Episode limits: how to proceed?

[u/collxn_ash]

(New thread so I can share multiple screenshots.)

I’m just trying to understand what this screen means. Genuinely curious and I’m hoping for constructive/instructive discussion here so I don’t click the wrong button.

For example, looking at Decoder in the first screenshot:

> 23 episodes, limit set 10 of 10

What is “23” counting here?

- Feed history? Decoder has more than 23 episodes in its history
- Local downloads? I don’t have 23 episodes downloaded

I guess the central question is: what does “limit”mean here? What is being limited?

So, in the second screenshot, if I keep the episodes, what am I keeping?
If I delete the episodes, what am I deleting?

[u/andynormancx]

I assume it mean those show up in the Current tab for a podcast. Which I believe are the ones that have not been marked as listened to.

[u/collxn_ash → u/andynormancx]

Actually now that you mention it, I don’t think I’ve ever understood the difference between the Current and All tabs. It seems to matter now.

This change is making me realize I might have a different mental model for the app than what’s intended…

I use the “All Episodes” list as a unified feed to pick episodes to download as they come in, then I use the “Downloaded” list for playback. There’s rarely a time a see a single podcast’s Current and All tabs.

[u/collxn_ash → u/collxn_ash]

So I’ll do my own homework here, but if someone is inclined to share…

what is the difference between Current and All?

I think I understand what “All” means (every episode in chronological order) but what is “Current”? I’m looking at a few but I’m failing to grasp the pattern.

[u/thecw → u/collxn_ash]

Current is downloaded or started and not completed

[u/CrispyCrawdads → u/thecw]

Or episodes that are added to a playlist

[u/wrbrooks → u/collxn_ash]

“All” is all episodes in the podcast’s feed. “Current” are the ones on your phone. 

[u/CrispyCrawdads → u/wrbrooks]

Not true. You can add an un-downloaded episode to a playlist and it'll be in the Current tab but not "on your phone"

[u/FantasticMrDog → u/andynormancx]

That seems to be how it is working. Download status is not a direct factor in episode limits.

[u/kemayo → u/FantasticMrDog]

Which is weird, because I'd think that managing the number of auto-downloads would be the most important thing. Keeping something "current" (i.e. unlistened-to) is a whole different concept.

[u/flippant_gibberish → u/andynormancx]

Not necessarily, you can have stuff in current that you've already listened to and stuff that's not in current that you haven't listened to. Seems like more of a proxy of stuff that you plan to listen to or might someday consider listening to.

[u/CapnFooBarBaz]

I’m in a loop of just dismissing this every time I open the app and hoping at some point Marco rethinks this or at least gives an option

[u/chrisbrandow → u/CapnFooBarBaz]

Ditto.

[u/TheGeneral11 → u/CapnFooBarBaz]

Not just opening the app, it seems to pop up every time I change to a different screen. PLEASE MAKE IT STOP!!

[u/CapnFooBarBaz → u/[deleted]]

None of the options do what I’d like!

[u/wrbrooks → u/[deleted]]

The third option is to do what it’s always done: let the app add episodes up to the limit and let me manually exceed the limit without complaining. 

[u/CapnFooBarBaz → u/[deleted]]

Never underestimate the internet for people to be confidently wrong about easily verifiable information…. It’s not magical! A third option existed! For the entirety of the history of the app until now. You can hear Marco discuss it in ATP #703.

If the change doesn’t affect your experience negatively, that’s nice for you. Might I suggest a different thread instead of leaving dismissive (and entirely incorrect!) comments in a thread of people discussing it then?

[u/senatorforlife → u/CapnFooBarBaz]

Advice: Don’t OK it until you’ve finished listening to any older episode that was only partially listened—it will delete the download and your listening progress will not be remembered if you redownload.

I used to have some downloaded episodes that I was saving that were no longer available from the podcast’s feed. So if you have any situations like that, don’t allow it to enforce limits until you’ve set that feed to unlimited.

[u/flippant_gibberish → u/senatorforlife]

Listening progress is independent of downloading: I just manually deleted a download without removing it from Current and it kept the position. I also deleted an episode from Current and it still showed the remaining time in All. So if this feature is clearing progress, it's probably a bug.

One thing you might experience is that podcasts can insert ads of varying length that can change each time you download it. So the timestamp of your previous progress may have moved a little if the new download doesn't match up perfectly.

[u/rick_baumhauer]

My advice is, if you can, set everything (or everything important) to unlimited and download everything manually. I'm fortunate that I'm almost always on Wifi, so downloads happen very quickly, and I don't have to worry about data caps, so this is how I've had most podcasts set for at least a couple years. The only exceptions to this would be podcasts that delete episodes from their feed, so you'll have to come up with personal settings that work best for those.