Is an iPod may be on your shopping list for this holiday season, or perhaps on the wish list you're submitting to Santa? As part of my series on iPods, this article will tell you some things about iTunes. I'll explain about setting up playlists, using the Jukebox, getting music from your CDs into iTunes, making iTunes accessible if you need those features, and using the iTunes store.

One thing this article won't cover is how to work with iTunes when you have more than one iPod in the family. That topic will get a separate post of its own later in the series. Other topics coming later include using an iPod in your car, iPod accessories, and finding free music for your iPod.

If you're still trying to make a decision about which iPod to buy, see Planning Ahead for Christmas: Which iPod is Right for You?

You can use all the iTunes features even if you don't own an iPod. But if you have an iPod, you must use iTunes as the bridge between the iPod and your Library on the computer. If you don't already have it, the first step is to get iTunes. You can download it free from Apple.com for either a PC or a Mac.

When you have a new iTunes install, it's a good idea to open Preferences and choose font sizes and other options. If you have any vision issues, there's a great article listed in the resources at the end that will walk you through making iTunes more accessible using the Preferences.

When iTunes is installed on your computer, open it up. By default, it opens first to a view of your Library of music. The Library also includes Movies, TV Shows, Podcasts, Radio, Ringtones and other items.

The previous image shows my Music Library. The music library is called the Jukebox. Just double click a song to play it.

Everything about the view in the iTunes Library Music category is customizable. Clicking column heads will organize music by artist, album, or genre. You can search for songs or artists or albums using the search feature in the upper right. Using the View options in the upper right near the search box, you can change the way you view the albums and music in your Library. In the next image, you see the view called Cover Flow, which lets you flip through your albums and pick the one you want to hear. I suggest you click around and try everything about View to find the way that appeals to you.

You can click through the menu items on the left sidebar to view and select from your movies, TV shows, and podcasts in the same way. (I'll explain where these things come from in a bit.) Everything under the Library category is stored on your computer. If you move down the menu on the left a bit you see the category Store. Here your choices are iTunes Store or Purchased. Purchased items are saved on your computer and are yours to use. They are no longer part of the iTunes store, so I don't know why this listed is under Store, but it is. If you click iTunes Store, you go online to browse the store. Here's an image of the iTunes store.

The front page of the iTunes store is a long scroll and shows links to music, video, books, movie rentals, podcasts, apps, and everything else you can get from iTunes. (If you scroll all the way down to the bottom, you will find some free items.) Back up at the top left, you see the main categories of things to get at iTunes in the small menu shown next.

Let's look first at some of the wonderful stuff you can get free. One of those wonderful free things is an education. Click iTunesU in the menu and you find a vast array of free courses you can download from places like Yale, Georgia State, and Stanford. The image below shows some courses available from Cambridge, Emory and UCDavis.

The Podcasts are usually free as well. In the podcast section you can subscribe to literally thousands of podcasts. These might be radio programs or programs from the BBC, Comedy Central, NPR, The Onion, Fox, ESPN, Disney, and lots of indie productions. You simply find a program you like, click through to its individual page listing, and click Subscribe. Each new podcast will automatically download to your iTunes each time you open iTunes. You can synch podcasts to your iPod as well.

As an aside, if you are producing a podcast or video podcast for your blog, you need to consider getting it included for subscribers at iTunes, as Serious Eats does. You'll find information about how to do this at the iTunes Store in the Podcast section. Near the bottom of the left menu there's a Submit a Podcast link that will get you started.

I suggest you really explore the menu at the iTunes Store and look at everything offered. There's always something free in every section. Each week the free things change, so if you keep up with the freebies, you can amass an interesting Library for free.

Are ready to make a purchase? How about some new music? You simply click through until you reach a page showing the individual item you want, such as the album shown in the next image.

You can buy the whole album, usually for $9.99. Or you can buy individual songs for $0.99. Double click a song title to hear a sample. When you click Buy the first time, you will be asked to create an account and provide your credit card info. Then the music downloads to your computer within a few minutes. It is stored in your iTunes, but you can also burn it to a CD and transfer it onto your iPod. You can legally make several copies of any music you pay for on iTunes. It used to be 3 copies, but I think that number went up to 5. I cannot find an exact number at Apple support, but I feel safe in saying you can't legally burn 40 copies of a CD for office Christmas presents.

OK, the iTunes Store is impressive, but let's get back to the personal iTunes installation on your computer. To leave the iTunes store, just click anything on the menu at the left, say perhaps, Music, and you're back to your own machine.

If you want to import music from your CD collection to listen to in iTunes or with your iPod, just insert a CD in your computer. iTunes will recognize that you have inserted a CD and ask you if you want to import it to your iTunes Library.

You may want to do a little work before you click the Import button, because sometimes iTunes doesn't get all the information it needs from a CD. If it does, you're good to go, but it if doesn't here's what to do.

It may not give the artist's name, the album name or the specific track names. This can be added manually for the CD. You'll see the CD added to the items in the menu on the sidebar. Click it. Select the first song, which may just show up as Track 1, and from the File menu choose Get Info. (This might say Properties on a PC, Get Info is a Mac term.) You are looking for a screen like the one shown in the next image.

Type the correct information in each field that you want filled in. Then click the Next button at the bottom of the window to move to the next song. It should be faster typing after the first song, because iTunes will automatically fill in things when it recognizes the first few letters of what you type. When you're finished, click OK. Then you are ready to import the CD. Just click the Import button. When it is saved into your iTunes Library, song titles, artist's names and whatever else you wanted will be listed properly.

What if you want to do the reverse? What if you want to take songs from iTunes and put them on a CD? First create a Playlist. To create a Playlist, click the plus sign icon at the lower left of the window.

An "untitled playlist" will appear in the left column under the Playlist category. Type the title you want there, and press Enter (or Return). Highlight the songs in your music library that you want on the playlist and drag them over to the name of the playlist in the menu sidebar. Drop them there. The original songs are still in your library, but you see them in the playlist, too. (If you want to delete the playlist after you've made the CD, the original songs will still be in your library. Only the playlist will go away.)

Insert a blank CD into your computer, select the playlist you want to burn, and click the Burn Disc button at the lower right in the iTunes window.

Of course, you can create a Playlist for reasons other than to burn a CD. You might want Playlists for different purposes: parties, kids, gym, easy listening, hard rock, etc. Once you have songs isolated into a playlist you can play songs with iTunes (or your iPod) just from that list. A Playlist for every mood is my philosophy.

The latest version of iTunes has a new feature called Genius. This will create a playlist for you based on a song of your choosing. Pick a song, click the Genius button, and iTunes generates a playlist of songs from your library that go great with it. If you get a really good playlist from Genius, you can save it for future use. To use Genius, you must turn it on. It's in the Store pulldown menu in the menu bar at the top of your screen. It's in the Store menu for a reason. Apple will send you recommendations for what you might like from the store based on your Library and your Genius playlists. Don't turn it on unless you like getting tips like that.

If you have a favorite tip or trick for using iTunes, please feel free to share.

Resources
- Apple provides a series of movies of iTunes tutorials that are worth watching if you are new to iTunes. Or even if you're not.
- Make iTunes Easier To See and Use from Ricky at ATMac provides all sorts of tips for working with iTunes if you have low vision or reading problems.

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Virginia DeBolt
BlogHer Technology Contributing Editor
Web Teacher
First 50 Words