Podcast workflow

[Travisimo]

I've done lots of searching, and I've found partial solutions, but not exactly what I'm looking for. Not sure it even exists, but I'm going to ask!

Got a new Droid X last week and love it. Coming from iPhone with iTunes. I listen to podcasts for several hours most nights at work using Bluetooth headphones. My iPhone worked great for this because I would plug it in each day and it would automatically sync the newest podcasts from the list I selected. I'd like to continue using iTunes because it is very nice for auto updating and I have dozens of podcasts subscribed to already.

But here's what I need to do:

1) I need a way to sync the newest 3-5 podcasts from SELECT podcast subscriptions. I've found an Android solution or two that will sync podcasts, but they appear to either sync ALL podcasts, or unplayed podcasts from ALL subscriptions. What I want to is what the iPhone can do: sync the most recent 3-5 podcasts from only the ones I select. I would have to delete DOZENS of subscriptions to be able to sync them to my Droid if I use the current tools I discovered.

2) I need a way to play the podcasts on the Droid, knowing which ones are unplayed. I've found solutions that will allow me to play the podcasts, but I can't seem to tell which ones I've listened to. On the iPhone, there's a dot that tells you if its unplayed or not. On the Android, there's just a big list of podcasts and there's no way to tell if I listened to it or not (from what I've found).

3) This one is not a requirement, but it would be nice if I could do this wirelessly because I've had a bit of trouble consistently mounting the Droid X to my iMac. I tried TuneSync, which does wireless iTunes syncing, but again, I can't choose individual podcasts to sync... it appears to be all or nothing.

Please help! I'm not hopeful that there's a solution for this, so I'm prepared to continue using my deactivated iPhone for listening to podcasts if I have to. It'll just be a pain having to carry both the Droid X and my iPhone with me at work.

 

[Travisimo]

I guess there's no such solution for Android? :-(

 

[booyamachine]

I'm fairly new to this too, but I think that DoggCatcher will do what you're asking, but without the use of iTunes. It costs $6.99, but I've found it to be a suitable replacement for iTunes and in some ways even better.

- Over-The-Air updating (no need to plug in and sync)
- You can set the number of auto-downloads for each podcast as well as the number of episodes you want to keep before deleting
- you can manually mark an episode as fully completed (it used to bug me that iTunes would keep an old episode in my syncs because I still had 45 sec left to listen to)
- home page widget

As far as apps go it is expensive, but I use it daily and it has completely replaced my iPod for podcast listening. The search function is great and it was easy setting up the feeds to all of my favorite podcasts.

 

[Travisimo]

Wow, thanks! It's not exactly what I was looking for because it doesn't sync with iTunes, but this is definitely the best one I've tried on Android so far. Only problem, there's apparently a bug in the version I downloaded that conflicts with my Droid X when it's connected via WIFI. When attempting to DL a podcast, it gives an error message saying it is not connected. Works fine over 3G, though. Found a couple others on their forum who are having the same problem, so I'm hopeful that it will be addressed!

Anyway, thanks!

 

[jcdill]

I'm using an application on my MacBook Pro called doubleTwist. It syncs my iTunes podcasts with my Droid. What I do to sync only a subset of the podcasts is to make a smart playlist that selects the podcasts I want to sync, then sync that playlist. For instance:

genre=podcast
artist(includes)NPR
playcount=0
limit-to(5)items(most recently added)

Will get the last 5 (most recent) NPR podcasts that are unplayed.