I would post this question on the ZaraRadio forums, but I haven't been able to log in there for some time, even after creating a new account. I know that a lot of people here use ZaraRadio, so hopefully I'll get some suggestions.
Here is what I want to do: I want to schedule an event for a one hour block. During that block, I want to first play from a list of 30 minute programs, then another 30 minute program. This much is easy. My problem is, I want to use several different folders to comprise each of the two 30 minute blocks. Let me try to clarify this with a simple example.
The First 30 minute block will play one episode from the folder "Jack Benny" in rotation. When all episodes of Jack Benny are eventually played, (over days or weeks) one episode from the folder "Burns And Allen" will play in rotation (more folders can be added later).
The Second 30 minute block will play one episode from the folder "Fred Allen" in rotation. When all episodes of Fred Allen are eventually played (over days or weeks), one episode from the folder "Milton Berle" will play in rotation (more folders can be added later).
What I'm trying to do in principle is to make one .rot playlist chain to another .rot playlist. I don't think this can be done, but maybe there is another way to accomplish this.
I know I can do this by making each 30 minute block a .rot file, consisting of all the different folders for that block. However, I would like to keep each folder in a separate list of some kind and build my playlist from these. It will make adding different shows to a given 30 minute playlist easier than dumping several different shows into one playlist.
Hopefully I made myself clear. If not, let me know and I'll try to clarify. Anyone have any ideas?
You can use the rot files as you are,but you can keep a separate playlist as well. You will have to update the rot files to change what they play,at least I havent found any other way to do it.If you set up a throw away play list and tell it to delete the file upon playing it,you wouldnt have any repeats and would run until the list is empty. I dont expect a lot of intricate functions in Zara,but always manage to find a way to make it do what I want,and it does work well. You may also find an external program that would change your rot files as you want . I use windows scheduler to run wget,wget then erases old news and wx files and replaces them with the new ones.These are temp files,not rot's. Works great until the site pukes or the web dies...
Regards,Lee
The best solution that I have come up with so far is to save each folder as a lst file (simpler file structure). I can append individual lst files with a text editor (with some minor editing). Then I can load the combined lst into ZaraRadio and save as a rot file.
I originally tried going directly to a rot file created from several folders. The problem is in adding or rearranging shows later. It is too cumbersome.
Since each folder contains separate OTR shows and there are widely different numbers of episodes in each show, it complicates things. Doing straight music would be easier.