So, it would seem that we’re beginning to rack up a hefty number of podcasts. It’s been four months, and we’re about to hit Episode #20 this coming week! As for our new listeners, we encourage you to jump in wherever you like. After all, we’re most interested in what interests you! But with our growing backlogs of artists, albums, and topics, we understand that culling our “Podcast Category” page can seem a little daunting. This is why we’ve added a brand new Podcast Archive page, easily accessible just below our main banner for an at-a-glance look at all that we have to offer. (Believe me, when these numbers get higher, you’ll be glad it’s here.)
A Tutorial:
This Excel window (courtesy of our friends at Microsoft and SkyDrive, utilizing their handy-dandy embedding option) is intended for your own convenience, presenting a complete list of episode #s, air dates, and artists & albums we’ve reviewed. And if you scroll to the right, within the embedding, you’ll also see our individual ratings, our total averages, as well as our topic of the day. We hope that you’ll peruse this data at leisure and perhaps find something of interest to you. If so, the blue “Episodes #s” on the far left column are hyperlinks to the corresponding episode page where you can play, comment on, and download the podcast as usual. And remember, if the download button fails, a helpful fail-safe is to instead right-click on “Download” and then select “Save link as…”
But the best feature about this new window is that it’s interactive! By this, we mean you can sort and filter any of the column data on the page itself, by using the arrow buttons beside each column. You can sort the episodes in reverse order, or alphabetically by artist or album. Under the “Pick” column, you can filter the word “Jon” to get an isolated selection of his own album picks, or you can select any of the “date filter” options on the “Episode Date” and “Release Date” columns. You may also want to sort by our rating columns, to see what we’ve venerated, down to what we’ve condemned (individually, or by the total average).
Wherever a cell is selected, remember that you can always press Shift + Spacebar to highlight the entire podcast row, which makes for an easier read when scrolling from one side of the workbook to the other. Alternatively, the “View full-size workbook” button in the lower right-hand corner allows this window to be expanded into the full SkyDrive-powered Web App page, which offers a wider view range, as well as the option to print the whole database (landscape is suggested). There’s also an info button where you can obtain the embedding code to post this archive in your own blog, and even a download option for the full Excel spreadsheet, so you can take our podcast guide with you on the go!
We hope this addition will help to make your Crash Chords experience an easier one, and most of all, we hope this will encourage you to give our episodes a happy home in your library. Remember, there’s always plenty more to hear, and plenty more to come!
