SageTV evolution is dead

[DFranch]

Originally Posted by briands

Anyone notice the OP posting history? Seems to pop in every 6 months or so to voice his displeasure and then disappears.

Yeah, this thread seems to be flame bait. Julianus has not made one additional comment to this thread. And the information is his post seems inaccurate at best. Apparently the only changes considered significant are UI glitz.

[scoful]

and some kids thrive on the 'bad' attention...

Wow, it's amazing how quickly a defensive thread grows, isn't it?

I've been using SageTV since version 2. It was extremely easy to set up with my PVR-150. I am sure any novice that can install a PCI card and run a setup program could have got it running with no problems.

That being said, I've been working with computers for over 25 years - professionally for nearly 20. I frequently find myself irritated by inconveniences and lack of capabilities.

I wanted to use a cable box with Sage - it supported an IR blaster. I decided I wanted tuning to be more 'reliable', so I moved to serial tuning.
I decided I wanted more accesibility, so I built a client box.
I wanted more content, so I added another PVR-150 - then another cable box and Multi-DCT tuner control.

I got an HDTV, so I expanded to Firewire control and built another client box for my basement.

Of course, I added in some great functionality provided by others - Comskip (which is probably undeniably my FAVORITE feature), OSD clock, various menu enhancements.
I even tweaked some menus, added some launchers for video games, MPAA ratings on guide/recordings description headers, etc.

Recently I updated again and found that I really needed to customize less than I had in the past.

Certainly the most tricky parts of getting Sage running has been tuner control configuration.

I recently set up Vista Media Center for a client - admittedly it was easy to do (though no more easy than Sage would have been). However; I really don't want to run Vista - especially for my Television. With the performance I have seen on a pretty good PC it would be a big step backwards from the performance I get on my current client PC's - not to mention the additional hardware investment to bring my PC's up to par for Vista.

As for the future of SageTV, I think tuner control problems will eventually disappear. If CableCard is ever allowed to be produced as a USB device, anyone should be able to set it up with multiple tuners and no hassle.

So, as I see it - you can set up Sage as easily as Media Center. You can also do a lot more if you want to, but you don't HAVE to. Most of the STVi's available for download require very little skill to install - and let's not forget - THEY'RE FREE!

And, if you really don't like something, you can do something about it!
Try that with a Microsoft product!

[gilded07]

Originally Posted by sleonard

1) The commercial skipping feature that Sage advertises is not the Comskip/Showanalyzer add-ons but the 10 second and 2 1/2 minute skip buttons that are included in the default, out-of-the-box software.

2) They are smart enough to never include the Comskip/Showanalyzer add-ins in the default install and thereby avoiding the near certain possibility of being sued out of existance by the networks

3) Your point is still valid concerning some of the other add-ins. Just not commercial skipping.

S

BeyondTV has commerical skipping, or least commercial identification, out of the box and has yet to be sued. IMO, this is a significant disadvantage for Sage. I have the comskip /dirmon 'hack' installed and it works well. However, my parents, my neighbors, and my non-technical friends will never implement sage because of the complex (in their eyes) customizations. Beyond TV has it ready to go in minutes. Its too bad because Sage has so much to offer. This functionality is such an obvious advantage; I don't understand why Sage can't step up to the plate.

[flavius]

Of course, he's a troll.

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by gilded07

BeyondTV has commerical skipping, or least commercial identification, out of the box and has yet to be sued. IMO, this is a significant disadvantage for Sage. I have the comskip /dirmon 'hack' installed and it works well. However, my parents, my neighbors, and my non-technical friends will never implement sage because of the complex (in their eyes) customizations. Beyond TV has it ready to go in minutes. Its too bad because Sage has so much to offer. This functionality is such an obvious advantage; I don't understand why Sage can't step up to the plate.

