The DRS 2006 Auto Play Manager is an optional plugin for the DRS 2006 radio automation software Version 4 and higher. This plugin includes full "walk away" automation features for your DRS 2006.

After activating this plugin you will have a new tab in your DRS 2006 software which looks like this:



On top of the Auto Play Manager tab are several controls.


The first two icons let you Start and Stop the Auto Play Manager. Please note that you only can start the Auto Play Manager if you have something scheduled in the future.



In the next section you have three icons and a drop down box to manage your schedules. This works just like managing playlists, cart sets or the Sound Processor settings. To save your current schedule you click on the floppy disk icon and insert a name for your schedule. After this procedure your schedule should be selectable in the drop down box. If you want to delete a schedule, you simply click on the red cross and confirm that you want to delete the schedule from disk.

Next are two special icons which you use to toggle two features:
1. Automatic Link: This feature helps you to place your objects like playlists, shuffle rotations or single database items back to back in the scheduler. Simply place your new object near the end of an existing object. If the automatic link is activated, the new object will be placed exactly after the first object.
2. Cover Flow: This feature displays all covers of the songs in a playlist by switching the cover every few seconds. If the toggle is off, only the cover of the first item of the playlist will be displayed. If you do not have much CPU power, we recommend to leave this feature off.

In the last section you control schedule. You can zoom, switch to other days, weeks or months and you can switch between different views.



The two arrows let you move back and forward. If you have selected the "Day View" (calendar icon with "1") the arrows will move 1 day back and forth. If you have selected the "Week View" (calendar icon with "7") the arrows will move 1 week back and forth. If you have selected the "Month View" (calendar icon with "31") the arrows will move 1 month back and forth. If you have selected the "Timeline View" (clock icon) the arrows will move 1 month back and forth.

If you press on "Go to Today" icon (simple calender), the schedule will jump to the current day within the currently selected view (Day, Week, Month or Timeline)

With the next two icons you can zoom in and out to display more or less details of your currently selected view.

 

With the last four icons you can switch the view of the schedule. You can select the day view, the week view, the month view or the timeline view.

You can schedule three different item types: Playlists, Shuffle Rotations or single database items. On the left side of the Auto Play Manager you will find two tabs. The first tab shows all the playlists you have built and saved in the main DRS 2006 screen. The second tab shows all Shuffle Rotations you have built and saved with the Simple Shuffle (Plugins Ribbon).



You can drag & drop any item from these two tabs into the schedule. Now a new dialog will open. The first row shows the object you have selected. If you have used a playlist, you will be able to switch to another playlist by using the drop down box. If you have selected a shuffle rotation, the drop down box will let you select a different shuffle rotation. In the next two rows you can set the "Start time" and the "End time" including the start and end date. The "End time" is automatically calculated depending on the length of the playlist. You can of course change the "End time" if you want the playlist to end earlier. You can either type in the hours, minutes and seconds or you can use the arrow up and down keys on your keyboard.



In the next row you can set a recurrence. If the checkbox is checked, you will be able to select "Daily", "Weekly" or "Monthly". This means that the Object will be repeated daily, weekly or monthly.

Also on the right side you will be able to set at "Recurrence pattern" and the "Range of recurrence". For example you can repeat the object "Every 3 days" or "Every weekday" and you can set an end date or after a certain amount of occurrences. If you want this object to just play once, simply uncheck "Recurrence". The recurrence settings will disappear.

In the "Additional Info" row you can add any information you want to. This information is shown within the item. By default it shows the number of playlist items or the categories of a shuffle rotation.

Finally you can set a "Label". This is basically used to have a better overview by using different labels and colors for your objects. You can define your own "Labels" and your own colors in the Settings (Top Ribbon, Common, Settings, Auto Play Manager Settings).

As already mentioned you can also set single database items. This works just like setting playlists or shuffle rotations. To set a single database item, you drag & drop a single item directly from the database on the right top. Please note that a single database items must have a minimum duration of 3 minutes.

Of course you can also right click on any item in the schedule. In the popup menu you can open the item, edit a series, change the label and of course delete the item. You can also use the 'del' key to delete the selected item.

You can also get more information and even prelisten scheduled items. If you move your mouse over a playlist or single database item, you will see a play icon and an information icon. Moving the mouse over the information icon will show you a simple playlist, duration etc. The play icon will start the playlist in the prelisten device you have set in the settings. While playing the playlist you are able to skip to previous and next playlist items and you can stop the prelistening. If your Auto Play Manager items is to small and you can't see it properly, please use the zoom icons as described above.



Now that you have set different objects in the Auto Play Manager, you can start it by clicking on the top left "Play" icon.



Back in the main screen the top row where you can normally load and save playlists will change. It will now look like this:



Here you can now see that the Auto Play Manager is activated. In the middle the currently playing object is displayed. In this example it is "Pop & Rock Shuffle #2". On the right side you see the next object that will follow and also when it will start. In this example "Pop Up Shuffle #2" will be started in 0 hours, 10 minutes and 37 seconds. As soon as the next object is started, the current object will fade out with the general fade which can be set in the "Program Settings". Of course you can stop the Auto Play Manager anytime and switch back to manual mode. You can also control the playlist manually while in Auto Play mode.

As already mentioned you can define own labels and colors in the Auto Play Manager settings. There are also three additional settings available:



Load last schedule on start:
When checked DRS 2006 will load the last schedule you used when you start DRS 2006.

Stop playlist on scheduler stop:
When checked the Auto Play Manager will stop the current playlist or shuffle rotation when you stop the Auto Play Manager.

Start playlist only on exact start time:
When checked the Auto Play Manager will only start an object on the exact start time. This means for example you have set playlist at 15:00 and you have started the Auto Play Manager at 15:05. In this case DRS 2006 will not do anything. It will not load the scheduled playlist and start it because the scheduled start time has already passed. DRS 2006 will simply keep playing the current playlist and of course also load the next scheduled object at the exact time and start it. If you have not checked this option and you are staring the Auto Play Manager at 15:05, the Auto Play Manager will load the playlist which should be running and start it. It will of course also load the next scheduled object at the exact time and start it.

Back to "Get Started"