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Audio Hijack 4, Shortcuts, Podcasting Automation

Audio Hijack 4 is Here! | Rogue Amoeba Blog:

Today, we’re thrilled to unveil a major upgrade to Audio Hijack, our flagship audio recorder and processor. Audio Hijack 4 brings both powerful new functionality and powerful new interfaces, to make its ability to record any audio on your Mac more accessible than ever. With an absolutely ridiculous 107 new features, enhancements, improvements, and bug fixes, Audio Hijack has never been better.

Read on to learn more or just click to download Audio Hijack 4!

Audio Hijack is an essential tool in my workflow. I use it to do everything from recording my podcast to capturing audio from apps. It's sort of a Swiss Army Knife of audio utilities on the Mac. And today it gets better.

You can read the post from Rogue Amoeba above to get the full scoop. You can read my previous post on Audio Hijack to get a feel for how I use it. I also had Rogue Amoeba's CEO Paul Kafasis on Music Ed Tech Talk to talk about all sorts of creative ways to use their audio apps in the classroom.

My favorite new feature of Audio Hijack 4 is the Shortcuts integration.

I can now automate features of Audio Hijack by adding actions in my Shortcuts. One example of this is my "Podcasting" Shortcut which I trigger before I record my show (or go on Zoom calls).

This Shortcut...

  • reminds me to turn off my fan (using the speak text action)
  • tracks how long I record in the time tracking app Timery
  • sets a reminder to turn back on the fan later in the evening
  • opens Craft and Obsidian (where I keep my show outline and show notes, respectively)
  • opens Zoom, launches the meeting, mutes my mic, and records the call (as a back up)

Now I can add Audo Hijack as a step. In the action above, I am having it automatically start running my "Input Device" session, which takes the audio input of my Scarlet 6i6 audio interface and records it as an AIFF.

This Shortcut also puts my devices into a Podcasting Focus mode which silences all notifications except the ones from my wife.

My favorite calendar app Fantastical releases version 3.6 with "openings" and "scheduling" features

My calendar app of choice, Fantastical, released version 3.6 this week.

Fantastical is an amazing calendar app that works with numerous calendar and task services and packs tons of powerful features in a graceful user interface.

The version adds some huge productivity boosts. My favorite of which is a feature called "Openings" which, if you have ever used the service Calendly, adds similar function right into the app.

By setting up a few quick templates, I can now quickly reschedule a private lesson with a parent by texting them a URL. I give Fantastical a window of time; it looks at the free time in between my calendar events and provides the parent with a website that prompts them to choose an available slot. Their chosen time is then added right to my calendar. It is going to help me save tons of time!

There is a video of this feature in action below, and you can read about all of the new features in 3.6 here.

Fantastical has an aggressive subscription price for the premium version, but updates like this make me feel glad I can fund their continued development.

Dorico 4

Dorico 4 is out! I've been testing it for the past few months, and I'm not even sure I am scratching the surface of what it can do. It is, in my opinion, the most important and exciting update to Dorico since its release in 2016.

This past summer, Dorico released an iPad app, which has many of the design updates and features seen in Dorico 4. You can read my first impressions about the iPad version of Dorico, and hear my conversation with Product Marketing Manager Daniel Spreadbury, here.

Fortunately, the Scoring Notes blog posted a review, which you can read here.

Here are some quick things that I am excited about in Dorico 4

Licensing

Dorico 4 uses Steinberg's brand new Steinberg Licensing, replacing the Steinberg e-Licenser. The e-Licensor was one of the two or three most frustrating licensing processes on my Mac. The new Steinberg Licensing is one of the least frustrating processes for licensing software on my Mac.

Once Dorico 4 launched, I was presented with the option to move my existing Dorico 3.5 license over and log into my Steinberg account. Once completed, Dorico can run on up to three machines without connecting to the web. This is a super easy and generous way to handle licensing.

Key Editor

I covered this in my iPad First Impressions post, so I won't go into too much detail here. The bottom area, which previously only contained project properties, now includes new note input methods like a piano, fretboard, and drum pads. It also integrates a piano roll and mixer right into Write Mode.