And that's a big difference because Sage can also be set to skip commercials automatically. (BTV can't)They just don't want to take the chance and end up like ReplayTV. MCE/VCE doesn't have it either. The point being those 2 programs, comskip and Showanlayzer, also allow you to tune and tweak how it works so much that for 95% of what I watch they are perfect breaks. I don't think BTV can claim that accurracy. (Unless you use those programs on it.) The 2 1/2 min skip and the 10 sec skip makes skipping a commercial a couple of button pushes away anyways for Sage out of the box.

Gerry

[bialio]

Originally Posted by flavius

Of course, he's a troll.

Trolls serve a purpose - if nothing else they build a sense of community as the faithful all rise up and bash them back into nothingness.

[Fastrack]

I gotta say I wrote my own hack of a PVR which used XMLTV & Visual Basic to create a Grid for TV Shows and used Zoom Player for playback (Back in 2003 until Apr 2006, when I wanted OTA HD)

Sage is unbelievable and if your going to rake a product over the coals like you are because of a UI that you BARELY see, so be it... Are you watching TV? Or looking at the UI?

I personally find the UI very nice and simple - VERY easy to use - running VMR9 makes it mint looking compared to anything else I've seen - maybe the original poster should be running Myth? And stuff is where you'd expect it to be. I would agree though with higher resolution HD (1280x720 and higher) we could have "more information" on the screen at any given time - multiple columns maybe. The back end of SageTV (Service) runs all the time - I constantly have 30+ days uptime and it runs without an issue.

But please go and use MCE on XP or Vista , you'll be back - maybe by v7

Happy SageTV user!

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by Fastrack

snip 8< Are you watching TV? Or looking at the UI? >8

Amen!! yes, the stock UI is very "boring", but I'm not there to play with the pretty menu, I'm here to watch TV!!! So skip the flashy CPU hogging graphics/animations and just let me watch TV!!

You have SageMC and several other UI beautification STV's (admittedly some add a lot of very useful features). For now, I'll stick with the stock UI and a few choice STVi's that give me features I want. (Comskip for stock stv, Media player Time Jump, etc)
For me, the UI is just a means to organize/select my media and I want it as unobtrusive as possible.

Myself personally I don't save a lot of content. I watch it and delete it. I do have some series archived, ones that don't re-air very often. That way I have things to watch when the writers go on strike and there's nothing new to watch.

[Addict]

Originally Posted by Fastrack

Sage is unbelievable and if your going to rake a product over the coals like you are because of a UI that you BARELY see, so be it... Are you watching TV? Or looking at the UI?

Originally Posted by waynedunham

Amen!! yes, the stock UI is very "boring", but I'm not there to play with the pretty menu, I'm here to watch TV!!! So skip the flashy CPU hogging graphics/animations and just let me watch TV!!

With respect, I have to disagree with these comments. The answer is not black and white. The answer to all of these points is "Yes". I watch TV on it. However, to get there, I use the interface...every single day, every single show I pull up.

Aside from that, which I think you guys are forgetting, is that SageTV is more (much more) than just a place to watch TV!

At a MINIMUM, we're talking about Movies, Photos, and Music! You can't possibly say the interface is irrelevant for those areas. It's crucial that the interface is fantastic for these functions.

Again, I'm not a proponent of what the initial poster said in any way (see my first response near the top of the thread). But, I do believe the interface needs an update to stay modern and compete with what's out there.

Sage is in the business of making money. First impressions are huuuuge in this industry. Someone sees a flashy feature and they jump on the product without knowing how solid it is on the back end. Sage is already solid on the back end and getting better and better every release...but I guarantee they're not getting business they should because someone finds a better looking interface elsewhere.

<shrug>

[Fastrack]

Originally Posted by Addict

With respect, I have to disagree with these comments. The answer is not black and white. The answer to all of these points is "Yes". I watch TV on it. However, to get there, I use the interface...every single day, every single show I pull up.

Aside from that, which I think you guys are forgetting, is that SageTV is more (much more) than just a place to watch TV!

At a MINIMUM, we're talking about Movies, Photos, and Music! You can't possibly say the interface is irrelevant for those areas. It's crucial that the interface is fantastic for these functions.

