New bits ready for Eurodance

Had a few bits & pieces changed and updated just in time for..

EurodanceWHT

  • Request page loads is a lot faster
  • Request suggestion list is cleaned (thanks, Anders!!)
  • The admins can now choose how to sort the list of requests
  • We are now taking the statistics & top charts to the next level! I will tell you guys more during or after Eurodance, depending if you’re there or not! But you WILL be there, right?!  😉

Some updates!

Finally back from the holidays! Here’s some new features for you.

  • If you haven’t already noticed, the landscape or “PC” view has a few letters (S, M, L and XL) at the bottom left of the screen. This enables you to change the font size of that screen in order to fit all your information. The XL font size also disables the event information box on the right in order to use a huge font size. Very usable for small projector screens or if you use iPads in the room.
  • The requests system now also suggests dance names in order to help the dancers get them correctly spelled. In these days, with some obscure dance names out there, this is a major improvement for the DJs to be able to find what dance you really ment to ask for. If your request isn’t suggested, you can still send it in.

I hope you like the news and I plan for adding some more soon!

PS. The database has some “garbage” dance names saved and tries to suggest them. I will clean it shortly. Sorry for the inconvenience.

What’s up at DJ Feed?

So.. What’s up with DJ Feed? Well.. Haven’t had a lot of time developing stuff more than minor bug fixing, but some things are underway. Thanks to Hans Palm, I got the idea of developing an API, which means all data can be extracted separately for special uses. Like in Hans’ case: An AppleWatch. Now, how cool is this?! A publicly available app is in the works. Watch this space!

Dj Feed – Apple Watch Edition

New look: Accent colour

Due to requests from near and far, the accent colour of the DJ Feed has been changed to a more “pow” version of the same. The old green was a bit hard to read off a projector screen, so now it’s more of a lime green version. I hope this works better! 🙂

When time permits, I will add an option to change the colour on a per-feed basis, so you DJs out there can change it to fit the event’s colours!

Multi room reinvented + other bits & pieces

Multi room – reinvented

I have now spent a decent amount of time upgrading, expanding and bugfixing the multi-room feature into what I now would call a very much more mature and useable feature of this product. We have seen multi room before at both WDM Worlds and Eurodance, but the admin part of that was for me a near nightmare. The system was built to handle one feed at a time and I needed to do some serious persuation to make the system do what needed for each time a multi room was needed. No more!

The system now has the capability not only to recognize a multi room event, but also handling the separate rooms as well as the common (or parent) feed. The parent feed makes an excellent event mini-website. Very useful for getting more non-urgent information i.e. maps, hotel checkin/checkout times etc. to your guests! Each child feed (room) will also point the guests to that parent page for information, and the parent will show links to all its child/room feeds for playlists and room times.  Any child feed would also include the room time table for all the other rooms of the same event.

Any urgent info (you know the green text at the bottom of the screens) will now show the same info in all rooms automatically.

I could go on and on about all the smart details, but I can see this is a lot of information to process.  So let me just say this; The new multi-room feature will be revealed at the Wild Wild West Reno Dance Event (14-17 May). After that you can test drive the thing yourself and I will try to have instructions ready. But as always; If you’re interested in learning more about the DJ Feed and what it can do for you; Please let me know. I will gladly give you the grand tour or explain a certain feature either by e-mail, facebook or even over the phone if you like.

Some minor bits & pieces
  • Added a view called Projector mode, accessible from the admin panel. It only shows the current playlist. No headers, no event information. I don’t recommend using it but in extreme cases with long dance names. But it is there and available if you feel the need for it.
  • Those of you who use spreadsheets containing alternate dances/floorsplits can now copy-paste directly from the spreadsheet and the output will be automatically formatted when you press save.
  • No name = no request. Except for the DJ of course. =)
  • The DJ Feed Recommended Requests will now show ‘Top 20’ instead of ‘Top 10’, for more dances to choose from.
  • Minor fixing in the user interface + adding, moving and removing links to different stuff for useability and ease.
  • A profile page is underway. That gives the users possibility to change user info/password etc. I will also add a “create your own feed” functionality in there. ‘When?’  -Soon!
  • I have finally found the reason for a bug that’s been lurking around for some time; some iPhones have had problems with the font size of the bottom banner, making the bottom part of the page hard to access/read. Until I find the final solution for this, I have made the banner smaller on all devices. Will fix as soon as possible.

