Making Gemstone a little more like Phoenix 2

[brewston]

Sorry if this is a noob question

I'm using P2 and love it but given that those STV guys (apart from Stuckless) are no longer around, I'm taking a look at Gemstone

So far, it looks similar to the default STV - how do I go about customising it ? The things I'd like the emulate from P2 are :

1) A simple vertical menu like this :

[Live TV]
[Recorded TV] -> Showing fanart per show
[Program Guide]

2) The FF feature of P2, when up arrow is pressed, I see scenes from the video and can just jump to the scene I want

Thanks

[stuckless]

Originally Posted by brewston

Sorry if this is a noob question

I'm using P2 and love it but given that those STV guys (apart from Stuckless) are no longer around, I'm taking a look at Gemstone

So far, it looks similar to the default STV - how do I go about customising it ? The things I'd like the emulate from P2 are :

1) A simple vertical menu like this :

[Live TV]
[Recorded TV] -> Showing fanart per show
[Program Guide]

2) The FF feature of P2, when up arrow is pressed, I see scenes from the video and can just jump to the scene I want

Thanks

Gemstone has a built in Menu Manager... So I would think you can make the menus (and submenus) be anything you want.

I don't know if Gemstone supports the UP Key showing thumbnails... I do recall that being something done at the STV level, but, there are Phoenix APIs that feed it the frames, etc.

[jusjoken]

Originally Posted by stuckless

Gemstone has a built in Menu Manager... So I would think you can make the menus (and submenus) be anything you want.

On the main menu press Options and then select Menu Manager. This is basically the ADM plugin added into Gemstone. It is VERY customizable.

Originally Posted by stuckless

I don't know if Gemstone supports the UP Key showing thumbnails... I do recall that being something done at the STV level, but, there are Phoenix APIs that feed it the frames, etc.

This was a feature in P2 that we always wanted to STEAL but felt that there should be some things unique to each STV option and it would not be right to STEAL that major creative feature.

Now that we know P2 is not moving forward and hopefully many P2 users will move to Gemstone then why not ADD that in....shouldn't be too difficult to do so I will add it to my list of TODOs.

k

[brewston]

Thanks guys - it was the options button I forgot about (Having not done any Sage customisation for a long time)

Looks like I've got lots of playing around to do here

[rnadeau]

I would also like to see the P2 feature to see frames to ff to.

[jusjoken]

I am working on the next release which will be Gemstone2 so keep the suggestions flowing...

But to be clear, the plan so far is to make Gemstone2 a SageTV 9+ STV so it will not be backwards compatible with SageTV 7. I may consider duplicating my efforts and updating both the old and new versions if a full installer for the OS version takes too long (haven't heard much on that front in a while) but I prefer to spend my time on the version 9 compatible Gemstone2 and not refit the old gemstone.


k

[mechling-burgh]

I guess my question is what has been added to Sage 9 to keep it from being backwards compatible to Sage 7. I have no problems with this just wondering.

[Monedeath]

Originally Posted by mechling-burgh

I guess my question is what has been added to Sage 9 to keep it from being backwards compatible to Sage 7. I have no problems with this just wondering.

There have been API changes, the one most relevant to a STVI that comes to mind immediately is the addition of APIs for tuner merit from within SageTV. I imagine there are some other STVI items as well.

[jusjoken]

Originally Posted by mechling-burgh

I guess my question is what has been added to Sage 9 to keep it from being backwards compatible to Sage 7. I have no problems with this just wondering.

Gemstone and Gemstone2 are designed as STV replacements, however, they are still built on top of the SageTV STV in order to make them as compatible with other plugins as possible.


Therefore Gemstone2 has been built and will continue to have its base as the v9 SageTV STV which now has v9 specific features. In theory other plugins written for v7 will continue to work with Gemstone2 as long as they hook into places that have not changed...only time and testing will tell.


This also gives us the ability to leverage other OS changes that may be on the horizon as I am sure there will be plenty.


k

[mechling-burgh]

Thanks that make a lot of sense.

[rnadeau]

I would love to be able to use the weather radar display that is available in the default stv.

[jusjoken]

I will add it to the list

k