Planning Center News

A New Look for our MP3 Player

new_mp3_playerHey everyone! We have an update to share with you that will enhance your experience in using Planning Center! We’ve been working on revamping the mp3 player that looked a little outdated, to say the least. We realized it didn’t match the rest of our site! So we have a new and improved mp3 “look”.  Let us know what you think, and enjoy!

Update (2/11 10:00am): To help with the transition we have re-enabled the old MP3 Player until we can add a couple more features to the new MP3 player. To access the old MP3 Player hover over the Rehearse button and then click the “Old MP3 Player” link.

Update 2 (2/11 3:00pm): We have added volume, pan & pop-out to the new MP3 Player. Woohoo!! Please let us know what you think!

61 comments

Larry #permalink

Like the update! Great job as usual!

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brenden #permalink

sweet now i can listen to music. that will sure spice it up

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brenden #permalink

sweet now i can listen to music. that will sure spice it up

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Bob #permalink

The new MP3 player is only working in Safari on the PC for me. It does not work in Firefox 3.0.6 nor in IE7. Works fine on the Mac in both Safari and Firefox

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Wes H #permalink

Love the new look.

I wonder if I am missing the volume control for the MP3 player?

Thanks

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Paco #permalink

To be honest, I thought it was very helpful for the mp3 player to open in its own window (and not be tied to the plan in the current tab/window). One possible solution is to make the link “right-clickable” so that we can open it in it’s own window if it suits our needs better. That would be a helpful option.

I also liked that the old one left a smaller footprint; this one is a tad too large and cumbersome. I do like that the fonts are a bit larger, but the “ribbon” wrap-around graphic (for lack of a better term) separating the songs seems awkward. If you do want to keep the ribbon, perhaps make the edges rounded instead of sharp (to match the “quick links,” “people,” etc.), and make the overall size a bit smaller.

Just two cents-worth. Hope it helps (that’s my goal). I appreciate that you’d take the time to revamp it. Thanks!

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Paco #permalink

PS… I, too, miss the volume control.

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Mike Whalen #permalink

Looks great; I’ve always had the MP3 player open in the new window, of course, I am running Safari (Everything works better on a Mac!!).

R.I.P. Volume Fader.

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Joe Wood #permalink

The new mp3 player is not working in IE for me. Any ideas why? Are there any settings that I need to tweak? By the way … thanks for Planning Center. It’s a real help to our team.

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Darren #permalink

Thanks for working on the update! I’m running Firefox 3 on a PC running XP and I have no problems getting it going.

I too miss the volume slider…

…and wasn’t there also a left-right pan? (I could be mistaken). For our ministry, we record rehearsal tracks with the original recording on one side and the singing part (Tenor, Alto, Sop) played out on the other side so that people can learn the correct parts and rehearse on their own.

I’ll also echo that the pop-out feature was ideal for me.

Also kudos for creating the “listen” links next to all MP3 Files! I think this will be one of the most useful features for me!

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Joe #permalink

Hooray for continuity. I like that it matches the site better. I also like that it can handle commas in file names now. There’s also a “listen” link that is next to the MP3 in the song item and on the song page, which is nice. Since it doesn’t open in a new window, I’m glad that you can at least minimize/hide it (even though it says “close”) because it covers up buttons; I can always open up other plans in new tabs. I generally don’t have this many good comments about anything, so good job. Now, just bring back the volume fader. A next and previous might be nice in condensed mode. Again, nice job.

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Sherly #permalink

This looks great!!!

Thank you,

one question… why when i click the pause button it wont stop the song, i basically have to refresh the page to stop the song….???

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James #permalink

I too really miss the player not opening in it’s own window. Also, it was nice that it automatically played through the set as well as offered looping controls if you wanted to keep looping the same track.

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Stephen #permalink

I liked the old one so much better. This one has no volume control, and I liked having it in a separate window. Keep working!

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Brent #permalink

This is VERY disappointing. Where did the pan function go?

We have spent *HOURS* recording our rehearsal tracks with parts panned so our people can rehearse. Planning center has been the perfect solution because it pans when even iTunes does not.

I am all for better design, but do not remove function. Make it look better.

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jordan #permalink

BOO no panning function. BOOO! We lived and died by that as did Brent. BOOO! Show some love and bring back the pan man!

