The new filter is in the filters area and contains all the tasks that are part of any of the company’s task templates:

The filter is quite easy to use: a tri-state checkbox is shown beside each task for users to choose which jobs to display based on their tasks’ statuses.

The example below shows how a user would display only the jobs which tasks Encoding and Quality Controlled have been completed and which task Metadata is still pending, independently of the status of task “Distribute”:

This is how the results page looks like after applying a filter by tasks status:

Of course, this new filter can be combined with any of the existing ones (by tag, licensor or assigned user) for an even more powerful filtering experience.

We hope you like it!

• go to the Work page,
• filter the page to only show titles containing tasks assigned to them,
• select all the titles shown, click “Work with Tasks” and re-assign the tasks to a workmate.

Good news is, users can do just that with a new Sequence feature released today.

We have introduced a new drop-down menu on the right-hand side of the Work page. It is labelled: “With tasks assigned to”.

The drop-down menu contains the list of all users of the Sequence account. Select a user in the drop-down menu, and the Work page will refresh to only show jobs containing tasks assigned to the selected user.

From there, you can work with Tasks, Notes, etc… in the usual fashion.

We hope this new feature will make your life easier, particularly at the end of that long shift…

]]> http://blog.bebanjo.com/2012/02/08/new-feature-in-sequence-filtering-jobs-by-assigned-use/feed/ 0 http://blog.bebanjo.com/2012/01/02/new-features-in-sequence-adding-tasks-and-notes-to-multiple-titles/ http://blog.bebanjo.com/2012/01/02/new-features-in-sequence-adding-tasks-and-notes-to-multiple-titles/#comments Mon, 02 Jan 2012 11:05:44 +0000 Pablo Alonso García http://blog.bebanjo.com/?p=428 Happy new year!

We start 2012 by releasing two new great features to Sequence: adding tasks and notes to multiple titles at once. Yee-haw!

Adding a task to multiple titles

In Sequence it is often useful to add new tasks to a given job, apart from the ones it was created with. This is handy when you need to deal with special cases or problems, or when a very specific task needs to be assigned to someone.

Sometimes, however, and specially when dealing with episodes of a series or with multiple titles from the same licensor, you need to create the same task for multiple jobs. Now you will be able to do just that, instead of doing it title by title!

To add a task to multiple titles at once, you can select some titles on the Work page and click Add a new task when working with tasks:

You will see a form to enter the details for the new task:

While typing the name of the task, Sequence will give you a list of the existing tasks in the current video service so that you can reuse any of them:

Finally, you can select where you want to insert the new task: at the beginning, at the end or before or after any of the tasks that the selected titles have in common:

Adding a note to multiple titles

Adding a note to several titles is now extremely fast. In the Work page, you will see a new item named Notes in the Work with menu. This will be your entry point for adding a new note to multiple titles.

You will see this screen after having selected some titles and clicked Notes:

In this case, we have selected 3 titles but we have finally decided to add a note to 2 titles (which already had some notes). If you fill in the note and click Save then the note will have been added to the selected titles :-)

We hope that you find these new features very useful.

The acquisition combines Cognacq-Jay Image, the leading French broadcast and broadband technical service provider, and BeBanjo, the company that builds best-of- breed back-office tool for teams managing on-demand services.

Together the companies will focus on providing a complete digital media solution for linear and non-linear platforms. This full-service solution will provide platforms operators, broadcasters and content owners everything they need to efficiently distribute media content across multiple platforms, devices and countries.

“We’re thrilled to be joining forces with Cognacq-Jay Image and to benefit from their technical leadership, their vast knowledge of the media business and their successful video processing services. It enables us to continue and expand on our mission of creating the world’s best back-office for companies looking to optimize their non- linear media workflow.”

says Bastian Manintveld, Founder of BeBanjo.

“With the acquisition of BeBanjo, Cognacq-Jay Image is broadening its expertise in the management and processing of multimedia content. We now are in a unique competitive position where we can service our customers across many different video platforms through our MediaOnDemand offer. The combined offer helps our customers to monetise their media on any platform in an easy, transparent and efficient way” says Régis Martin, deputy CEO of Cognacq-Jay Image. “We are glad to welcome BeBanjo’s team and customers to the TDF group.”

