New “ID Show” feature

A couple people have stumbled onto what the coding elf has been working on for Christmas – but now it is offcially active (although probably still fragile).

“ID Show” is a middle of the road approach in between “Art/Fred micromanages everything” and anarchy. This feature gives anyone (not just a volunteer) the ability to immediately “fix” schedule problems without being reviewed and fixed by hand (by me).

The basic idea is this – when a listener finds something that is “wrong”, they are presented with a list of
– the show that is on before this one (if there is one) “<”
– the show that is on after this one (if there is one)  “>”
– what used to be at this time (if there was something) “@”

Then you’re given a list of “generic” shows like “Local News/Talk”, “Classical Music”.

After that, you’re given a list of the syndicated shows that are currently on the air on at least one station (likely suspects). If you can’t find a match, you can try searching for the show, and matches will be added to the list of possible shows.

You have four basic options:
“<” – Join this time period to the previous show (let’s say the database had Rush from Noon-1PM, and you’re listening at 2:15 PM and Rush is still on)
“>” – join this to the following show
(It’s 12:20 PM and Rush is on, but the schedule says 2-3PM)
“@” – reinstate an old expired schedule item

or choose a syndicated or generic show from the dropdown list. You can’t create new “Shows” – if the show is not in the database, choose a generic show as a placeholder (and do NOT email me asking that I add your show!)

By default, only the current hour is added or changed in the database. If you want to set the show to “All Day” (like if you’re adding in the Generic “Country Music” for a station that just plays country music all day, or “Entire Show” if you’re adding in a live syndicated show and don’t want to do it an hour at a time.

Note that the tool tells you the current time at the radio station (if you look at the schedule), but all of the times in the database are Eastern time – if you don’t live in Eastern Time Zone, this could be confusing.

Be aware that after midnight in the Eastern Time zone, things get very confusing, but there isn’t a way around it. It can be 215 AM in New York on Thursday, but 10:15 PM Wednesday in Alaska.

This ability has been added to the Program Check page (along with more things to “fix” like “unknown” programs), as well as replacing the “Wrong Program” page.   Changes on the “What’s on now” pages can take up to 3 minutes to show up due to the buffering of the data to keep the popular pages fast.

No need to wait 3 months for me to see something that needs to be fixed :)

Merry Christmas!