The main player screen has two modes:
which provide different controls for navigating with an audio selection (described below). You can switch between the modes by swiping up or down on the bottom two-thirds of the left edge of the player screen. There are three small, faint horizontal bars to identify the area.
Driving Mode provides an easier/safer way to pause or skip forward/backward while in the car. While in Driving Mode, tap on the cover image to play/pause, and swipe left or right to skip forward or backward. The default skip value is 30 seconds for both directions, but this can be configured in the Preferences area.
The two round sets of skip buttons allow you to move forward or backward by fixed increments, in either seconds or minutes. The top set of buttons skips by seconds, and the bottom is skip-by-minutes, indicated by a red background and a red clock hand.
The skip button values can be changed in the Preferences area. You can change the seconds and minutes of each button from 1-99. You can also change the sec/min label suffix (for example, to "s" and "m").
The Part Selector shows a title listing of episodes available for the selected podcast. Simply tap on a episode title to start playing that item.
"What do the little symbols mean that I see on the left of the Part Selector items?"
There can be one or two symbols on the left side. The upper symbol denotes the play status of the audio: a red circle means the episode has not been played or marked as seen, a blue and white pie shape shows how much of the audio has been played, and a black circle indicates the episode was completed. The lower symbol denotes the download status of the audio file: A miniature download symbol (arrow pointing down) means the audio file is currently being downloaded, a paper/file symbol means the audio file is available to play.
Swipe left or right in the upper title area to go to the next/previous part. Double-tap the title area to go to the detailed episode listing. There you can do things like view podcast or episode information, download files, change titles and artwork, and delete files.
On the iPad, the speed controls can be found in the lower right area of the Control Panel. Tap on the rabbit to increase the playback rate, and the turtle to decrease it.
The values for the speed controls are: 0.6x, 0.7x, 0.8x, 0.9x, 0.95x, 1.0x, 1.1x, 1.25x, 1.5x, 1.75x, 2.0x.
The sleep timer will stop the audio, and create bookmarks at the beginning and end of the sleep time period. You can add time to the sleep timer any time the sleep timer is operating, and up to a minute after it expires, by skaking the device.
The Sleep Timer must be enabled in the Preferences before first use.
You can also adjust some of the default settings for the sleep timer in the App Preferences.
To start/stop or adjust the Sleep Timer, tap on the big Sleep Timer button in the control panel.
In addition to setting a specific time, you can have the sleep timer expire at the end of the current episode.