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Danny #permalink

Excellent new player. I’m using in on XP Pro with IE8 Beta 2. Only thing I couldn’t find was the volume control but it’s really no big deal to use the Windows volume control.

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Kathy Unnasch #permalink

I love the new look but I really liked it opening in its own window. That way I could listen while doing other things on the site like setting up new plans, etc.

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Barry Westman #permalink

I’m sorry, but I have to agree with the previous comments that I think this upgrade could still use a little tweaking. I know many hours of work have gone into this, and I do think there have been many improvements to the player, such as being able to read the entire title and easier navigation between titles.

But, I do think it was very nice to be able to have the player open in a separate window so you could continue to browse the web as you’re listening to the songs for this week. I know you can still do that by opening up another tab, so that’s workable.

The volume control isn’t that big of a deal, because I can just turn the speakers on the computer up or down.

I haven’t explored this idea of recording with the original recording panned one way and the parts panned the other way – what a great idea! How do you do that?? I can see where that would be frustrating for people who have prepared files that way and now can no longer use them.

So, thanks for always trying to make PCO better – we so appreciate that!! But, I think this update still needs a bit of tweaking.

Thanks!

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Heather #permalink

I like the new new look, but I would like to have it continuously play as it did before. Now it only plays through the songs one time…

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ministrycentered #permalink

Hello Everyone! Thanks for the comments, I would like to respond to some of them:

1.) Pan Feature: Thank you so much for your feedback on this feature, we will definitely add it here very shortly. We were trying to simplify the interface and didn’t realize how people used this feature. In the meantime we have brought back the old MP3 Player as a link under the current MP3 Player called “Old MP3 Player”. We will keep this up until we get this feature up on the new MP3 Player.

2.) Popping Out MP3 Player: We actually have plans for this and hope to get this out in the next week.

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ministrycentered #permalink

@Bob Hmmm, we tested this on all environments. Can you hold down control and click refresh and see if that fixes it? If not please try installing the latest version of flash from http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer. If that does not work please feel free to contact support and we will work with you to resolve this issue.

@Heather: It should play through. Could you contact support so we can see what is happening and get this resolved. Thanks!

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Jason Patterson #permalink

nice work on the mp3

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jordan #permalink

Thanks for the response guys.

Yes it is a great way to do rehearsal tracks.
We simply lay down acoustic guitar.
Then track a melody vocal.
Another track of alto we pan hard left
Another track of tenor we pan hard right

Mix the thing down in Pro-tools (or any multi-track program for that matter) and boooya…you are ready to go. Our folks love it because they can figure out what part to sing with great clarity.

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wes english #permalink

I liked the smaller window before and the continual loop and the volume.
It worked fine before ? but I like change too (looks)

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ministrycentered #permalink

@wes The continual loop & volume will be coming back soon. ;-)

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Paco #permalink

One thing I think is an excellent– that you’d add an “old mp3 player” option so that we can continue to test the new one while still having the benefits of the old one. That shows a lot of care and wisdom. Thank you– much appreciated!

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Jon #permalink

Love it! You all continue to amaze… I found it this morning by accident – looks fantastic.

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Karen #permalink

Hey guys -
Like the new look, but my biggest loss in this change is the option to download all pdf’s in the plan at once. That used to be an option under “rehearse”. Did it get moved somewhere else?

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Karen #permalink

the pause button doesn’t work for me either…

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Katie Willard #permalink

@Karen- the rehearse “Download all pdf’s” is still there, unless you don’t have pdf’s in that plan, or unless you’re on a non-paying plan. Then it wouldn’t be there for you.

If you’re having problems with the pause, please try holding down control and clicking refresh. Then if that still doesn’t work try uninstalling and reinstalling your Flash. And make sure it’s the latest version (10.0). Hopefully this helps!

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Marc Millan #permalink

Looks WAY better, is there a way to just drag songs around as well? Like Itunes, be able to just re-create a playlist and rehearse to songs in the order that I want to?

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Katie Willard #permalink

@Marc There isn’t a way to create a playlist like this. Sorry about that!

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Jeff Richards #permalink

I like the old player better myself. I liked the fact I could fast forward to the next song in the list much faster then the new one. The old one is also clearer and easy to use.
Just my 2 cents.

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ministrycentered #permalink

Hey Everyone!

We have added a lot of what you have asked for. You now can now change the volume & pan and also pop-out the MP3 Player into its own window. Please let us know what you think!

