S60 Open to new features

This sounds like a lot of effort, and a lot of responsibility for every podcaster, when, if iTunes or other podcast downloading software is used the ID3 tags aren't used at all and all meta-data is collected from the RSS feed.

iTunes, for example, knows the difference between music and podcasts and separates them within the UI. If the device requires that the ID3 tags be populated with data found in the RSS, then IMHO it is the responsibility of the podcast downloading software to ensure that the data is transferred from one to the other.

It is especially important to do the above in the download software when you place such restrictions that it is very easy to get it wrong (eg. cover art, personally I put as good quality image as I can find into my MP3 files, and these rarely weigh in at less than 30Kb).

Let me reverse the final question... Do you really want your device to show every show as "Artist: Unknown" "Genre Unknown" "Title: Unknown" with no artwork, when every other 'podcast capable' device shows the details effortlessly? Didn't think so.

Good comments... But let me clarify a few things that may have not come across correctly in the post.

The Nokia Podcasting client DOES recognize everything correctly from the RSS feed. If you play back your podcasts from the Podcasting app, you'll get a similar experience to iTunes.

So, mostly what I am talking about is the experience if you use the Music Player for Podcast playback to make the files look great.

The main reason for me posting this info is to help podcasters ensure that their content is as compatible as it can be for the best user experience.

Sure its awesome to have everything done automatically for you, but honestly, is it REALLY extra work after your podcast is created to click ADVANCED TAG EDITOR in WMP11 and update the basic IDtag for your file?

Took me less than 20 seconds to update the file for my podcast and the file is now in a friendly format for the majority of players and PCs.

We're taking all the suggestions for improving the UI into consideration. But until things are perfect, I think its best to let Podcasters know how to deal with limitations to make their content as good as it can be.

PS. Thanks for the shoutout on your blog for Nokia Podcasting as a great free S60 app. :-)

We are talking about the same thing :o) I know the podcasting application works like iTunes.

The requirements above are just one set of requirements for a podcaster. When you add this requirement to other requirements for certain maximum quality or non-VBR formats you put more and more pressure on the author to make their show compatible with every player, and unless they have one of each device to test on, they can be pretty sure that at least one device will have an issue somewhere, to some degree. Add the 10-20 seconds of this solution (never mind the time to resize the show image and make sure it still looks good) to the numerous other things a podcaster needs to do to each of their episodes and we begin talking about a more substantial amount of time to work on things that they shouldn't need to worry about.

I do have an issue with using WMP11 though, since, apart from my work laptop I only use OSX or Linux. Now you've given the information about what is required it shouldn't be too hard to figure out how to do it in the various different media applictions, but I don't have an issue with the instructions :o)

I'm all for information sharing, especially when it comes to requirements/restrictions of certain systems, so I think it's great that you're at least letting people know, but the issue still stands that the importing tool. Maybe applications like FireAnt and Democracy could add an 'export for Nokia' option somewhere, but I think also Nokia Podcasting should ensure the files meet the expectations of the player.

A slightly tongue-in-cheak observational question: Is it anticipated that the author of every podcast someone wants on their Nokia phone will read this blog post and modify their tags accordingly? :o)

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ID3 is a metadata container most often used in conjunction with the MP3 audio file format. It allows information such as the title, artist, album, track number, or other information about the file to be stored in the file itself.

ID3 tags may be edited in a variety of ways. On some platforms the file's properties may be edited by viewing extended information in the file manager. Additionally most audio players allow editing single or groups of files. Editing groups of files is often referred to as "batch tagging". There are also specialized applications, called taggers, which concentrate specifically on editing the tags of and related tasks. These often offer advanced features such as advanced batch tagging or editing based on regular expressions.

there are also specialized applications, called taggers, which concentrate specifically on editing the tags of and related tasks.

ID3 tag is a data container within an MP3 audio file stored in a prescribed format. This data commonly contains the Artist name, Song title, Year and Genre of the current audio file. This website contains the format standards information for the ID3 tagging data container. If you've read this far and are confused, check the ID3v2Easy page for a short, low-tech introduction.

ID3 is a very popular audio file data tagging format in active use by software and hardware developers around the world. ID3 tags are supported in software such as iTunes, Windows Media Player, Winamp, YME, MusicMatch and hardware players like the iPod, Creative Zen, Toshiba Gigabeat and Sony Walkman.

the graphic should now be embedded in your mp3 file and show up nicely when playing back on most Nokia n series devices

Hi all,

thought you might be interested in a new site www.signsymbiansoftware.com where you can get software like Rotateme and Nokmote signed for your phone.

rob