I really enjoy writing with notation and a piano roll visible on the screen at once. Perhaps this is because I am comfortable with DAWs. But I think it also speaks to how easily I conceptualize and edit rhythmic duration on a piano roll. Ethan Hein summarizes this well:

You can also view a mixer in the bottom area while in Write Mode. Cool.

Jump Bar

"Command pallet," "command search," "quick open"... whatever it's called, this feature is becoming very popular in pro-software. If you have used Sibelius, you might be familiar with their Command Search feature. The feature is also quite popular in productivity software. I love using Command+O in OmniFocus to open projects and perspectives quickly. In my note app Obsidian, Command+O smartly searches my notes, and Command+P acts upon them.

The idea is that you have a keyboard shortcut that brings up a search, you start typing, and then the software smartly displays some options on the screen for places it thinks you want to go or things you want to do.

Dorico has added this feature with their new Jump Bar, and I couldn't be happier. Just press the letter J, and you can type "m30" to bounce to measure 30 or "dynamics" to bring up the dynamics popover.

Popovers are my favorite part of the Dorico workflow, but I sometimes forget which keyboard shortcuts belong to which menus. In my opinion, having one command that allows for natural-language searching is a workflow win. Even if it is technically more keystrokes to find things, there is way less mental overhead in just typing what you want plainly.

Improvements to Play Mode and the Interface

Play Mode moves a handful of track options to the left, making it more familiar to users who work inside DAWs. Working with inserts and effects feels less esoteric in this design. I like it.

Project Templates

You can now turn any project into a template. Templates appear in the File menu, under the New from Project Template selection.

Previously, I used a Siri Shortcut to manage project templates in Dorico. I wrote about that for Scoring Notes here. My shortcuts method handles some of the file management for you and is worth a look if you want to learn more about macOS and iOS automation.

Generally, I think it is a benefit to store templates inside of Dorico, and I will be taking some of my most frequently used templates in the Shortcuts app and moving them inside of Dorico.

Library

Dorico moves most options relating to customizing the app's behavior into a menu called Library. It drives me nuts when professional creative software stores its settings across numerous custom preference panes throughout the application. This adjustment makes customizing Dorico's various options more discoverable, regardless of the mode or context they relate to.

The new library features also include many new options for font styles, which I am sure will make David MacDonald very happy.

M1

Dorico 4 works with Apple Silicon. From Scoring Notes:

Dorico 4 is the first Dorico version, and the first of any of the major desktop applications, to support Apple silicon Macs, such as the M1 MacBook Pro, iMac, and Mac mini. If you have an Apple silicon Mac, Dorico will run as a native application by default. However, if you use VST plug-ins, Dorico can only load VST plug-ins that can run natively on Apple silicon as well, and these must be VST 3 (there is no support for VST 2 plug-ins on Apple silicon). It is possible to force Dorico 4 to run under Rosetta 2 on Apple Silicon, which will allow VST 2 and Intel-native plug-ins to be loaded, though at the expense of slower overall performance.

Overall, Dorico 4 is a huge step forward. I imagine a lot of the work on this update was done in preparation for the iPad release. Now that both versions exist, I expect that the shared development platform between desktop and mobile will mean that future updates are released in side-step and continue to be feature-rich.

#48 - Holiday Special 2021, featuring Will Kuhn, Craig McClellan, David MacDonald, and Jon Tippens

Friends of the show join to answer burning questions about music, education, and technology in 2021 (and beyond).

Patreon subscribers get some extra discussion about Dune and Foundation.

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Show Notes:

Album of the Year - Nate Smith: Kinfolk 2 | Stevie Wonder: Talking Book | Magdalena Bay: Murcurial World | John Mayer: Sob Rock | Cory Wong and Dirty Loops: Turbo

App of the Year - Obsidian | Fin Timer | OP-Z App | Pixelmator Photo | Molskine Actions

Tech Tip of the Year - Focus Modes (some discussion about how I am using these on episode 44 of this show) | camelcamelcamel.com | Use OBS for everything | Feedbin | Press and hold the spacebar on iOS to move your cursor around

Please don’t forget to rate the show and share it with others!

The Music Ed Tech Talk Holiday Gift Guide, featuring Dr. David MacDonald

David MacDonald joins Robby to share their favorite books, hardware, apps, services, and musical gift ideas.

