Technical Support Archive

ADDING LATE SPOTS TO PRISTINE MMCS PLAY LIST

All radio stations receive late arriving commercial orders after the day’s Play List has been generated, edited, and loaded on the Playback Computer. There are several ways to add these commercials to the Play List, depending on whether the commercial was previously created in the Pristine MMCS database, or if it is a new commercial and needs to be added to the existing Pristine MMCS database. The following procedures should guide you through adding late arriving commercials to an existing Play List on your Playback Computer.

PROCEDURE WHEN COMMERCIAL ALREADY EXISTS IN PRISTINE MMCS DATABASE:

Use this procedure when the commercial to be added to an existing Play List already exists in the Pristine MMCS database. This means the commercial has previously been scheduled by your traffic system and passed to the Pristine MMCS database by way of your traffic interface, or the commercial was manually created in the Pristine MMCS database. This procedure also assumes that you have updated the Pristine MMCS database on your Playback Computer with the latest data from your Scheduling Computer.

1. First, determine what date, hour, and at what item number you want to add the late arriving commercial.
2. At the Playback Screen on your Playback Computer, press the F8 key to go into Assign. Be sure to have at least three minutes remaining on the song that is playing in order to give you enough time to Assign the new commercial.
3. Enter the correct date and hour for the Play List you want to add the commercial, and press enter. Answer No to the create new Play List question.
4. Enter the first four or five characters of the client’s name in the first keyword field at the top of the Assign Screen, then press enter three times to drop down to the list part of the screen.
5. Now enter the correct item number for the late arriving commercial in the left column in front of the description and press enter. You will be asked to “(I)nsert, (R)eplace, or (E)xit” at this point. Enter I to insert the commercial. Notice in the bottom right of the screen the number of items and length of the hour will increase at this point.
6. Finally, press the F1 key three times to return to the Playback screen. 

PROCEDURE WHEN COMMERCIAL DOES NOT ALREADY EXIST IN PRISTINE MMCS DATABASE:

Use this procedure when the commercial to be added to an existing Play List DOES NOT already exist in the Pristine MMCS database. This means the commercial has NOT previously been scheduled by your traffic system and passed to the Pristine MMCS database by way of your traffic interface, or the commercial was NOT manually created in the Pristine MMCS database. This procedure also assumes that you have updated the Pristine MMCS database on your Playback Computer with the latest data from your Scheduling Computer.

Before going to your Playback Computer, be sure that you have manually created several LATE SPOTS in your Pristine MMCS database on your Scheduling Computer. If your station uses Pristine MUSIC PLUS to schedule music and commercials, be sure to manually create the same LATE SPOTS in the Pristine MUSIC PLUS database too. Give these members hard disk numbers, enter LATE SPOT as the description, enter the length, enter 01A for fade code, and enter LATE SPOT in the Artist/Group field so you can find it during assigning. Leave these LATE SPOTS in your Pristine MMCS and/or Pristine MUSIC PLUS databases for future use. Transfer your DAT/IDX files to your Playback Computer using the Pristine Transfer Routine on your Scheduling Computer.

1. First, determine what date, hour, and at what item number you want to add the late arriving commercial.
2. At the Playback Screen on your Playback Computer, press the F8 key to go into Assign. Be sure to have at least three minutes remaining on the song that is playing in order to give you enough time to Assign the new commercial.
3. Enter the correct date and hour for the Play List you want to add the commercial, and press enter. Answer No to the create new Play List question.
4. Enter LATE in the first keyword field at the top of the Assign Screen, then press enter three times to drop down to the list part of the screen.
5. Now enter the correct item number for the LATE SPOT in the left column in front of the description and press enter. You will be asked to “(I)nsert, (R)eplace, or (E)xit” at this point. Enter I to insert the commercial. Notice in the bottom right of the screen the number of items and length of the hour will increase at this point.
6. Press the F1 key three times to return to the Playback Screen.
7. Repeat this process for each LATE SPOT you need to Assign.
8. Finally, make sure that your Production staff has not only recorded the LATE SPOT to its normally scheduled number, but it must also be copied to the correct LATE SPOT number and transferred over to Playback. This copy can be done very easily in the Pristine Audio Commander. 

Be sure to know the correct DATE, HOUR, and ITEM number before starting these procedures. Also, be careful to allow enough time to go through all the steps without having to prematurely exit the Assign Screen. You will see warnings in the bottom left corner of the screens if you cut it too close. If you do not leave the Assign Screen before the song that is playing is finished, the CD will continue to track until you return to the Playback Screen.

If you have a large number of LATE SPOTS to add, it would be better to add them to the Play List on the Scheduling Computer and then reload the remainder of the day’s unplayed Play List, rather than tie up the Playback Computer for an extended period of time. In some situations it may be faster to regenerate the log in traffic and Pristine, rather than manually add a large number of unscheduled items.

© 1997 Professional Management Services Inc.
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This page last updated 11/10/97