Just another update

Another dilemma for the users that visit a lot of events; Their smartphone might get cluttered with shortcuts to different events, as they add a new shortcut each time. Of course we can fix that!

Just bookmark djfeed.net/active and you will see all feeds that has been updated the last few days! Et voilá!

Feature upgrade

Hi everyone!

I have finally been able to put some time into the DJ Feed again. Still working on several other improvements, but this seems to be what most users need at the moment. First up was to fix the requests part of things. For that purpose, the user interfaces (UIs) has been re-written.

The new look & feel adds a few things:

  • The DJ can now “quick add” dances directly where the requests are
  • The Requests admin interface now uses more columns to fit more info into less space and at the same time make it easier to overview
  • The Requests Admin now allows to remove single requests in the case of misspelling and similar
  • All requests are handled faster, which means it gets easier for DJs to manage
  • The dancer’s UI is cleaner and more informative
  • Both UIs looks better (according to me) 🙂
  • Easier-to-use, more intuitive, link/address

And also; I added an “enable/disable requests” in the normal admin interface. Might be useful if you want to prevent users from adding requests near closing time or between events.

If you’d like to try the new way of handling requests, the link for users is: <your feed name>/requests/ and for you to administrate things (requires your login): <your feed name>/admin/requests/

Please note that the old links will continue to function as per normal if anything should fail. It will be removed fairly soon, though.

Now; Off to enhance the multi-room features!  =)

Crystal Boot Awards around the world!

As many of you know, the ‘Oscars’ of the linedancing world has been on this weekend as a live stream originating from Norbreck Castle in Blackpool, thanks to Linedancer Magazine’s efforts in the UK. This means we (the people who wasn’t able to get tickets to go), can pick up the feed and do our own local events and still get the feeling of being on site with all these celebrities. This year not only the CBA DJs, but also a few more DJs around the world were using the DJ Feed to broadcast what dances they are playing. I will post some pictures here later on!

We had a similar event in Gävle, Sweden and since I knew some of the other event sites, I snuck a peek onto their playlists as well. I had so much fun watching what they were playing and getting inspiration on what requests I would make here!  =)

And you know what? I just checked something. I had the server tell me how many people have been watching any DJ Feed this weekend. It can’t distinguish who is who, but every web browser gets an anonymous identity tag when it tries to read a feed, so I can count the number of unique devices accessing the site. Any guesses? I would guess 100-200 over the weekend. I was wrong. Dead wrong..

Total number of unique devices accessing the site from midnight Fri Jan 30th until this post is… *drum roll*…  1.180! One t h o u s a n d one hundred and eighty different devices. I am in shock! Soo happy to be able to serve you all and that you chose to use this system!

If any of you have good pictures from wherever you spent this weekend showing a DJ Feed screen, please please e-mail me! I’d love to see what you’ve been up to!

What’s up

Hi all!

I keep getting more feedback about the DJ Feed and I must say I am very grateful for that. Recent reviews are from Norway, Denmark, USA and England and every single one is making me more confident this system surely has added positive things to their events and this kind of system really is what they need. Now and in the future. Thanks everyone for letting me know I am on the right track!  =)

I really appreciate when people send me info on what they use the DJ Feed to achieve, what they like about it along with any feature requests and/or photos of them using it.

Last weekend we went to Norrköping, Sweden and along with two more requests if they can use the DJ Feed at their events, I also got to meet a whole lot of dancing friends from here and there. Mostly around mid Sweden, but also a happy group from Norway. And the ‘main attraction’, someone I haven’t seen in many years; Mr. Paul McAdam.

image

And yes, of course, they used the DJ Feed there too. 😉

Server downtime

I will always try to keep the DJ Feed online much as possible, but due to the fact the server has got a whole bunch of new users lately, I will start doing frequent check-ups and updates on the server and the services provided. This means the server will be unavailable when maintenece needs to be done. Normally this is scheduled to run when the server has the least probability of users needing the DJ Feed and for now it will start on Thursday mornings at 06:00 CET. The services will return to normal as soon as this maintenece is done. I will however need to do reboots at other times as well, but this is very rarely done on high usage times.

