster to have access to these wonderful features contact your MusicMaster Music Scheduling Consultant.

By Drew Bennett

One of the most common phone calls we get is how to change a layout. Many times, our customers have been so conditioned to accept the layout they are given in a music scheduler like DOS or other Windows-based software that some of them don’t even know they have the choice of what fields to see or not see on the screen! (more…)

By Drew Bennett

One of the many features we all love about MusicMaster is the ability to customize the look and feel of it. You can change layouts, move windows around, choose to show or hide elements. You can even plug your own logo into the software and print reports or just spruce things up a bit. Now, MusicMaster 5.0 takes customization a step further with Custom User Buttons for your main Toolbar. (more…)

by Marianne Burkett

When you start using MusicMaster after having worked with other scheduling software, you may or may not be aware of all the choices you have about colors, layout, font sizes and embedding your logo into the software.  Yes, all things are possible and it’s very fun to play at setting it up. (more…)

By Aaron Taylor

So, here it is…The end of the first month of the year.
How are those New Year’s resolutions working out for you? Even if many (or all of them) have fallen by the wayside at this point, the way I look at it, it’s still not too late. Here is one completely achievable New Year’s goal, resolve to more fully utilize one of the most important tools in your programming arsenal…MusicMaster!

Perhaps you’ve seen or heard about some of the features and functionality I’ll touch upon here, but either you’ve never had the time (or the knowledge) to put them into practice or maybe you weren’t even aware they existed. Let’s resolve to change that today. (more…)