WHS Login Needed For Netflix SageMC Import Usage

[voorhees]

OK, I finally got the new version of the Netflix import with the Silverlight option up and running on my WHS system. Thanks so much for all of the hard work put into the new version.

I can watch movies and everything seems to work fine. However, if I restart my server or it gets restarted from MS updates (i.e. Power Pack 2 last week), once I try to play a movie with Netflix I get a black screen. However, once I remote login to the server with LogMeIn, it works fine. I can then disconnect from LogMeIn and everything continues to work fine. It appears that the Netflix import, SageMC, SageTV, and/or WHS needs to have someone login once for the import to work. Is there any way use the Netflix import with Silverlight once the WHS server restarts without having to manually remote login? Should one of the processes be run as a certain user to avoid this problem?

Thank you very much in advance for any help.

[gplasky]

You have to have it login as a user for the Netflix plugin to work. Google for various ways to have WHS auto-login as a user. Also when running SagetV as a servcie and using Netflix check the box on the servcie so it can interact with the desktop.

Gerry

[voorhees]

Gerry,

Thanks so much for the reply.

I do have the check box for "Allow service to interact with desktop" checked. Which is under "Log on as:" "Local System account."

If SageTV is supposed to login as a user, then it looks like you can not check "Allow service to interact with desktop." Is that correct?

Or, is Netflix supposed to auto-login?

Still a little confused. Thanks.

[voorhees]

Gerry,

To clarify, my Netflix plugin works fine once I login to the server after a reboot with the server set to "Log on as: Local System account." But, it will not work until I login after a reboot, I just get a black screen.

I tried to set the SageTV service to run as one of my user accounts, but it would not start and locked up the console. Also, the check box for "Allow service to interact with desktop" is gray out if you use a user account.

Like I mentioned, I am very confused. I will keep playing around and searching, but any additional guidance would be great.

[gplasky]

You need to leave it as Local System Account. You need to leave the checkbox checked for Interact with desktop. You need to get Windows (WHS) to auto login as a user. Like I said Google the net or search the forum. When you get Windows to autologin as a user then you will see the desktop after a reboot and NOT the dialog box to login.


Gerry

[voorhees]

Gerry,

Thanks for clearing that up. I was just a little confused by your statment "You have to have it login as a user for the Netflix plugin to work" since my plugin worked and I was not sure what "it" was. I did find a few different folks on the web talking about serveral different ways to have Windows login as a user. I will give them a try this weekend.

Thanks again for the help.

[voorhees]

I have been working on this for many hours, and really have no idea what is going on.

I tried and tried to get a non-administrator account to autologon, but it would never actually do it. I created a new account in the admin group and that auto logged on, but gave me new errors when I tried to run Netflix through the console or Sage. The errors where either ActiveX disabled or Java Script disabled. I got the ActiveX one when logged into WHS trough either RDC or LogMeIn and when I tried to play Netflix movies through IE/Silverlight. I got the Java Script one when I went through Sage and the Netflix import. I have check and checked and checked, and Java Script support and ActiveX support is enabled. i now get this behavior no matter what. I can not even get back to my previous state.

As part of the process I was at times using the program Autologon for Windows v2.10 to setup the autologon. However, now I am unable to even run the program after I used an autologon account in the admin group (see error). How is this possible when I am logged is as the Administrator. That seems real bad...

I am really hopping I do not need to reinstall the server. HELP...please...

[voorhees]

Well, I played around a little more and discovered that I can not run any install files logged in as administrator any more. Any ideas how I get true admin privileges back in my WHS admin account.

Thanks.

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by voorhees

I have been working on this for many hours, and really have no idea what is going on.

I tried and tried to get a non-administrator account to autologon, but it would never actually do it. I created a new account in the admin group and that auto logged on, but gave me new errors when I tried to run Netflix through the console or Sage. The errors where either ActiveX disabled or Java Script disabled. I got the ActiveX one when logged into WHS trough either RDC or LogMeIn and when I tried to play Netflix movies through IE/Silverlight. I got the Java Script one when I went through Sage and the Netflix import. I have check and checked and checked, and Java Script support and ActiveX support is enabled. i now get this behavior no matter what. I can not even get back to my previous state.

As part of the process I was at times using the program Autologon for Windows v2.10 to setup the autologon. However, now I am unable to even run the program after I used an autologon account in the admin group (see error). How is this possible when I am logged is as the Administrator. That seems real bad...

I am really hopping I do not need to reinstall the server. HELP...please...

You have to understand that WHS is a server OS. And because of that security is setup much higher in IE than your normal Windows OS. Your Active X and javascript issues are a security issue within IE that must be addressed there under the IE options and the security tab.

As far as your Admin account and not being able to install programs what kind of errors are you getting? You should never make changes to the admin account regarding groups, permissions, etc. As a backup I always make a copy of the Admininistrator account and rename it. For even more security it's recommended to rename your Administrator account to something else to guard against hacks into the system.

There's no protection or rollback in a server OS. Unless you know what you changed and can undo it you may need to do a reinstall of WHS. (And all of your apps) But your data will remain intact. But you MUST choose a reinstall and NOT a new install.

Do you have any idea what all you changed? Did you change permissions to files on a group level?

Gerry

[voorhees]

Originally Posted by gplasky

Do you have any idea what all you changed? Did you change permissions to files on a group level?

As I mentioned, the only thing I changed was that I created a new account in the Administrators group to use as a test case for an auto logon account. I did not change anything in the groups or permissions. The reason I used an account in the Administrators group is because I could not get accounts in any of other groups to auto logon when SageTV launched Netflix. When I would try to launch Netflix, SageTV would show me the server desktop with an error that the account did not have Remote Terminal Services logon permissions. After the fact, I found the group permissions listing that showed that the Administrators group was the only one that had remote logon capability. I only created accounts, I never changed permissions.

That being said, after playing around for several more hours, it looks like I got everything working OK again. In the end it looks like when I tried to have the server auto logon with an Administrators account, it royally messed up IE7. This some how affected my ability to run exe files. I reinstalled IE7 (it let me run that one for some reason, but not others) and set it up, and now everything is right with the world again. It looks like the auto logon corrupted IE7 when Netflix tried to launch and that was the cause of all of my problems. I am totally stumped as to how a corrupt version of IE7 does not allow me to double-click on and run exe files, but it did. Oh well. Everything seems to be working fine again.

I will wait and see if I want to, or need to, take another run at this windmill. Thanks for your help.