Sure. Sounds interesting. Does this do just live playback or does it record as well?
Does it have any sort of commercial skipping? Skip forward/backwards or simply streaming? Do you display the long description of a show anywhere? (One of my biggest annoyance with the PS3) Thanks, Kevin On Tue, 2009-06-30 at 12:47 -0700, Thomas Hansen wrote: > I run a videolan backend with dvb transponders! > > Using standard http, rtsp and udp(multicasting) stream's. > > The plugin I use in Moovida connects to a portalserver that > distributes the channel list -and VoD list. > > This is a simple setup, and requires no special adjustments like for > the Myth protocol. > The EPG/Channel -and VoD list that the portalserver provides is a > simple XML structure and is listed in the moovida menustructure like > any of the other plugins do. > > This ofcourse requires some knowledge to vidoelan and some web > development. The moovida plugin can almost be copied from an existing > plugin with minor ajustments witch requires very little coding in > python. And then zipped to an .egg package when done. > > I can post some sketces of my platform if this is of interest to > anyone. > > --thomas > > > > On Tue, Jun 30, 2009 at 7:21 PM, Michał Sawicz <[email protected]> > wrote: > Dnia 2009-06-30, wto o godzinie 10:57 -0700, Kevin Fox pisze: > > On Tue, 2009-06-30 at 10:15 -0700, Michał Sawicz wrote: > > > Dnia 2009-06-30, wto o godzinie 16:48 +0200, David McLeod > pisze: > > <SNIP> > > > > > > Actually if LiveTV is more important than recorded shows > is debatable. > > > According to #mythtv-users most of the users set in their > MythTV setup > > > rarely use LiveTV. They have so much recordings set up > they don't have > > > the time to watch live. Of course the ability to watch a > show > > > currently > > > being recorded is needed, too. The usual PVR does never > show a > > > completely 'Live' TV. It's always a recording, just a > recording of > > > what > > > is currently broadcasted. This, in turn, allows for all > the use cases > > > you've described. > > > > This is how I use it. > > > Yeah me too, mostly. Only recently my hw got dodgy on me and > does not > record most of my schedules correctly. > > > > What we really need, IMO, is a new way to do EPG. The > stale old table > > > of > > > channels vs. time is soooo 90s. We need to leverage the > abilities > > > Moovida provides us with in terms of UX and design. I'm > not saying I > > > know what to do, I don't even have a set idea of what > could we do, I > > > just want us to brainstorm here. > > > > I usually use Myth's search feature rather then the channel > vs time for > > this. > > > Yeah search is important, but some kind of EPG could be > useful, too. > > > > Another thing is channel hierarchy. I don't think a flat > list digs it > > > now that we have hundreds if not thousands of channels > available. > > > > Again, this is one of the reasons to not bother with live > tv. What I > > want to do is watch the shows I want to watch, not "tune to > channel 107 > > at 5:30pm". You let the PVR do all of that. > > > > I think the EPG should be designed around letting you pick > what you want > > to watch. Sort by Genre of show, similar shows to what you > like, etc and > > then let you schedule recordings easily. > > > Still, most users that start with PVRs don't get it from start > so we > need to allow that, too. > > > > I > > > think the ability to arbitrarily set up a tree of channels > (where the > > > same channel can show up in different branches) would > allow for easy > > > and > > > user-defined grouping by service provider, channel type > (movies / > > > sports / news), favorites etc. > > > > I think thats probably too confining. I'd take your 90's > comment and > > apply it to channels entirely. The SciFi channel for example > plays > > science fiction and and sometimes fantasy. Say I was a Scifi > nut but > > didn't like fantasy. If the tree was more like: > > > > Sports/All > > Sports/Football > > Sports/Basketball > > Science Fiction > > Fantasy > > Drama/All > > Drama/Some kind of hospital show series > > > > Etc. > > > > I could just select based on what I liked. > > > That's why I wanted it to be completely user-defined. You want > it this > way? Good, have it your way. > > > > I know that 'Watch TV' is the usual way to start watching > - just jump > > > to > > > the last watched channel. I find myself doing that even if > I want to > > > watch something else, I then have to wait for the channel > to lock and > > > start playing before I can switch