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mackenzie #permalink

hey just wanted to day YOLA to everyone

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Sasha #permalink

I think there are still some tweaks that should be added. It is harder to skip to a certain section of a song, where you click does not line up with where the progress bar goes. Also when you pause the song the progress bar disappears. I like to pause songs and find certain parts in a song, then keep going back to those parts but it is hard to do that in the new format.

From PCO: Great Idea! We have updated the site with this.

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JoshN #permalink

Awesome update. Thanks and good work. Do you think there will be any updates on the format of the iPhone site? I find myself usually going to the regular site as opposed to the iPhone-friendly site. It just has more details and better access to the files need for the worship service.

again, thanks!

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Barry Westman #permalink

You guys are great! Thanks for adding all that stuff to quickly! Great upgrade!

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Chad #permalink

I love Planning Center. I am not sure how I made it before. Keep making improvements!!!!

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Joel Lanier #permalink

No one responds to their customer base like you guys do. The changes don’t even effect me because we haven’t used the “pan” as creatively as some of these other churches have, but I felt I had to write when I saw the speed at which you addressed the needs of the people that use your product. God bless you guys and gals for what you are doing for the Kingdom!

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Clark #permalink

I have read most of your comments, I haven’t seen the on line mp3 player yet, but what I do is download the song and play it in windows media player, it has all the controls…..pause, volume, etc..

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Bo Mail #permalink

This is wonderful! I love being able to play all my favorite songs. I don’t know how it was set up before, but it works great for me. Thank you!

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Lisa #permalink

OK, GREAT PROGRESS… but now I can’t get the transposer to work and I’m desperate to get mp3 files ready… gee, we are so demanding,how can you stand it!?!?!?

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Katie Willard #permalink

@JoshN At this point, updating the iPhone site isn’t our top priority, but we can certainly add this to our list of things to look at for updates in the future. Thanks!

@Lisa Could you please email us with your issue with transposer to support@ministrycentered.com? I’ll need to look into your account and see what’s going on. Thanks!

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Marilyn Peters #permalink

Love it. I just figured out how to transpose mp3′s. That is sooo helpful.

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Ryan #permalink

New player is much sleeker. Found the volume control and panning function easily. Nice how it’s embedded into each page now. Good work…..

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Catherine #permalink

Can you add to the mp3 file so that it will play mp4 files? Most of the music I try to upload to the site is in the mp4 format.

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hilda.Campos #permalink

can we download on mp3 player songs to reherse for choir?

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ministrycentered #permalink

@Catherine: We would love to do this but unfortunately Flash does not support this. We are looking into making it possible to convert MP4s to MP3s on the site but we have not figured out how to do it.

@hilda: This is an option your church decides based on each file in the system. Please contact your church to see if this is possible.

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Kevin Rush #permalink

I love the new MP3 thanks for always changing the little things.

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dustin #permalink

What are the chances of getting it to play AAC files? I spend alot of time converting to mp3

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Tim #permalink

The one thing that would make this EXCELLENT would a built in pitch bender. We often adjust the key of songs up/down (mostly down) from the original recording. Being able to do this directly in the player, on the fly, would be fantastic.

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scotthodgin #permalink

I’m having issues with distortion. I’ve uploaded mp3s created from aiff files, and when trying to listen to them on the new mp3 player, they are garbled. Others in our ministry have also told me that this is happening to them when trying to listen from their PC and Mac. Thanks.

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Matthew #permalink

I can’t get the mp3 player to work on IE6. Any ideas why not?

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ministrycentered #permalink

@scotthodgin: That sounds like an issue with the conversion. If you can send the original & the MP3 to support@ministrycentered.com and we will see what is going on.

@Matthew: We have tested the MP3 Player on IE6 and found it works. Please try holding down the control key and press refresh and see if that fixes it. If not please e-mail us at support@ministrycentered.com

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scotthodgin #permalink

I’ve gone back to check some of the “distorted” files, and they seem to be working fine now. Perhaps the problem has worked itself out. Thanks. The player looks great, and it’s streamlined listening time and made it very easy to rehearse.

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Mike #permalink

What happened to the conversion utility? That was awesome. Copyright issue?

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ministrycentered #permalink

@Mike: Hmm…we never had a conversion utility, but that is a great idea!!!

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Djim #permalink

Awsome! now I can listen to music.

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