Future of MyMovies and alternatives in SMM

[PLUCKYHD]

Just on FYI if you are wanting to use SMM but use a linux or mac platform or simply don't like mymovies and their collection manager there is another option coming. As of this point I don't know where future development will fully be focused as the MyMovies guys have ignored my last 6 emails and instant message request (been trying for about 2 months). I don't feel they are fully supporting me like they should. I have made them money of this project (I know lots of you have paid) and I make nothing so their responses or lack there of are not acceptable to me. I have also seen several complaints on this board and in private emails about their lack of support on their own forums to paid users and that is 100% not acceptable to me.

MyMovies has a great product, but to get all the features it is also not a free product. I feel they should support their pay users (and also their third party developers) more than they do. I feel I go above and beyond what is required/requested for user request and support in my projects. I feel any company I am supporting or backing should do the same. (Shout out again to the great team at SageTV!! )

To that end as long as they keep open my api access (I don't see why they wouldn't) the mymovies features you have today will still continue to work without issue as well as I will bug fix issues as they arise.

There will also be a new option coming which is 100% free for users and I feel offers all of the features of mymovies and more. This option will be linux and in the future mac compatible option as well. My main reason for supporting mymovies was their great feature set and capabilities of their collection manager. (offline disc, boxed sets, filters, automated ripping, whs add in, multi disc etc etc). I feel the new implementation will offer the same feature sets with better user and developer support.

I hope you guys understand and support me as I add support for this new option. Again I will still fully support the MyMovies features you have today and bug fix issues as they arise. I realize some of you threw money at MyMovies due to my work and I will not leave you out to dry.


Also the new provider supports individual tv rips and tv metadata as well!!!
cheers

pluckyhd

[dbone1026]

Thanks for filling everyone in Plucky. MyMovies does not have the best reputation for support on their forums.

Regarding alternative support, do you know yet in what format/naming the metadata/fanart will be (i.e. will it be the same naming as the current MyMovies metadata which I believe is mymovies.xml, mymovies-front.jpg and backdrop.jpg, or something like that)?

[emotionnotion]

Hey Plucky,

I think the combination of SMM and Ortus along with the new HD300 is a threat to the Windows media centre community.

I am surprised they have taken this stance (I have found Brian Binnerup to be responsive as a paid MyMovies customer) but clearly something has changed recently.

I think the SMM experience is far superior to the Windows Media Center experience and the extender is better too; look forward to a new metadata backend.

I suppose as long as you have already documented your DVD library through MyMovies and the API remains open, who cares?

[dbone1026]

Originally Posted by emotionnotion

Hey Plucky,

I think the combination of SMM and Ortus along with the new HD300 is a threat to the Windows media centre community.

I am surprised they have taken this stance (I have found Brian Binnerup to be responsive as a paid MyMovies customer) but clearly something has changed recently.

I think the SMM experience is far superior to the Windows Media Center experience and the extender is better too; look forward to a new metadata backend.

I suppose as long as you have already documented your DVD library through MyMovies and the API remains open, who cares?

Keep in mind that MyMovies does not necessarily represent the WMC community. I would bet that Media Browser makes up a muck larger percentage of WMC users then does MyMovies

[ohpleaseno]

you've been working on this project for over 6 months, right? I feel bad for all that work you put in to this and them not responding to your requests.

[PLUCKYHD]

Originally Posted by ohpleaseno

you've been working on this project for over 6 months, right? I feel bad for all that work you put in to this and them not responding to your requests.

Try 10 months

[PLUCKYHD]

Originally Posted by emotionnotion

I think the SMM experience is far superior to the Windows Media Center experience and the extender is better too; look forward to a new metadata backend.

I suppose as long as you have already documented your DVD library through MyMovies and the API remains open, who cares?

Thanks for the kind words it has been a labor but the results have been great I think.

And correct as long as they don't kill my api access all is well. I don't know why they would but can't guarantee it because it isn't mine to control.

Thanks for the support.

[madpoet]

You certainly made them money off of me... I would hope they would treat you better The results have been great, and I look forward to whatever else comes down the pipe. Will you be rolling your new tv epidsode features into the new effort or will we see it sooner?

[Brent]

Is there anything we can do to help get their attention for you?

[PLUCKYHD]

Originally Posted by Brent

Is there anything we can do to help get their attention for you?

No but thank you. I don't feel that should be needed.

[APorter]

As a Media Browser user, your SMM was the main reason I ordered a HD300 instead of building a mini-HTPC. I don't know much about Linux, so I hope there is still a way to use SMM without My Movies for us Win7 and/or WHS users.