With this acquisition, BeBanjo joins Cognacq-Jay Image and SmartJog in the TDF Group Multimedia Business Unit. The Spanish company will retain its distinct brand identity, strengthening and complementing Cognacq-Jay Image’s fast-growing service delivery platform. BeBanjo will continue to be based in Madrid, Spain.

Thanks to Cognacq-Jay’ successful technology, media relationships and broadcast expertise, BeBanjo will continue to build on its success as one of the world’s most efficient back-office tool to manage non-linear services and will keep investing in R&D to improve its suite of products.

About BeBanjo

BeBanjo is a software company focused on building the world best back-office for teams managing video-on-demand and catch-up services. BeBanjo was founded in 2008 by Bastian Manintveld and Jorge Gómez Sancha and is headquartered in Madrid, Spain. BeBanjo clients include Channel5, BSkyB, Telefonica and Tv Numeric.

For more information: http://bebanjo.com

About Cognacq-Jay Image

Since 1996 Cognacq-Jay Image, a TDF Group company, operates broadcast playout services for TV channels. Part of the TDF multimedia division, Cognacq-Jay Image proposes new services that drive innovation and deliver next generation multimedia solutions to its customers.

Led by Thierry Carpentier and Régis Martin, the company offers easier and more efficient management of linear and on-demand services for TV channels, service providers and content owners.

For more information: http://www.cognacqjayimage.com

Contact:

@bebanjo: Bastian Manintveld – bastian@bebanjo.com + 34 600 616 941

@cognacq-jay image: Ysabelle Alcide – ysabelle.alcide@tdfvs.tdf.fr + 33 1 49 55 02 01

Cognacq-Jay Image, the leading French broadcast and broadband technical service provider, and BeBanjo, the Spanish start-up that builds best-of-breed tools for teams managing on- demand services, join forces to propose an innovative offer to companies looking to optimize their non linear television workflow.

This offer, called MediaOnDemand, helps content owners to get their programming out to multiple platforms in a highly automated and cost effective way.

MediaOnDemand is a combination of BeBanjo’s award winning software products and Cognacq Jay Image’s expertise in media asset management software and services. It provides platforms, broadcasters and content owners everything they need to efficiently distribute on- demand content across many different platforms, devices and countries.

“BeBanjo is about to celebrate its third birthday.” says Bastian Manintveld, Founder of BeBanjo. “The partnership with Cognacq-Jay Image is a major break through in our quest to provide the world’s best back-office for teams managing video-on-demand services.”

“We have worked with Cognacq-Jay Image on behalf of our clients for a while now” says Jorge Gómez Sancha, Founder of BeBanjo. “We’re very proud that this collaboration has now resulted in a far reaching partnership”

“With the BeBanjo tools, Cognacq-Jay Image is adding very user-friendly interfaces to our core transcoding and video processing services” says Régis Martin, deputy CEO of Cognacq-Jay Image. “Thanks to this partnership, not only can our customers rely on our service capabilities, but we also make their life easier”.

About BeBanjo

BeBanjo is a software company focused on building the world best back-office for teams managing video-on-demand and catch-up services. BeBanjo was founded in 2008 by Bastian Manintveld and Jorge Gomez Sancha and is headquartered in Madrid, Spain. BeBanjo clients include Channel4, BSkyB, Telefonica and Tv Numeric. For more information: http://bebanjo.com

About Cognacq-Jay Image

Cognacq-Jay Image, a TDF Group company, operates since 1996 broadcast playout services for TV channels. Part of the TDF multimedia division, Cognacq-Jay Image proposes new services to drive innovation and multimedia solutions for its customers.

Its offer is now segmented as follows:

• MediaOnAir: dedicated and mutualized channel playout services.
• MediaOnDemand: content processing tools and services to publish on any on-demand platform.
• MediaLive: headends services to grab and reroute live content to any device.

For more information: http://www.cognacqjayimage.com

About the MediaOnDemand solution

Media Manager – Software Solutions

The Media Manager suite of software products is comprised of the following:

• BeBanjo’s Movida: Rights management and Scheduling for catch-up and on-demand across multiple platforms, devices, networks and countries.
• BeBanjo’s Metadata Manager: Simple and efficient management of metadata across multiple platforms without ever worrying about the technical specifications.