If this is in any way an inconvenience for you or if you find the DJ Feed is unavailable when you need it, please e-mail me. I hope for your understanding.

 

New functionality being added

Hi again!

As excited I am about having the DJ Feed running at World Dance Masters in Blackpool next weekend, I am still working on extending the functionality of things. So far I am going to launch event chat channels, a way for people who don’t know each other to meet and text each other in order to clear out questions like ‘Am I the only one who knows dance XXX?’, ‘Does anyone know a good place to eat in this town’ and ‘I live in the next town south from here, anyone going there on the way home?’. Chat channels are currently only available at WDM Worlds, but will be globally available shortly.

Another useful feature is the requests page. The page has three sides to it:

  • A send-your-request form
  • A listing (for dancers) of the requests made, approximate play time and a list of requests already played.
  • Inspiration links plus a top list of previous requests
  • An admin view where you can see who requested what and when.

The requests page is currently available to all feeds. Just drop me an e-mail and I will enable your feed.

There has also been updates on security, stability and a complete re-make on multi room handling to make it even easier to use and understand.

I think we might be getting ready for Blackpool now!  🙂

World Dance Masters 2014 up next!

Hi everyone!

I recently got a request if the DJ Feed could be used at WDM Worlds in Blackpool, UK in August 15-17. This would be a privilege and an honour for me. I have attended this event every single year but one since the beginning and I truly love it.

The event has a bit different audience from what the Feed is used to. Daytime, the main ballroom will have line dance competitions, the Spanish ballroom will have line dance workshops and the Arena Ballroom will have West Coast Swing workshops. At the evenings, there will be social dancing at all three floors.

That weekend there will be hundreds of dancers from all over the world watch the feed. Am I excited? Guess!!

Detailed plan underway! See you there, maybe?

Wohoo! Eurodance rocked!

Hi!

Me again. Me and my ‘line dance family’ just got home from Eurodance in Southport, England. This event was set up at a hotel for 4 days with 3 different dance floors, 35 choreographers and about 400 dancers. This means we had three DJs updating the feeds and one view to show all three floors’ next three dances and next upcoming event. One of the event directors put an iPad powered 42″ TV in the reception (which everyone had to pass) and that was a brilliant move. Strongly recommended!

Due to the large demand during this event, I was a bit scared the server would have a hard time coping with the requests. And yes, there was some minor issues with the updating of the feeds, but this was 100% due to problems with the local WiFi. The server never even flinched.  Not a single drop-out. Not a single page miss. As I think I wrote earlier, the DJ Feed was officially released during that event. And. it. worked. perfectly! I am so happy!

Will try to get hold of some pictures from the event to show y’all!

Help wanted!

Hi everyone!

I am currently translating the DJ Feed to different languages. Could you possibly help me with yours (or any other language you know)?

All I need is your common expression for:
Event (Summary/General event info i.e. what the event is called)
Playlist (or dance list? What du you call it?)
Event information (Times, workshops.. Like ‘schedule’)
Notes
Follow this in your mobile
Feed (as in ‘news feed’)
Not shown to users

Remember: Use the words that feel common to you. In Sweden, we never refer to the Playlist as Playlist. Therefore, the translation in Swedish would be “danslista” (Dance list).

Have a look at these pages to see what it looks like:
Demo feed | Admin page

Please just drop me an e-mail with your translation. My address is found here.

So far we’ve got:
English
Swedish
Norwegian (Thank, Hanne!)
Danish (Thanks Johnny!)
German (Thanks Anne-Berit!)
Estonian (Thanks Merju!)
French (Thanks, Jean-Pierre!)
Finnish needs to be checked. Can someone with FI settings please surf to the demo feed and have a look?

Super thanks in advance!
// Marcus

First blog entry

Finally had the time to make a web site for the DJ Feed! 🙂

The feed itself has now been seen on by hundreds of dancers on two different continents. So far I haven’t heard anything but positive words and that’s the reason I felt the DJ Feed now deserves a proper web site.  😉

I hope there will be more people finding out about the feed shortly, since it will be officially released during Eurodance in Southport, England in the beginning if June 2014. Looking forward to hearing what input they might have!