Making Castro’s Feeds Update Faster the Lazy Way • Hacker News Board

Re: Making Castro’s Feeds Update Faster the Lazy Way

#41

Post by joeross » Tue, Oct 22, 2024, 12:01 AM UTC

spiderfarmer wrote: post #10

ttepasse wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Me too. I switched to Overcast when Castro had its huge hiccups, but followed the new owners and the updates with great interest. The forward momentum seems great. I can see myself switching back home, when my new iPhone arrives. My ideal podcast client would be something like Castro with additional playlist queues. I never could build a good triage model in Overcast. But sometimes you'll want some organization. (And…

I wonder if Marco Arment will ever reconsider designing the Overcast app himself. He seems to be the only who is convinced that he doesn't need one. As a fellow indie I get wanting to do everything yourself, but as a Apple fan I feel he should value design way more than he does now. The Castro app is so much better, it's like comparing iOS to Windows Mobile.

> The Castro app is so much better, it's like comparing iOS to Windows Mobile.

lol respectfully, this is a wildly bad take. yes you’re entitled to your own opinion, but you aren’t entitled to your own window mobile comparisons.

Re: Making Castro’s Feeds Update Faster the Lazy Way

#42

Post by leokennis » Tue, Oct 22, 2024, 9:22 AM UTC

yzydserd wrote: post #38

leokennis wrote: post #2

I’m so happy Castro has new owners. For me it has the best interaction model of all podcast apps (inbox + queue), it had a beautiful design and now it’s also getting the backend + tech debt love it requires.

I used Castro for 5 years and loved it. But when it had the ownership meltdown I switched back to iCatcher. It’s quirky, but easy to set up an Inbox and Downloaded queue which is the Castro USP. I haven’t missed Castro and can’t say the news entices me back.

Haven’t tried iCatcher myself. It has that utilitarian look that usually either means it’s a power user app that can be configured to behave exactly like you want, or it is a hobby project of a single person without UI/UX talent. Going by your comment it’s the former ;-)

I’m lucky Castro fits my workflow (or rather, my podcast workflow came to be by using Castro since forever), and as it looks pretty as well I have no reason to switch apps.

Re: Making Castro’s Feeds Update Faster the Lazy Way

#43

Post by dabluck » Tue, Oct 22, 2024, 4:11 PM UTC

lucasban wrote: post #33

thoroughburro wrote: post #15

Overcast lost me after months of waiting for its disastrous redesign to be fixed. Castro is, in my opinion, the best replacement for feature equivalence. However, I actually chose standard Apple Podcasts. The transcriptions are a game changer.

Does it transcribe private feeds? I pay for the ad free streams for some of the podcasts I listen to the most, so if those aren’t transcribed then the usefulness diminishes

We are going to add transcriptions soon for podcasts that include it in their feeds. No plans to add autog-enerated transcripts anytime soon, I'd rather show the feed that creators intend listeners to see.

Re: Making Castro’s Feeds Update Faster the Lazy Way

#44

Post by lucasban » Tue, Oct 22, 2024, 4:27 PM UTC

dabluck wrote: post #43

lucasban wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it transcribe private feeds? I pay for the ad free streams for some of the podcasts I listen to the most, so if those aren’t transcribed then the usefulness diminishes

We are going to add transcriptions soon for podcasts that include it in their feeds. No plans to add autog-enerated transcripts anytime soon, I'd rather show the feed that creators intend listeners to see.

Thanks, hopefully that gets more common as apps add support.