Does iTunes want us to delete podcasts from the list?

Question

So after the Podcasts.app for iPhone got another update today, I once again got stuck with trying to manage my Podcasts, and once again it drives me crazy.

Currently I am wondering this: In iTunes 11 there is an "Unplayed" and an "All Episodes" tab for each podcast. This would suggest that "All episodes" lists, well, all episodes, nut that actually is not the case. If you delete an episode (right click -> delete) or you have auto-delete activated for a podcasts (for example "keep only unplayed episodes"), iTunes actually deletes those episodes from the "all episodes" lists. wait... what? Yep. So "all episodes" does in fact NOT necessarily display all episodes. If you ACTUALLY want to see all episodes, you have to go to the itunes store.

The reason I am wondering about this is because I have limited hard drive space, and I wanted to activate auto-delete of podcasts and tell itunes to only keep unplayed episodes. The problem is that all played episodes disappear from my "all episodes" tab, which not only annoys me but also tickles my OCD bone in an unfriendly way.

Long story short: If you don't want to simply keep all your episodes it seems to me that the user is required to delete every episode he already listened to, which in turn makes the "all episodes" tab pretty useless and dumb. Am I correct in thinking this? Or does anyone of you actually have a nice way of managing podcasts, including the podcasts app on the iphone?

Answer 1

I've found that iTunes never reliably deletes podcast episodes. So I just delete them manually.

Answer 2

This is old, but I was trying to figure this out too and noticed that if you right click a podcast on iTunes 11, there's an option called "Show All Available Episodes" which, it seems, restores the entire list of available episodes. Silly that you have to do this (in my opinion deleting a podcast file should just restore the Download button on the side of the podcast entry, same as iTunes Match), but this at least helps to 'reset' the state of that podcast in your iTunes library.

Hope this helps.

Answer 3

Thought I would weigh in... I am running IT 11.2.2 I am using MBP 10.9.4 This may be a bit premature, but I believe I have found the solution to deleting podcasts permanently. Open Finder>>>Music>>>Itunes>>Podcasts Delete manually (not my favorite) Quit IT, Don't close it, QUIT it Close the lid on your LT (just like the toilet) Reopen LT, then iTunes The files should be gone Like I said, this may be premature, but they haven't shown up So Far So Good I am continuing to research this, and I have tried different protocols and nothing has caused the P/C to download Also to note, for anyone who has had issues with a sign in window appearing when opening IT, it asks for a U/N and P/W No, it is not a virus or someone trying to hack in In my case the website for the software was mevio.com Simply find the P/Cast that is connected to it and delete it Obviously you won't know until you find it, it is by trial and error Good Luck K

I almost forgot, Just something to make you go "Hmmmmm" When I tried to log into Apple Support Communities to spread the word, the response came back as the page could not be found and I had just been there 2 minutes prior I have tried and tried and cannot get on the site Interesting......