UPDATE: In the interests of disclosure, and in accordance with this blog’s editorial policy, please note that on July 18, 2007, the CBC asked me to update this post with some corrections, clarification, and additional information. The CBC’s comments are italicized.

Here’s a look at the overall interface. Notice you can have up to eight tracks now, and you can even resize the tracks to focus on a particular track (a voicetrack, for instance).

Ripping a track from a CD requires a separate (and UGLY) application, but at least when it rips it in the right format and places it right in a Dalet category for you to drag into your work or show folder. Needs to be integrated into the application, but it’s not a huge deal. This is a big improvement over real-time acoustical dubbing.

This is the ClipBin — the replacement for the Clipboard. It has a few nice features, including the ability to see the waveform, and if you’ve pulled a region of an active SURFER into the ClipBin, you can see where in the waveform that region exists (that’s the grey blocks on the green bars). Very nice touch.

I love this. Converting to a new file format is as easy as dragging the file from any category into one of these special auto-convert icons. Note the blue icon in the file list on the right which indicates to anyone logged into DaletPlus that that file is currently being converted.

Yay! Making volume curves no longer makes me want to poke needles in my eyeballs.

There seems to be a hidden Instant Message application built within DaletPlus (similar to iNews). I expect IT wants you to use the Groupwise Messenger instead.

CBC says: “Not hidden – simply not used in CBC workflow. The app is called Chat. It’s under Windows menu, and can be on toolbar.”

Dear God, we actually have an application called “InterWeb”?! Did nobody tell the Tri-Medial Sub-Committee Task Force on Desktop Application Naming Conventions that “InterWeb” is actually a JOKE on the Internet?! When people online say “The InterWeb,” they mean it ironically. We mean it literally. *sigh*

You can save keywords as part of any audio title, but I wasn’t able to find those titles by searching for them. Too bad, because this would be a great way to put a show abbreviation, guest name, or other metadata into the file for easy later retrieval. This should be priority one to fix.

CBC says: “Keyword search does work. After entering the keyword, it may take a minute or so until the database updates.”

Tod’s reply: “Fair enough, I probably didn’t wait a full minute for a database update.”

Now you can tell if someone else is using a title or project because a lock icon appears beside it. Also, titles and projects can be saved in the same category.

Okay, I’m nitpicking, but it bugs me that DaletPlus uses totally non-standard User Interface fonts and label styles.

The desktop player (basically the new Navigator) can accept Groups. Yes, it always could, but making groups are a bit easier now. It’s still a little gimpy, though. I expect most on-air people will still drag elements to fire in manually.

CBC responds: “Desktop Player is not ‘basically the new Navigator’. The new OnAir Player replaces the old Navigator. Image in your review is in fact not the OnAir Player, it is of the DeskTop Player. Desktop Player is one channel. OnAir Player is two channel. OnAir Player can accept groups, just as Navigator always could. There are substantial functionality differences between the two apps.”

Tod responds: “Oops. Still, seems silly that there are two different players, depending on how many channels you want to use. Either way, it’s a huge improvement.”

Sure, it’s nice to have a list of regions you’ve defined, but you can’t dock this window (again, a non-standard UI problem), shortcut jump to the region, delete, or rename them from here. What’s the point of the window then? This needs improvement.

CBC responds: “Actually, [the] user can “shortcut jump” to the Locator by clicking on the Locator and clicking OK. Play Marker will jump to Locator.”

Tod responds: “Cool. Wasn’t taught that in the course. A little UI help might assist — like having a “Jump to Marker” button or something. I still stand by my comment that you can’t delete or rename the markers in this window, which seems like a minor thing, but can actually save a lot of time on a big project.”

Here’s how you save a group. You have to right-click on an area that’s pretty much invisible, and select Rundown Properties. Huh?! How about File/Save Group... ? The folks who write Dalet need to hire User Interface people.

CBC responds: “This is not how user saves a Group. Group is saved by simply closing the Rundown Editor. Save is automatic. The area clicked on is the Group Title – not an invisible area. This “New Group” field is right clicked on in order to change title, not to save.”

Tod responds: “What I described is how that procedure isn’t being taught, at least out here. You don’t click on the group title; you literally click on the blank space. But even so, closing the group with an Automatic Save breaks a number of UI conventions as well. I still think the Dalet folks need to simply add a File/Save Group… menu item.”

Finally, this is a look at a SURFER8 with volume curves in place. It would be helpful to visually show the effect the volume curve has on the waveform — e.g. when you fade out a clip, the waveform should shrink according to the curve.

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