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Show Notes:

Books

Hardware

More Hardware

Software

Services

Misc

Music of the Week

Robby - Sarah Jarosz

David - Sister Rosetta Tharpe

Tech Tip of the Week

Robby - Focus Modes

David - CopyChar.cc

Where to Find Us:

Robby - Twitter | Blog | Book

David - Twitter | Website | Blog

Please don't forget to rate the show and share it with others!

METT Episode #42 - Pass the Baton, with Theresa Hoover

There's a new episode of Music Ed Tech Talk out!

Theresa Hoover returns to talk about career changing, COVID practices worth bringing into this school year, productivity apps, and empowering student creativity!

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Become a Patron!

Buy me a coffeeBuy me a coffee

Thanks to my sponsors this month, Blink Session Music.

Show Notes:

App of the Week:
Robby - Instapaper / Readwise Theresa - Kumospace

Album of the Week:
Robby - Turbo Theresa - Cory Wong

Tech Tip of the Week:
Robby - Safari Tab Groups, Sync Safari and Chrome bookmarks with a Windows PC Theresa - Chrome Reading List / Favicons Favorite Bar

Where to Find Us:
Robby - Twitter | Blog | Book
Theresa - Twitter | Website

Please don't forget to rate the show and share it with others!

I'm on the iPad Pros podcast to talk about Dorico and Sibelius for iPad

I am pleased to be a guest on the iPad Pros podcast this week to talk about Dorico and Sibelius for iPad.

Tim Chaten does an awesome job with this show and has a background in composition. If you want to spend quite a bit of time with us and hear my thoughts on these two professional scoring programs for iPad, give it a listen!

YouTube version here:

Making Tunable, with Seth Sandler (Music Ed Tech Talk Ep. 40)

Seth Sandler, maker of the poplar mobile tuner app Tunable, joins the show to talk about the process of making a tuning app, developing for iOS/Mac, and more!

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Show Notes:

App of the Week: BusyCal

Album of the Week: Chris Thile - Laysongs Acapella Musicals on Spotify

Where to Find Us: Robby - Twitter | Blog | Book
Seth - Twitter

Please don't forget to rate the show and share it with others!

Ukulele Resources, Pedagogy, and Curriculum

I’m getting ukuleles for my general music classes this year so I thought it would be natural to have past guest Chris Russell on the podcast. He is a technology expert and maker of many online ukulele resources, amongst his many other skills.

I learned a lot talking to him. The conversation was packed with resources for teachers looking to better their ukulele skills so be sure to scroll down and check out all of the resources he mentions on the show, which I have provided links for.

Episode Description

Robby is getting ukeleles to teach general music this year. Chris Russel (tech and ukelele specialist) joins the show to talk about how to get the best use out of them. We also talk about the state of tech in music ed.

Full Topics:

  • Ukelele pedagogy
  • Where to find ukelele resources online
  • How to integrate ukelele and technology
  • The state of technology in music education
  • Apple's App-centric and native approach to education vs. Google's web-centric approach
  • Our favorite apps, albums, and tech tips of the week
  • The tools and process Chris uses to make ukelele play-along videos on his iPad (in the post-show for Patreon subscribers)

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Become a Patron!

Buy me a coffeeBuy me a coffee

Show Notes:

App of the Week: Robby - Carrot Weather Chris - PDF Expert / TikTok / Vegas Bowling Apple Watch App

Album of the Week: Robby - Squint - Julian Lage Chris - Safe Haven - Ruth B / The Show - Lenka

Where to Find Us: Robby - Twitter | Blog | Book
Chris - Twitter | Websites - Techinmusiced.com / Ukestuff.info

Please don't forget to rate the show and share it with others!

App of the Week: ViDL (Downloads YouTube Videos On Your Mac)

For anyone looking for this kind of tool, I recommend checking out ViDL for downloading video content from websites on to your computer.

ViDL for Mac - Download Web Videos Easily:

ViDL is a free Mac app that allows you to easily download videos from YouTube and hundreds of other websites for offline viewing.

It is based on the popular youtube-dlcommand line tool, but much easier to use, especially with videos/playlists that require a login (like your personal "Watch Later" list).

Find Robby elsewhere on the web