Will My Movies still be needed if using Phoenix or BMT?

Will SMM every use fanart/backdrops/metadata already stored in movie folder pulled from another source (Metabrowser)?

[PLUCKYHD]

Originally Posted by APorter

As a Media Browser user, your SMM was the main reason I ordered a HD300 instead of building a mini-HTPC. I don't know much about Linux, so I hope there is still a way to use SMM without My Movies for us Win7 and/or WHS users.

Will My Movies still be needed if using Phoenix or BMT?

Will SMM every use fanart/backdrops/metadata already stored in movie folder pulled from another source (Metabrowser)?

I will get everyone the information they need as far as fanart is concerned.

This option will also work on windows/whs as well I was just stating it was also linux compatible as well as windows where mymovies is not.

Also as stated as long as they don't kill my api access MyMovies will still work as is as well.

[tonysathre]

Sorry to hear that Plucky. It's a shame.

There will also be a new option coming which is 100% free for users and I feel offers all of the features of mymovies and more.

Could you elaborate on this a little?

Tony

[PLUCKYHD]

Originally Posted by tonysathre

Sorry to hear that Plucky. It's a shame.



Could you elaborate on this a little?

Tony

Not just yet. I am working to make sure everything fits the bill before announcing any details. All I can say is it is a known scraper and i have been told it remain 100% free. I not to keen on making someone else money again.

[Ericft]

any chance that this new method will have some sort of autorip bluray/dvd process such as the anydvd/my movies combo on the WHS?

[dbone1026]

Originally Posted by Ericft

any chance that this new method will have some sort of autorip bluray/dvd process such as the anydvd/my movies combo on the WHS?

Man you guys are really digging for info It is highly doubtful that whatever Plucky is exploring will have the WHS capabilities of MyMovies. Right now I don't know of any other scraper/metadata management software that is integrated into WHS like MyMovies (not saying it can't be done, but MyMovies is it for WHS right now, at least via the console)

[PLUCKYHD]

To answer a couple of questions

1. Linux support is probably about 3 months out currently (but I might be that far out myself on sagetv support)
2. There is automated ripping.
3. There is currently no plans for a whs console version although it will run on the whs and auto rip just won't have it in the console
4. There will be a Vail console version.

cheers

[Ericft]

awesome!!! can't wait...the only reason i still have my ripped videos on my WHS box streamed to my Win7 sagetv server is the auto rip function and my movies...would love to use the win7 machine alone with the videos ripped to my attached raid enclosure to speed up delivery to extenders...this will be great...

[samgreco]

You had me at TV Rips and TV Metadata

[stanger89]

First off, great work, and it's a shame you're not getting the level of support you should be, developers just shouldn't be ignored, even if the response is nothing more than "I can no longer help."

Alright, now, apparently I can't break my job thought process, what throwing rocks at things and trying to break them (not literally of course, though that would be fun ), so here goes.

I've had a "concern" shall we say for a quite a while now about the (potential) fragmentation in the community between various customizations/plugins. The first one was SageMC, which was/is an awesome thing but not what everyone wants, which isn't a problem in and of itself, except a lot of plugins became available for it that didn't ever make it to the stock STV.

Now I think we're seeing the same thing with Ortus, Phoenix (BMT/Sage native DB) and SMM. We've now got 3 separate, distinct, and AFAIK somewhat incompatible (or at least non-interoperable) metadata schemes going on. SMM uses MM for it's database and AFAIK Ortus uses a database separate from Sage, while Phoenix uses (entirely?) SageTV's built in database, at least for the storage of metadata.

I guess what I'm getting at, is it sounds like you're thinking of making a MyMovies Collection Manager replacement, ie a Metadata management/database, and metadata source engine. Have you given any thought to getting together with Phoenix or Ortus and collaborating on a "common" solution?

For example I'm think if you were to use Phoenix's metadata APIs, your manager would work with the stock STV, Phoenix, and SMM (maybe even Ortus). To put it another way, I think we can't have enough metadata collection options, and we probably can't have enough UI's, but I "worry" about confusion and fragementation if we have lots of different, and not-compatible ways of storing metadata.

Don't get me wrong, all the development going on with V7 now is very exciting, it's awesome. Everything going on with SMM, Ortus, Phoenix, is amazing, and you guys in may ways "show up" SageTV (no offense to Jeff and the gang ) with what you're doing. Of course maybe that's Sage's master plan, to create a foundation for development as much as a product itself.

Now, if I'm completely off base, just give me a smack