Media Factory – Services

Cognacq-Jay Image’s Media Factory provides a fully outsourced content processing solution for on-demand and catch-up television on multiple devices: cable, IPTV, mobile, web, tablet, TV, connected TV etc.

Through BeBanjo’s award winning Sequence workflow product, Cognacq–Jay Image’s clients have real time control and visibility over the workflow status for each title across multiple platforms.

Contact

@bebanjo

Bastian Manintveld — bastian@bebanjo.com — + 34 600 616 941

@cognacq-jay image

Ysabelle Alcide — ysabelle.alcide@tdfvs.tdf.fr — + 33 1 49 55 02 01

On the 14th of October, BeBanjo won it’s second Streaming Media Readers’ Choice Award. We’d like to thank everyone in the industry who voted for us.

We are very proud of this kind of recognition, and it’s encourages us in our quest to build the world’s best back-office for teams managing video-on-demand services.

Early next year we’ll be launching our third product and we hope that it will be equally well received.

Our press release can be viewed and downloaded here.

Thank you!

-BeBanjo Team

BeBanjo’s Movida winner of a StreamingMedia Readers’ Choice Award

Movida enables channels/broadcasters to manage archive and catch-up scheduling and rights management like never before.

• Movida is a web based solution that provides beautiful, highly automated scheduling and rights management for on-demand services

• Movida is currently the only solution in the world for efficient rules-based catch-up scheduling

• BSkyB, Telefonica, Channel Five and TV Numeric manage their TV services using BeBanjo’s products.

• BeBanjo will launch it’s third product focussed on managing metadata across multiple platforms during Q1 2011.

Madrid – 26 October 2010

BeBanjo today announced that it has won a Readers Choice Award for its second product Movida. The awards are organized by StreamingMedia Magazine. The awards recognize the innovation and operational improvements that Movida has delivered to some of Europe’s most important on-demand service. More than 12,500 votes were cast for more than 240 products.

Movida is a beautiful, highly automated solution for scheduling and rights management. It’s unique in its ability to distribute catch-up and library content across multiple VOD platforms based on simple rules.

Movida helps its customers to reach a wider audience, and generate more revenue from their content rights without increasing the size of their editorial team.

“We started our company two and a half years ago.” says Bastian Manintveld, Founder of BeBanjo. “Today our software is used to help manage some of Europe’s most important on-demand services for clients such as BSkyB, Channel Five, TV Numeric and Telefonica. We are aiming to build the world’s best back-office for teams managing video-on-demand services and hope that this positive response from the industry will reflect equally well on our future products ”

“This kind of recognition is very encouraging to us” says Jorge Gomez Sancha, Founder of BeBanjo. We’re very proud that after winning an award for our first product, Sequence, we’ve won an award this year for our second product, Movida. ”

About BeBanjo

BeBanjo is a software company focussed on building the world best back-office for teams managing video-on-demand services. BeBanjo was founded in 2008 by Bastian Manintveld and Jorge Gomez Sancha and is headquartered in Madrid, Spain.

For more information: http://bebanjo.com

About Streaming Media Europe

Streaming Media Europe is the largest dedicated event for businesses harnessing the power of streaming video, audio and multimedia on the Internet in Europe. Streaming Media Europe is the longest running, largest and most prestigious event focused on the streaming media industry in Europe.

Press contact:

Bastian Manintveld

+34 91 458 3737 -  pr@bebanjo.com

It is a very simple thing, really. Just a form with a button. Here’s how it looked like in our prototype:

Of course it’s ugly, that’s what prototypes are for.

Our workflow when creating a new feature is pretty straightforward. We first agree on the functionality, and then create a working (and usually very crude) prototype. While this prototype is being coded, we take out our crayons and start playing with the look and feel of the feature.

Let’s make it nice

There’s only so much stuff you can do with a form.

On the other hand, we are fans of time-boxing and usually allocate a fixed amount of time for developing a new feature. This “we have a lot of time for this small thing” approach allowed us to spend some quality time with input fields, thinking how we’d like them to look like if they didn’t look like they look like by default.

Here’s our first approach:

And this is how they looked like in place (I like to start coding HTML pretty early in the design process, so I can see whether my ideas actually work in a browser):

Once our text fields were looking nice, it was time to think about the behaviour of the form.

Make mine fast, please

A beautiful application is useless if it does not help the user work better, faster and smarter. So we spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about the small details that make or break the functionality.

