STV Import: NetFlix for SageMC (v2.1) 28-Feb-09

[Brent]

Thanks for the quick answers Morgan. Also, I had missed the icon thing so thanks for that too.

One other thing I'm noticing is when I play one preview (one that works) and then play another one, it plays correctly but always shows the details (name etc) of the first one for every preview after that. Not a big deal at all, but thought I'd mention it.

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by Brent

Thanks for the quick answers Morgan. Also, I had missed the icon thing so thanks for that too.

One other thing I'm noticing is when I play one preview (one that works) and then play another one, it plays correctly but always shows the details (name etc) of the first one for every preview after that. Not a big deal at all, but thought I'd mention it.

I tried to reproduce this but always see the correct info. Which version of SageMC do you have? Anyone else with this same problem?

Are there many trailer that do not work for you? Could you give me a few examples. For me, they seem to not work at all (if my cache file is old) or all work that I try. I assume all the trailers are the same video standard, but I could be wrong. I know other have mentioned that some do not work.

[cncb]

Originally Posted by myoung84

How do you put in @ on the HD extender??

Press "Pause" until you have the numeric text entry mode and then press '1' several times until you select '@'.

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by mkanet

Hi Morgan, is there a way for me to change the spelling of "Blue-ray" to "Blu-ray" in the channels list? I'm guessing it's not as simple as just opening a text file and changing it.

Maybe they are spelling it wrong. Ok, it's all ready for the next release. It is in the jar library so it can not really be patched easily.

[cncb]

Does this work in general with extenders? I can't seem to get any of my "channels" to show up on the extender but it works fine on my client PC. I have checked to make sure I inputted my ID correctly.

[wbarber69]

I get nothing when I load the menu screen after installing the plug-in everything is just garbled text on the top left hand screen no way to go through setup or anything and the background is solid black I don't know if that is the way it is supposed to be or not, it just doesn't work

sagetv 6.3.8
sagemc6.3.7

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by wbarber69

I get nothing when I load the menu screen after installing the plug-in everything is just garbled text on the top left hand screen no way to go through setup or anything and the background is solid black I don't know if that is the way it is supposed to be or not, it just doesn't work

sagetv 6.3.8
sagemc6.3.7

Perhaps that is from an importing conflict with a previous import file. What other imports do you have installed? I would try reloading the SageMC 6.3.7, import the NetFlix, and see if it appears correctly. THen go ahead with any additional imports.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Morgan111

I tried to reproduce this but always see the correct info. Which version of SageMC do you have? Anyone else with this same problem?

Are there many trailer that do not work for you? Could you give me a few examples. For me, they seem to not work at all (if my cache file is old) or all work that I try. I assume all the trailers are the same video standard, but I could be wrong. I know other have mentioned that some do not work.

Hi Morgan,
I have the latest version of SageTV and SageMC. I'll try to reproduce again tonight and give you full details with some screen-shots. I had played the "Walk the Line" preview and then played several other previews. Each of the subsequent previews worked fine, but showed the "Walk the Line" title and details when playing them (not in full screen mode).

A few trailers that worked for me (I'll give you a few more titles tonight):
"Elizabeth: The Golden Age"
"Whale Rider"

One trailers that didn't work and came back with an error (I'll give you a few more titles tonight):
"Rocket Science"

I remember when Craig (cncb) was working on the Beyond Media, Netflix Plugin some trailers used a different method/standard than others so this could be part of the problem I guess.

One additional thing I thought of last night to ask you. Is there a way to browse the "watch instantly" titles by themselves? This would obviously make it easier to find a streaming movie/show to watch.

EDIT: By the way, there are lots of news stories out there today about the Vista Media Center Netflix Plugin (just came out this past weekend also) so I've been trying to get out the news that you can do this with SageTV (SageMC) also. Here's my blog post on it. Which was picked up by TVSquad's PVRWire this morning. Gotta keep up the SageTV love just to let the unknowing that theres a good (better imho) HTPC alternative called SageTV

Thanks!
Brent

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by cncb

Does this work in general with extenders? I can't seem to get any of my "channels" to show up on the extender but it works fine on my client PC. I have checked to make sure I inputted my ID correctly.

I just tried it myself for the first time and saw the same thing. The Java code was not seeing the the configuration items from the properties file. I did then see what is happening. When I read/write properties in the studio code it is accessing the .properties file under Program Files/SageTV/SageTV/Clients. I found that all reading/writing of properties as done from the java code in the netflix.jar file is accessing Sage.properties in Program Files/SageTV/SageTV.

I copied the plugin/NetFlix... lines from the client/xxxxx.properties file and pasted them in the Sage.properties file (with the server shut down). It worked fine after that.

I am not sure why the NetFlix Java library is accessing the other properties file.

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by Brent

One trailers that didn't work and came back with an error (I'll give you a few more titles tonight):
"Rocket Science"

I remember when Craig (cncb) was working on the Beyond Media, Netflix Plugin some trailers used a different method/standard than others so this could be part of the problem I guess.

I did a search on Rocket Science and found a movie and a documentary with same names. Neither of them had trailer that were provided by NetFlix. Did you have a View Trailer button show up for that one?

Originally Posted by Brent

One additional thing I thought of last night to ask you. Is there a way to browse the "watch instantly" titles by themselves? This would obviously make it easier to find a streaming movie/show to watch.

That will be coming before too long I hope. I am planning the ability to browse all movies by genre, and all Watch Now movies by genre. One I can browse all movies, browsing Watch Now movies should be a piece of cake. I'm trying to come up to speed on Java in my free time, so it is not happening as fast as I would like between that and work.