Again, I'm not a proponent of what the initial poster said in any way (see my first response near the top of the thread). But, I do believe the interface needs an update to stay modern and compete with what's out there.

Sage is in the business of making money. First impressions are huuuuge in this industry. Someone sees a flashy feature and they jump on the product without knowing how solid it is on the back end. Sage is already solid on the back end and getting better and better every release...but I guarantee they're not getting business they should because someone finds a better looking interface elsewhere.

<shrug>

Yes I agree with your comments - but in the last year I've been using SageTV I've seen transparent menus come about and various other features. The interface looks much slicker than it did a year ago.

The DVD & Photo browsing interface could be improved.

[CyRex]

And what about the (mostly) recent addition of animation to the menus? I think that improved the 'slickness' of the UI quite a bit.

[Fastrack]

Originally Posted by CyRex

And what about the (mostly) recent addition of animation to the menus? I think that improved the 'slickness' of the UI quite a bit.

Yep that made it much slicker!!

[stanger89]

You guys should look at the Kaleidescape UI, by many acounts the pinacle of a "media center" UI



How's that for spiffy

Disclaimer, I'm not trying to say Sage matches the functionality of K-scape, but maybe it will put the UI "flash" thing in perspective

[travisbell]

My big beef with Sage has always been the interface.

I bought a Sage license back in the v4 days and have used it on and off ever since. Here's the basic of how I feel...

Does Sage work as advertised? Yes.

Have I had a reliable and good experience with the software, support and community? Always.

Does Sage's technology always seem to just "work"? Certainly.

Is Sage one of the ugliest things around? Unfortunately, yes.

Now, one could certainly argue that in exchange for features we've been left with this pretty ugly UI. I am inclined to say that is ok, but at the end of the day, when I am showing off my spiffy new media center on my HDTV, Sage looks like an antiquated piece of a**. It's kinda like my iPhone vs. a BlackBerry. BlackBerry works sure, might even do some things better but at the end of the day, it's 2008 and we're living in a time when the user interface is arguably the very most important part of any piece of software.

Because of all this, about 4 months ago I swapped over to Vista Media Center and honestly, haven't looked back. With such a beautiful UI, WAY better music library and some great plugins (More TV & TV Collection Manager) I have no need for Sage any longer.

I've bitched about the UI on these forums before and never got much attention but it seems in this thread, there are certainly other users who, like me, think Sage is in need for a major visual overhaul. Lets put it this way, I remember using Meedio wayyyyy back in the day and Meedio, in 2004, looked better than Sage does today.

Sage devs, put some time into your UI already! Your product rocks in every other way!!

[sainswor99]

Originally Posted by stanger89

You guys should look at the Kaleidescape UI, by many acounts the pinacle of a "media center" UI



How's that for spiffy

Disclaimer, I'm not trying to say Sage matches the functionality of K-scape, but maybe it will put the UI "flash" thing in perspective

Ooooh, classic strawman argument. Pick the one ugly screen and ignore the kaleidoscopic effect of the related DVD titles. Nice.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by sainswor99

Ooooh, classic strawman argument. Pick the one ugly screen and ignore the kaleidoscopic effect of the related DVD titles. Nice.

Not at all, like I said, I was making no claims that Sage comes close to K-scape on features, but the basic gist of this thread is that the Sage UI isn't "spiffy". It doesn't look flashy like appleTV or Vista MC, it doesn't have the fancy glassy graphics, or things like that.

The bulk of the discussion about the Sage UI lately (past couple days) has been on aesthetics, and no Sage is no AppleTV/VMC. But probably the best media system out there has a UI that's far less flashy than Sage's.

Yes, I agree the kaleidescope similar movies view blows everything away on a functional level, but aesthetically it's not really anything different than the current Sage video library (grid of covers).

To sum up my point in one sentence:

I'd take a K-scape over an AppleTV any day, despite the AppleTV UI being a 1000x more flashy.