For this form, our main focus was “speed”. When you are assigned the daunting task of adding two hundred series to the application, the last thing you want to deal with is a pretty form that gets in your way.

So, we concentrated on these points:

Keyboard friendlyness

You should be able to complete the task of adding series without reaching for your mouse.

Progressive disclosure & flow

When creating a series, you may want to add the episodes for that series. But not always. That’s why we hide the fields for the episodes unless you select a checkbox:

The checkbox is selected when you tab out of the previous field, so the flow is not interrupted (bonus point: hitting ‘space’ to check the checkbox will take you to the first Episode field)

Another little tidbit: you can save a new series and inmediately create another.

Be as smart as possible, but not smarter

Adding some intelligence to your form can save you a lot of time, but not if you end up building another Clippy.

One of the features in this form is the pseudo intelligent prefill we added to External ID fields (an External ID is some unique identification for an item in our system).

These IDs are usually sequential, so when you fill one, the next External ID field is automagically prefilled with the most probable next ID:

(Bonus points: it works with letters too!)

By the way, External IDs are completely optional. If you don’t add an External ID to the series, the episodes won’t even display that field.

The finished form

And where is this love you talk about in the title?

The amount of work required to turn a prototype-level thingie into a completely functional and helpful feature grows exponentially with the amount of polish you want in it.

There is only one way (that I know of) to accomplish this while not jumping out the window: love.

This is what I posted on Campfire (the chat we use at BeBanjo for work-related stuff) this morning:

I really wish every web developer out there poured so much love into every form as we did with this one.

We’re well on our way to create the best video-on-demand back office in the world right now! With our current customers our products are now used to put out VOD and Catch-up services to a wide range of platforms in Europe such as: IPTV, Over the Top, XBOX360, PS3, DTT, Internet-TV, Cable, mobile, etc.

Using the API’s we’re now integrating our products with a variety of systems for playout, asset management, rights management, MAM/DAM and media workflow. More info here: http://wiki.github.com/bebanjo/almodovar/

This year we’ve been been nominated again for StreamingMedia’s annual Readers Choice awards, and we need your help to win!

Movida

We’re especially keen to make people aware of our new product called Movida. Movida is the best solution in the market for rights management, metadata and scheduling across multiple on-demand services and platforms. Specifically it’s great  and very efficient at so called catch-up scheduling.

Voting

Now on to the logistics of voting. It only takes 2 minutes of your time. There are three steps:

1. Go to: http://www.streamingmediaglobal.com/ReadersChoice

2. Fill in your name and email address

3. Vote for us. We’re nominated in the following two categories, and you can vote for us in each:

• Server Hardware/Software:  Sequence
• TV over IP Solution:                Movida

You don’t have to vote for any of the other categories unless you want to.

Your vote really helps us to get the message out that BeBanjo creates the best Video-On-Demand back office in the world! With your help we can win again this year.

Thank you!

It couldn’t be just any designer – it had to be someone with the potential to take BeBanjo to the next level through Design, in particular through our products, but in general through applying design principles to anything we do, whether it is for our customers, for our friends or for ourselves. Last but not least, it would have to be someone with the design chops to live up to and continue the amazing work that our friends at Vostok have done with Sequence and our website and logos.

After many moons searching and discarding, many moons of scratching our foreheads wondering if we would ever find THE ONE, if he really did exist or if the oracle was pulling our leg when she said that he would be able to bend reality… we are incredibly pleased to announce that Alejandro Muñoz (a.k.a. @bomberstudios) has joined BeBanjo.

We knew Ale well already; him and us had worked together already as The Catacrockers for the 2009 Rails Rumble making it to the 12th place in 48 hours with our Diversion App, a git powered text editing and collaborating tool. The amazing thing is that every time we daydreamed about who would be great for BeBanjo, Ale was there at the top of our very short list. We think we are incredibly fortunate, and we can’t wait to see what we are able to produce in the coming weeks and months.

Ale comes from The Cocktail, easily the leading web design and development boutique in Spain. He is also well known in the community through his Sofá Naranja blog, and through Orange Commands, an open repository of custom made Adobe Fireworks scripts, a tribute to his wizard-level skills with Fireworks.

Welcome to the team, Ale.

Look at him go! He is so good, he doesn't need to look at the screen...