to a different channel I > actually > > > want > > > to watch. > > > > I hardly ever do that. > > > I still do, sometimes. > > > > That would, probably, be easier as the backend side of > things is > > > complete. On the other hand Myth is recently getting a > rehaul and we > > > can't be sure what will the future bring. > > > > One of my biggest complaints with them though has been how > far apart > > their stable / devel branches get. Its years before then > release. > > > > But, this means if you always target the stable release for > your client, > > your pretty safe. It is definitely not a moving target. :) > > > I may be biased, but that's just because I'm left with using > Myth even > when I don't like it. Most of the ideas they have are great, > but IMO > Myth is so big a lump it needs a rewrite. And that's what > Moovida's here > for ;P > > > > The thing to notice here is > > > that there's completely no alternative UIs for MythTV > anywhere. I > > > think > > > there's a reason. > > > > I think its because their UI is deceptively simple looking. > Once you dig > > into trying to implement it elsewhere you find a lot of > little, great > > features, that are hard to implement in whatever client your > trying to > > bind to it. > > > Deception is a good word :D > > > For example, commercial skip. I have it set on by default. > It works 9 > > times out of 10. The 10th time, I can just hit back a couple > of times or > > forward a couple of times and get past the issue. Or, I can > hit 'E', > > bring up the commercial skip list editor and fix the issue, > so next time > > I watch that recording its fixed. If I tell it to burn the > show to a > > DVD, I can have it use that same cut list that I ensured was > correct > > right in the client, and burn to the disk cropping out the > commercials. > > > Yes, editing is great, simple and effective. > > > If I'm watching a live stream, and the scheduler wants to > use the tuner, > > it prompts me if I want to let the scheduler have it. If I > don't respond > > in time, it just takes it. > > > Yeah I sometimes have problems with that, it sometimes does > not ask and > hangs the frontend. And where's the 'Record and watch as it > records' option > gone? > > > Or a big one, all the metadata related to a show. They way > they order > > things, if you have 30 different episodes of the simpsons > recorded, You > > can easily look through them, get a short/long description > and find one > > you want to watch and ignore the ones you don't. I've seen > very few > > media clients that do that well. > > > Grouping by series / season name is something we already have > and as > discussed earlier, we could easily integrate it with current > TV Show > menus. > > > > I'm also not sure about Gstreamer's ability to play / > rewind > > > files saved by MythTV, my quick tests show that playing > the file > > > directly or through a mythv:// URI does give me playback, > but > > > rewinding > > > is only possible for files that have stopped recording. > > > > We'd need to fix up gstreamers codec then. Which would be > harder, > > rewriting mythbackend from scratch, or fixing a slightly > broken > > codec? :) > > > > Also, having this codec fixed helps for other reasons. No > matter what, I > > still have lots of NUV encoded stuff laying around. > > > Yeah but it's a niche, I don't believe there's a proper > container ready > for this kind of use. > > > > > > The other method is to use Gnome DVBD, this means > providing our > > > own > > > > > code for TV streaming, interfacing with GDVBD's EPG or > using an > > > > > outside source (preferable). Also this means writing > our own code > > > > > for things like recording, schedules, expiration, ad > skipping, and > > > > > possibly alot more. > > > > I think this is pretty hard to do well. It took Myth a long > time to get > > all of that usable. > > > We can learn from them, simplify and improve even further. One > of the > most important features of Moovida is simplicity. > > > > >From discussions we already had on IRC the easiest way to > integrate > > > with > > > GDVBD would be to use UPnP. We would need to extend the > protocol but > > > that, according to Frank Scholz (d...@#elisa,#coherence), > the core > > > developer behind Coherence, should not be too difficult. > > > > This sounds like a good idea to me. It would be nice for my > PS3 as > > well. :) > > > Yeah that's an additional gain. > > > > One BIG drawback of GDVBD is that AFAIK it's currently > DVB-only, > > > -- > > Michał Sawicz <[email protected]> > >
