Testers Needed: MultiUser Support

[thomaszoo]

Sweet!

This is a pretty minor issue for me (especially since there is a work-around). I am actually more interested in the ability to log multiple users in at once (i.e., family viewing). That will max out the WAF.

It did take me awhile to figure out how to use this plugin because I thought it was tied in with the new User Categories. Once I understood there was no connection it all made sense.

[gdfisher]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

It did. I am fairly certain it's an incompatibility with the latest 7.1 beta (which I have not upgraded to yet!). I should have seen that from the logfiles that gdfisher sent me because he is running 7.1 also.

I'll fix this after the next beta comes out, I do not want to install the current beta because it had some difficulties with the HVR-2250.

Tom,
I downgraded back to version 7.0.23 and can confirm that these issues are related to the 7.1 beta.
Regards, Geoff.

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by gdfisher

Tom,
I downgraded back to version 7.0.23 and can confirm that these issues are related to the 7.1 beta.
Regards, Geoff.

I'm sorry I sent you on a wild goose chance producing logs. The answer was in the first log you sent and I never caught it.

I've got a new version ready to go that corrects some other bugs. I'll try to post it in the next few days.

[gdfisher]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

I'm sorry I sent you on a wild goose chance producing logs. The answer was in the first log you sent and I never caught it.

I've got a new version ready to go that corrects some other bugs. I'll try to post it in the next few days.

No problem Tom. I am really looking forward to Multi User Support so am more than happy to assist.

[toricred]

Any chance you could add give to user and share with user to the favorites screen?

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by toricred

Any chance you could add give to user and share with user to the favorites screen?

It's already on my to do list. I've been trying to focus on fixing bugs rather than add new features.

[tmiranda]

Version 0.08 just posted:

- Updated for Sage 7.1.
- Added option to Share Favorite With Another User and Give Favorite to Another User.
- Changed font color in footer to make user name more legible.
- Fixed bug that prevented "Show Requester" option from appearing on recordings that were already in progress.
- Fixed bug that prevented the Favorite icon from showing up in the user guide immediately after user added Airing as Favorite.

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by toricred

Any chance you could add give to user and share with user to the favorites screen?

I added this, but it's in the recordings Options dialog. Let me know if you think it makes more sense to add it to the menu that lets you set the Favorite details.

Tom

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by thomaszoo

I am actually more interested in the ability to log multiple users in at once (i.e., family viewing). That will max out the WAF.

I'll probably start working on this next. This is non-trivial so it will take some time.

Bugs always take priority, so if (when) you finds bugs please let me know ASAP.

I'm also open to any other suggestions or requests.

[gdfisher]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

I'll probably start working on this next. This is non-trivial so it will take some time.

Bugs always take priority, so if (when) you finds bugs please let me know ASAP.

I'm also open to any other suggestions or requests.

This is looking really good - Thanks for your efforts. I have some niggling questions.

I created a favorite for a single user and found the following:
Logged on as that user I marked a scheduled recording of the favorite as watched (to prevent it recording). The show was marked as watched, however the watched indicator didn't display and the show remained on the list of shows to be recorded. I expected that as a single user favorite the watched status should have been reflected in the core so that the program would not record. Note that if the Admin user marks the show as watched the behaviour is reflected in the core.

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by gdfisher

This is looking really good - Thanks for your efforts. I have some niggling questions.

I created a favorite for a single user and found the following:
Logged on as that user I marked a scheduled recording of the favorite as watched (to prevent it recording). The show was marked as watched, however the watched indicator didn't display and the show remained on the list of shows to be recorded. I expected that as a single user favorite the watched status should have been reflected in the core so that the program would not record. Note that if the Admin user marks the show as watched the behaviour is reflected in the core.

Yes, there are a lot of small things like that and some, like this one, I don't have a satisfactory answer for just yet. I could make it mark the Airing as watched, but then it will probably have adverse consequences for other users. For example suppose another user adds the Favorite. Then the Airing will never be recorded (for that user) because it's marked watched in the core.

It will mark the Airing as watched in the core if the user watches it (or marks it watched) and then deletes the Airing.

Let me think about it a little more. Feel free to post observations and opinions. I can always make options to control different behaviors so people can choose what they like.

[gdfisher]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

Yes, there are a lot of small things like that and some, like this one, I don't have a satisfactory answer for just yet. I could make it mark the Airing as watched, but then it will probably have adverse consequences for other users. For example suppose another user adds the Favorite. Then the Airing will never be recorded (for that user) because it's marked watched in the core.

