Sync Selected Songs - Multiple Users

Question

Hi Guys,
We have three Ipods (2 Nanos, and a Shuffle) that sync to our library. All are set to sync only selected songs.
Every time one user selects their songs, and syncs, the next user will see the same selections for the previous user. Basically, each user's selections are saved globally, rather than for each Ipod.
Is there a way to save the selection lists independantly for each user? This way, each person will not override the other, and have to reset their selection list each time.
Thanks in advance,
John

Answer 1

Are you syncing by checking and unchecking songs? Using unchecking to manage an iPod is an option (and works fine when you are working with a small number of specialised tracks such as Christmas songs that you want to keep off the iPod during the year for example) but only if you can live with the other things unchecking does:
Unchecking is not selective, an item is either checked or it's not so it affects all the playlists an item might appear in.
Unchecked songs will be skipped when playing songs from the library or a selection. They will only play when individually clicked on.
Smart Playlists have an option that unchecked songs won't appear.
Unchecked songs will not be burned to CD.
Genius and iTunesDJ will not use the songs that are unchecked.
Basically unchecking is a way of telling iTunes to ignore the item and exclude it from other automatic features.
Another method you can use to auto-sync your iPods with iTunes is "Sync Music - Selected Playlists". Syncing selected playlists is just like syncing your whole library only on a smaller scale and more "selectively". This is particularly useful when your library is larger than the capacity of your iPod. When your iPod is is set to sync selected playlists it automatically picks up any changes you made to that playlist in iTunes since you last connected. Anything you added to the playlist will be added to the iPod, anything you deleted from it will be deleted from the iPod. In other words the iTunes playlist and the iPod are kept "in sync".
Open iTunes and create a playlist to update each iPod from, call them -iPod1, -iPod2, -iPod3 for example (the dash will position it at the top of the playlists in Sources). Drag whatever content you want to have into the playlist. Now connect the first iPod and when it appears in the Source list click on the iPod icon to bring up the preference tabs in the main pane. Go to the Music tab and choose Sync Music and the Selected playlists radio button. Choose the playlist you made for this iPod from the selection and click Apply. Repeat the process for each of the other iPods in turn.: Syncing Music to iPod