Hi,
Like anyone outside the US, I have zero podcast functionality. I briefly tried the iTunes sync solution (horror) but it was just too awful and still did not enable me to subscribe correctly.
I've been trying 3rd party apps - most of which are terrible. One that shows promise is Podcatcher and the author is very receptive and positive. However, even if this app achieves all its goals, it seems to me that there will always be insurmountable problem with third party apps. Let me explain using an experiment:
I dug out my old Optimus 7, started a podcast playing from the hub, pressed the back key all the way back to the start screen then fired up another app and started playing a video. On returning to the podcast part of the hub, it was clear (and several experiments confirm) that it had remembered where it was up to at the instant the video started playing, even though the podcast part of the app was not in the multitask app list at all. Now try the same experiment in WP8 with any third party app. As you press the back key tot exit the app and return to the start screen the podcast keeps playing. If you play something else and then return to the podcast app to try to carry on where you left off, it is not possible - it only seems to remember the playing point up until you exited the app, even though the podcast was still playing.
Sadly, my use-case means that I come across this problem very regularly and it ruins the experience completely (for me). It leads me to the following questions that someone may be able to help with:
1. Is it really only the built-in podcast app that can remember play-position even after the app is exited?
2. If 1 above is not the case, are there any developers out there that can suggest how to achieve the required behaviour?
3. If 1 above is in fact the case, the I really need to be use the main hub podcast utility. The problem, of course, is how to subscribe to podcasts there in the first place! My brief iTunes experiment showed that syncing podcasts placed some files in the podcast folder on the phone which I believe ended in ".ser". Whilst these displayed the podcasts in the hub app, there was clearly insufficient metadata in them to allow formal subscription from within the app. A possible solution would be a utility that produced these files for the podcasts to which you would like to subscribe. The user could then drop these into the phone's podcast folder, enter the hub podcast app and select the subscribe for each one. Does anyone know if this has been tried or investigated?
I cannot even begin to describe my frustration that such a perfectly-working feature was removed from WP8 since WP7. In fact, if you look at the podcast issue, the problems with music streaming and the fact that Bing Maps has been ruined (no more turn by turn etc), it strikes me that a new phone with WP7.8 on it might be the only way I can get full functionality returned. This is a sad and bizarre proposition to say the least
Regards
Like anyone outside the US, I have zero podcast functionality. I briefly tried the iTunes sync solution (horror) but it was just too awful and still did not enable me to subscribe correctly.
I've been trying 3rd party apps - most of which are terrible. One that shows promise is Podcatcher and the author is very receptive and positive. However, even if this app achieves all its goals, it seems to me that there will always be insurmountable problem with third party apps. Let me explain using an experiment:
I dug out my old Optimus 7, started a podcast playing from the hub, pressed the back key all the way back to the start screen then fired up another app and started playing a video. On returning to the podcast part of the hub, it was clear (and several experiments confirm) that it had remembered where it was up to at the instant the video started playing, even though the podcast part of the app was not in the multitask app list at all. Now try the same experiment in WP8 with any third party app. As you press the back key tot exit the app and return to the start screen the podcast keeps playing. If you play something else and then return to the podcast app to try to carry on where you left off, it is not possible - it only seems to remember the playing point up until you exited the app, even though the podcast was still playing.
Sadly, my use-case means that I come across this problem very regularly and it ruins the experience completely (for me). It leads me to the following questions that someone may be able to help with:
1. Is it really only the built-in podcast app that can remember play-position even after the app is exited?
2. If 1 above is not the case, are there any developers out there that can suggest how to achieve the required behaviour?
3. If 1 above is in fact the case, the I really need to be use the main hub podcast utility. The problem, of course, is how to subscribe to podcasts there in the first place! My brief iTunes experiment showed that syncing podcasts placed some files in the podcast folder on the phone which I believe ended in ".ser". Whilst these displayed the podcasts in the hub app, there was clearly insufficient metadata in them to allow formal subscription from within the app. A possible solution would be a utility that produced these files for the podcasts to which you would like to subscribe. The user could then drop these into the phone's podcast folder, enter the hub podcast app and select the subscribe for each one. Does anyone know if this has been tried or investigated?
I cannot even begin to describe my frustration that such a perfectly-working feature was removed from WP8 since WP7. In fact, if you look at the podcast issue, the problems with music streaming and the fact that Bing Maps has been ruined (no more turn by turn etc), it strikes me that a new phone with WP7.8 on it might be the only way I can get full functionality returned. This is a sad and bizarre proposition to say the least
Regards
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