Back in December, we at WUMD started using OMTASL to keep the showlog area filled with the latest promos. (See the original article.) The program has worked well and reliably. I recently made a few changes to make it even better.
I’ve added the option to have it omit any promo that has been played within a certain number of hours, defaulting to 12, and to optionally remove any promo with the same genre as the current show. I’ve also added the option to force any cut from the database to show up at the bottom of the showlog.
1. The showlog is updated every hour, and now (optionally) checks the OMT database to determine if a cut about to be included in the showlog hasn’t been played within the specified number of hours.
This helps the DJs to not accidentally play a promo that was recently played. They are supposed to check the studio log, but sometimes they forget.
The program, if finding no promos available due to the hours separation, will reduce the separation by one and try again, until something will be in the showlog. This is a fall back position to make sure that there is at least one promo available to play.
2. Each promo is of course associated with a program, and that program has a genre type. The genre type has an option to ‘exclude like promos’, which means any promo attached to a program of the same genre will be omitted from the showlog. This helps the DJs to promote shows of genres other than the one currently airing.
3. There are now two optional “slots” that can be configured. (I made add more later.) If set, the program checks to see if the cut exists and is “active”, and if so adds it to the bottom of the showlog with a tag also specified in the configuration.
I use this for our special hourly announcements. Built into the schedule is a top of hour and 20-past and 40-past announcement cuts. This cuts don’t always exist in the database, and are created when needed, such as a weather or other emergency, or whatever. When the cut is recorded and added into the OMT database, automation will play it if automation is running.
What about when automation is NOT running, like when there is a live DJ in the studio? These announcements can easily be missed, but with this new feature, they appear on the showlog, and the DJ can play them at the appropriate time.
And: As I mentioned in the original article, I still have other enhancements planned. Stay tuned!
