Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Just about everyone that uses iTunes has a hella hard time keeping their music files organized. This is a shame because (a) it’s actually pretty simple and (b) it is a colossal pain in the ass to move your library if it’s not organized correctly. (Note that I’m talking about the organization of your actual music files and not the appropriate tagging and categorization of your music library.) The bummer of the thing is that the folks at Apple unwittingly made this more complicated and difficult by trying to make it simple and easy. It happens. Trust me. I have been building software for just over a decade now and it happens all.the.time. Don’t get mad at Apple for this one. Let’s just fix it.
First I’ll tell you what you need to do, and then I’ll explain why.
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Thursday, June 14, 2007
Let’s say you want to create a smart playlist in iTunes that will contain the 25 highest-rated Beatles or Bob Dylan songs that you haven’t heard in a while. That would be pretty cool, right? It’s not that simple, but it can be done. I’ll show you how.
The main roadblock you’re facing is that iTunes only gives you two ways of restricting / selecting songs. You can build a smart playlist based on songs that meet all of your criteria or one based on songs that meet any of your criteria. This any / all option really puts you in a corner. First I’ll explain why, and then I’ll show you how to fix it.
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Tuesday, November 14, 2006
I have just about 9,000 songs (35GB) in my iTunes library, and I listen to music the entire time I’m in the office every day. I live and die by my smart playlists. I’ve seen more than a few tutorials lately about how to utilize this iTunes feature, so I thought I’d toss my hat in the ring with a few tips on how to make Apple’s killer app work better. Here are five tips to keeping your daily listening enjoyable.
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Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Once again I found myself in trouble at the Los Angeles International Airport, and once again it was (arguably) my own damn fault. Last Thursday I flew Southwest to Providence, Rhode Island to testify in court on behalf of my dad, who was in the midst of a textbook “frivolous lawsuit”. I detest being late in general, and even more so when it comes to flying. I am the guy that gets to the airport at least two hours in advance. My adventure began almost as soon as I got out of my friend’s car.
It is not even remotely illegal to wear sunglasses in an airport.
I was told by the Southwest skycaps at the curbside check-in that my flight was canceled. “What?! Why?!” I exclaimed. I was told by the first skycap that it was because of inclement weather in Rhode Island. He directed me to his superior, who told me that it was because of a mechanical problem with the plane. (Much later in the day I would be told that the flight was canceled because there simply weren’t enough people wanting to fly from LA to Providence that day to justify sending an entire plane on the route.) She took my luggage and got me on the next flight, due to leave for Phoenix in three hours.
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