[bastafidli]

You know, the funny thing about this discussion is that the UI is probably the easiest thing to fix. Much easier than to add the functionality that Sage already has and is already doing so well. Seems like Sage team is very responsive towards bug fixes and backend functionality but no so much regarding the UI.

Sage has a great flexibility, it even has a way to design new themes or new STVs.
There are tons of ui designers out there available for hire or maybe willing to take a chance to win some cash reward for designing the best UI for the best media center application out there. Sage can either decide to hire somebody to do such design or start a design competition or users can start such competition themself.

I would be willing to contribute some $$ towards reward for the best (looking/usable) media center UI for SageTV under condition that at the end it would be freely distributable and fully open sourced. We could discuss and prioritize the requirements/criteria/wishes here on the forum, to help the designers to understand what we Sage users want and then vote for the winner.

[MeInMaui]

Well, I think I'll chime in here. In general, I don't have any real problems with the default UI organization. My main concern/problem with the default UI is that they try to cram just a bit too much in each screen. By this I mean that there are:

1. Too many functions/options/choices on each screen.

Only the basic functions required to do the primary task should be presented to the user on the default screen. Everything else should be available in a separate advanced options or configuration menu. Basically, if a function isn't used at least once in every few visits to the screen, then it shouldn't be there.

2. Too much either unclearly presented or unnecessary information displayed at once.

I'm not against having lots of information available, but but it needs to be presented in a way that is clear and obvious at first glance.

Icons (such as first run, HD, etc.) should be different enough in design that they can be clearly differentiated instantly. Further, the design should be such that the meaning of the icon is also easily understood by a first time observer without having to consult the manual.

Key media information should be available on the screen, however secondary information should be out of the way.

3. The number of borders and lines throughout the UI has greatly improved since v2, but there are still some places where this turns up, such as in the video OSD.

Extra lines and the such just add to the feeling of clutter. Again this area has improved greatly.




The core animations have gone a long way to making the UI easer to follow and use (plus they add that slickness factor). Add to that a little more polish on the default graphics to make them a bit 'shinier' with a bit more contrast and maybe some icons to give a bit more splash to the main menu and there you have it.

My impression of the default UI is that it is cluttered and it always seems a bit harder than it should be to do the basics, mostly because I have to sort through so much to find the function I want. I might be a bit off base here since I hardly use the default UI at all, but I think the principles I mentioned should be valid anyway.

That's really about it. Basically, less is more. Each screen should be kept clean, simple and on purpose. Anything that doesn't need to be there shouldn't be.

Well, that's all I've got. Thanks for reading.

Aloha,
Mike

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by bastafidli

You know, the funny thing about this discussion is that the UI is probably the easiest thing to fix. Much easier than to add the functionality that Sage already has and is already doing so well.

I don't think this is true. UI design is hard, precisely because it's so subjective. With new functionality, you typically have a spec that spells out how the new function should work and how it interacts with the rest of the system, and there's not much room for disagreement about whether you've met the spec or not. With UI design, all you have to go on are vague complaints that it's "ugly" or "dated" or not "stylish" enough, and everybody has a different idea about what that means. You can bust your butt to create a cool new UI and then find that people still complain it's not what they wanted. (To some extent this is exactly what happened with the V6 music browser.)

Add to that the fact that there's a thriving community of STVI developers that need a stable base UI to work from. A policy of frequent UI makeovers just for the sake of keeping up with the competition could easily kill the third-party developer community by making it very difficult to maintain STVI compatibility from one release to the next. (Never mind that Microsoft probably has more programmers working on VMC UI flash than Sage has in their entire company, so that keeping up is probably impossible anyway without the help of third-party themes and add-ons.)

[sainswor99]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Yes, I agree the kaleidescope similar movies view blows everything away on a functional level, but aesthetically it's not really anything different than the current Sage video library (grid of covers).

Are we looking at the same thing? The k-scape allows you to select a movie (by hovering over a title) and other movies rearrange themselves dynamically to fit your grid. That's a little different than the static grid of video covers from Sage.