It will mark the Airing as watched in the core if the user watches it (or marks it watched) and then deletes the Airing.

Let me think about it a little more. Feel free to post observations and opinions. I can always make options to control different behaviors so people can choose what they like.

Understand your logic.
If another user adds the favorite my expectation was that a show marked as watched in the core would have this status reflected in that user's status. The user could then mark the show as not watched so that the status in the core changed to not watched (and the show would then record). I suppose I'm thinking from the point of view that if all current users of a show have marked it watched then shouldn't the core reflect that? An interesting situation!

[tmiranda]

I've been doing some experimenting and thinking about how to implement allowing multiple users to log in at the same time and I'm not very hopeful. All sorts of issues arise at almost every decision point. Simple things, like determining where to resume playback in a recording, are suddenly not so simple. Difficult things, like conflict resolution, are about impossible.

I'll plug away at it a little more, but I am not confident that the end result will be something useful.

How many people are interested in this feature? I know thomaszoo wants it, anybody else?

[toricred]

I would also be interested.

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by toricred

I would also be interested.

Tell me how you would use it. Which functions and behavior are important and which are not? Tell me how you would expect things like Favorites, Watched, Don't Like, IR, Manual Recordings, etc to work?

Things like:

- If you are looking at recordings that are Favorites for some logged on users and not favorites for others does the F marker appear or not? Ditto for Watched and Don't Like.

- If multiple uses have started watching the recordings and you press play, at which user's start position does the playback resume?

- Suppose you change the Favorite options (let's say end padding), and one of the logged on users has already changed them (let's say start padding), do the new overrides replace the old overrides (so the user's start padding gets reset to 0) or are the new overrides "added" to the existing overrides (so the user now has start and end padding set)?

Just think of everyday things that you do and what you'd expect them to do with multiple user's logged on.

Thanks,

Tom

[Skirge01]

I like the idea, but the only time I see this being useful (and uncomplicated) is when a show is being marked as watched and/or deleted. Having the option to do so for all users could be very beneficial.

However, if more functionality is desired by you or others, what about using an "admin" account which would override the desired option across all users?

Hope you don't mind the input from someone who isn't using this (yet). I think razr also likes this, so that gives me hope it will eventually work with TVE, as well.

[thomaszoo]

- If you are looking at recordings that are Favorites for some logged on users and not favorites for others does the F marker appear or not? Ditto for Watched and Don't Like.

This is not important to me. I would suggest whatever is the easiest (maybe like if you are not logged in at all)


- If multiple uses have started watching the recordings and you press play, at which user's start position does the playback resume?

Again this is not a big deal to me. I would suggest starting either at the beginning or at the position with the least amount of time if that is not difficult to implement.



- Suppose you change the Favorite options (let's say end padding), and one of the logged on users has already changed them (let's say start padding), do the new overrides replace the old overrides (so the user's start padding gets reset to 0) or are the new overrides "added" to the existing overrides (so the user now has start and end padding set)?

Again this is not a big deal to me. I would suggest doing what is easiest.

What I really want is for it to keep track of the watched status for everything. Anything beyond that is nice, but definitely above and beyond. Even as it is I have something that is workable; we just have to go to each user and delete separately.

I am not aware of anything else like this in the world. It is functionality that I believe places SageTV into a league of its own. Thanks again.

Wayne

[tmiranda]

OK, thanks for the feedback.

Skirge01 - There is already an Admin user that does override SOME user settings, but not all. I also hope razr puts this into TVE, I'll do whatever I can to support him. I've got some ideas on how to get this to work but nothing concrete.

Thinking out loud - How about the idea of a "primary user" and one or more "secondary users". Most of the STV behavior would be driven by the primary user's state, but certain functions would be applied to secondary users. I could start by simply making the Watched status the sole function applied to all users and then add from there.

I'll have to think about it some more, but this architecture would be a lot easier to implement and it would lead to less confusing behavior in the STV.

How does that sound?

[thomaszoo]

That would absolutely work for me.

Wayne

[Skirge01]

That sounds pretty good. My only minor concern would be surrounding how the user making the change would know when/who/what is being changed for those secondary users. I'm guessing you have some ideas about how that will be clear to people using the GUI, but figured I'd bring it up anyway.