Hi everyone, I just discovered Justcast, which works in conjunction with Dropbox to host your own podcast RSS feed using your Dropbox account.
Here are the steps.
<ol><li> Go to www.theJustcast.com and click Sign Up Now, type in your dropbox login details, and give it permission to use your account. It will automatically create an Example subfolder under Dropbox > apps > Justcast.
</li><li> Find some mp3 or other media files on your computer, and paste them in that example folder from step 1.
</li><li> After the files have finished uploading to Dropbox, go back in your Justcast account in your browser, it will show you the folder has x many files in it. activate the Edit link below the folder name.
</li><li> There will be many fields on this page for putting in your own podcast description, author name, twitter handle, etc. if this is just for your personal use for transferring files, then The only important ones there are the public or private radio buttons. I think perhaps if you leave it public then it will be published for anyone to discover and subscribe to. If you choose Private, then they randomize the rss feed URL and do not publish it. Activate the update button at the bottom, and then activate the link that is the name of the folder.
</li><li> There are a few options on this page for how to distribute the link to your podcast feed, there are links to put it on Facebook, Twitter, or email. If you copy the link that just says RSS, that will be fine for the next step.
</li><li> Open your podcast app of choice, add a new podcast, and paste in the address from the previous step, and that's it.
</li><li> Optional, to make it easier for you or others to type the podcast RSS feed in step 6, you can take the long RSS feed URL from step 5 and turn it into a shortened URL through sites like Bit.ly, etc. as an example I created a sample podcast feed for you to try out. before I shortened it, the feed address looked like this: http://www.thejustcast.com/shows/b8750ea377073f2f0efb33d04e9d91dbc9ad3f49/audioposts.rss
and here is the shortened link: www.tinyurl.com/justcastTest
You can add either one in your podcatcher.</ol>
Here is their video to further demo these steps (mostly visually, but you get the idea) https://vimeo.com/76843050
Justcast has a free and a paid Pro option. The free version lets you have 3 files in your folder at any one time. the paid version (at the time of this posting, was $5/month or $50 USD a year) took away any restrictions as to the number of files.
There are many ways to transfer files from our computers to our iDevices, but I was looking for a one-click solution. Basically I wanted to be able to have a special folder somewhere on my computer, and somehow have everything in that folder automatically downloaded to my iDevice. Since I update my podcasts with just a single click on a regular basis, doesn't it make sense to have any extra audio I wanted on my device to be transferred that way as well. I don't think there is an easier way than this, once you get it set up.
Naturally this was designed for creating your own podcast, but I personally find it much more useful for sending audio files to my iPhone.
This is the first time I’ve posted anything like this. I wasn’t sure where to put it so will start with the forum. If you have suggestions for how I can shorten it or clean it up, feel free.
Comments
I use transmit to do the same
I use transmit to do the same thing. Access my computer from anyware then just transfer and do what I need to do.
hope that helps
What am I missing?
What does this app gain you? Why not just access the files directly from Dropbox?
Also, you can get direct access to your Dropbox files from Voice Dream Reader. Unless I'm missing something, I think you can do as much or more with the Voice Dream Reader app.
Re: What am I missing?
Hi Jeff, the difference is that this way with one click, you download a number of files directly, without having to zip them first. if you're going through voice dream, you have to download each file individually or zip them all together first. and if you go through dropbox, in order to have them actually downloaded to your device, you would have to individually download them and then make them offline, again, many more taps. And if you regularly listen to a lot of podcasts, you have access to those files as just another podcast.
iOs
Can you upload podcast media files from iOs?
I personally don't like the
I personally don't like the approach as remember dropbox has a file limit when third party apps such as boos jock and other websites and apps. I believe it's 200 mb per file. There is no way around this. I don't mind zipping the files as I do this on my computer and I can do all of this using file browser anyway.
Re: iOs
Hi Podcast Junky, Yes you can do this directly on your device. First you would create the recording using whatever app you want, and then you would have to save it to your dropbox. You can move it into the justcast folder all within the dropbox app on your device.
file size limits
Hi KE7ZUM, I am unable to find any documentation on any file size limitations for third party apps, could you post a link to anything you've found? I will test this out when I get home and let you know. I'm glad you have a workflow you personally prefer, this is just yet another way to easily load files onto your device, however the major difference in this one is that it requires fewer taps on your device, while allowing you to also stay within your podcatcher app. Don't misunderstand me, Voice Dream is still an excellent app, this is just one more option for people.
Having choices is good
I fully understand that having ways to do things that work for one person is good, but remember, we have people on this site from all different walks of life with varying skill sets. What works for one person may not for someone else. I know a guy who is probably the biggest nerd in the universe but he accepts the fact that people have different skill sets and his way isn't always the best way. Choice is good.
If you use the api which that
If you use the api which that site and app do there is a size of 150 mb. See the docs here.
https://www.dropbox.com/developers-v1/core/docs
There is a way to raise that limit, however I don't think most devs do this. You need to do something with chunks.
Hope that helps a bit.
Thanks for the link, I just
Thanks for the link, I just tried with a 320 mb file and it worked like a charm, so it appears they must be using that /chunked_upload API call.
Question
So, if you delete a file from your justcast folder in dropbox, does it delete it from the podcast feed?