Originally Posted by Brent

EDIT: By the way, there are lots of news stories out there today about the Vista Media Center Netflix Plugin (just came out this past weekend also) so I've been trying to get out the news that you can do this with SageTV (SageMC) also. Here's my blog post on it. Which was picked up by TVSquad's PVRWire this morning. Gotta keep up the SageTV love just to let the unknowing that theres a good (better imho) HTPC alternative called SageTV

Cool! Thanks for the blog entry.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Morgan111

I did a search on Rocket Science and found a movie and a documentary with same names. Neither of them had trailer that were provided by NetFlix. Did you have a View Trailer button show up for that one?

Yes, on the SageMC Netflix plugin, it shows "view trailer" for:
The Game Plan
Crossover
Fracture

But then for "The Ex" and several others it works fine and doesn't show "view trailer" as it shouldn't because there isn't one on netflix.com.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Brent

Hi Morgan,
I have the latest version of SageTV and SageMC. I'll try to reproduce again tonight and give you full details with some screen-shots. I had played the "Walk the Line" preview and then played several other previews. Each of the subsequent previews worked fine, but showed the "Walk the Line" title and details when playing them (not in full screen mode).

Okay, I checked this again tonight and here's what I think is happening. After I view a watch-instantly movie that is when it happens.
1. view watch-instantly movie (the office in this example)
2. later on I start a movie preview (not full-screen) and it is showing "the office" cover art and "the office" details, rating etc. The office details and cover continue to show on all previews until I view another watch-instantly movie.

[skyeclad]

After installing the import on my client I was able to view my queue and the only thing that doesn't seem to work are the trailers. Although everything still has loading on it.

Anyhow, the real issue is that the HDExt doesn't seem to be able to see the queue or anything else for that matter. I re-entered the login identification and passwords a bunch of time and I even entered them manually in the client properties file but that doesn't seem to help any. Any thoughts?

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by skyeclad

After installing the import on my client I was able to view my queue and the only thing that doesn't seem to work are the trailers. Although everything still has loading on it.

Anyhow, the real issue is that the HDExt doesn't seem to be able to see the queue or anything else for that matter. I re-entered the login identification and passwords a bunch of time and I even entered them manually in the client properties file but that doesn't seem to help any. Any thoughts?

Originally Posted by Morgan111

I just tried it myself for the first time and saw the same thing. The Java code was not seeing the the configuration items from the properties file. I did then see what is happening. When I read/write properties in the studio code it is accessing the .properties file under Program Files/SageTV/SageTV/Clients. I found that all reading/writing of properties as done from the java code in the netflix.jar file is accessing Sage.properties in Program Files/SageTV/SageTV.

I copied the plugin/NetFlix... lines from the client/xxxxx.properties file and pasted them in the Sage.properties file (with the server shut down). It worked fine after that.

I am not sure why the NetFlix Java library is accessing the other properties file.

Copy those properties from the clients .properties file to the sage.properties file.

Gerry

[cncb]

Originally Posted by Morgan111

I copied the plugin/NetFlix... lines from the client/xxxxx.properties file and pasted them in the Sage.properties file (with the server shut down). It worked fine after that.

This worked for me too. Thanks.

I noticed that the text on buttons for a few menus is hidden when they have focus (the setup menu and Queue item edit menu ). I think this might be due to the Animation Layer as discussed here: http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30086

[skyeclad]

Originally Posted by gplasky

Copy those properties from the clients .properties file to the sage.properties file.

Gerry

Gerry,

That did the trick. I'm not familiar with the original version. Why do the Channels only display a limited selection of videos? I know I can search the entire Netflix Database but I thought the channels would allow browsing based on star rating or something?

Lastly, I noticed that the View Trailers cause a playback exception when played on my client but they play fine on the Extender. Is this a codec issue?

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by cncb

I noticed that the text on buttons for a few menus is hidden when they have focus (the setup menu and Queue item edit menu ). I think this might be due to the Animation Layer as discussed here: http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30086

Ah, thats the problem! I had seen that earlier in some situations and noticed that turning off the animation stopped it, but never went back to it. I will get another update in the next day or so with some corrections like that.

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by skyeclad

Gerry,

That did the trick. I'm not familiar with the original version. Why do the Channels only display a limited selection of videos? I know I can search the entire Netflix Database but I thought the channels would allow browsing based on star rating or something?

Lastly, I noticed that the View Trailers cause a playback exception when played on my client but they play fine on the Extender. Is this a codec issue?

The channels are RSS feeds with a select group of movies. It is an easier way for grabbing movie info from another program. I will be adding the ability to browse through all movies by genre in an upcoming release.

Do you have the latest SageTV 6.3.8 on your client? If so, try playing a trailer right from the NetFlix site to see if that plays correctly.

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by Brent

Yes, on the SageMC Netflix plugin, it shows "view trailer" for:
The Game Plan
Crossover
Fracture

But then for "The Ex" and several others it works fine and doesn't show "view trailer" as it shouldn't because there isn't one on netflix.com.

I'm not sure at the moment what may be happening for you. I don't see View Trailer for those. I did a Search Title to view those originally, then did find one of them, Crossover, in a channel. Does that one show up with View Trailer when selected from the Thrillers channel and Search TItle option?

[skyeclad]

Originally Posted by Morgan111

The channels are RSS feeds with a select group of movies. It is an easier way for grabbing movie info from another program. I will be adding the ability to browse through all movies by genre in an upcoming release.

Do you have the latest SageTV 6.3.8 on your client? If so, try playing a trailer right from the NetFlix site to see if that plays correctly.

I am using 6.3.7 as 6.3.8 gave me problems with my HDHR. I can play Netflix trailers through my client browser with no problems.