Unofficial Secret Extra v5-6 UI Features

[Opus4]

Replying to a conversation in a different thread...

Originally Posted by Patilan

But this is exactly the problem: when you do that, all "Archived" recordings get totally mixed up with all the other recordings, and you can't tell which one is which. And they all look exactly the same!

The last time you brought this up, you said this:

Originally Posted by Patilan

I use Malore menus, and this new way of dealing with the archived recordings makes no sense to me. I can't find a easy way to display the archived shows separately. And if I filter them in together with all the other recordings, then it gets really messy. Can't tell which is which.

... in the post right after where I said:

Originally Posted by Opus4

That was about a 5 minute addition, so in the next beta, the malore menus containing recordings can be set to filter archived recordings into or out of the list. Of course, you have to also choose the option to include archived shows in the list before the filter has any real effect.

You completely missed that I said you will be able to have a list display just the Archived or just the non-archived recordings. By using the alternate views, you can easily jump from one set of filters to another, as I said here:

Originally Posted by Opus4

I keep bringing this one up recently because I think it is a little-used feature on the malore menus: look into the Custom4 command to create alternate views within each malore custom menu. The next version will have a UI option to set the number of alternate views available. You can quickly toggle between differently grouped/sorted/filtered views of the same data. I'm also debating using FF2/REW2 to more easily switch forward/back between these alternate views.

FF2/REW2 are already implemented in a version I am testing. In addition, you can: set the number of alternate views per menu, name the alternate views for each menu, see the alternate view choices in an optional category bar, choose to use double height rows per menu so there is more info shown for each airing, choose to filter a selected cateogry into or out of the list, along with some other tweaks that I already forgot about w/o going to look them up.

- Andy

[Patilan]

Reading your reply here, I see that this problem has been adressed in the next beta. Thanks.

[Opus4]

Since this now works OK for me, here is a test version with some changes to the malore menus:

1. Added option for malore 2-pane menus to use double-height buttons on the right pane or on both panes. The setting is individual for each malore menu. (I like having single-height buttons in the schedule & double-height for the right side of the recordings list.) I'm not entirely sure why the left pane would use a double-height display... but I put it in there.
   
   
2. Added option to set the number of alternate views for malore menus. Can set the number of alternate views for each menu, instead of one value for all malore menus. You can add up to 6 views of the same menu, each with different settings for the grouping, sorting, and filtering options.
   
   
3. Added Smooth FF/REW and FF2/REW2 commands as method to go to the next/prev alternate menu view. (Also added this for these default menus: SageTV Recordings, Recording Schedule, Online Video Search Results, and Search.)
   
   
4. Added category bar for alternate views. The category bar takes a line from the description area.
   
   
5. Can name the alternate views.
   
   
6. Added an icon bar. The icon bar takes a little space from the left pane; the right pane's width is not affected.
   
   
7. For the purists who don't want the new bars: added single option to enable/disable use of icon & category bars. (Either both are used, or neither are used.)
   
   
8. Added ability to filter archived shows into or out of the list and added filter options for "Manual or Fav" and "Not MR or Fav".
   
   
9. Added themed MaloreNormalBG.png as the unfocused BG image for malore menu items.
   
   
10. Added option to filter the chosen category into or out of the list. We discovered that while it was nice to have an alternate view for the "Children" category, it would be even better to have a view that contained nothing from that category.
    
    
11. When Watched & Partial Bars are enabled, the partial recording bar can be enabled for all partial recordings or just for those listed on the partial recording menu. For recordings in progress, you can see how much has been recorded while on the SageTV Recordings screen.

<test version removed due to updated beta>

- Andy

[nyplayer]

Opus,

Very impressive great job.

1 question what png controls. The selection of alternate views on my theme it is very close in color to the bar.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by nyplayer

1 question what png controls. The selection of alternate views on my theme it is very close in color to the bar.

Check out the CatBar*.png images -- there is a bar BG, active item highlight, and focus item highlight (BGSelect). I think those are what you are referring to.

- Andy

[Ron]

Andy:
I've successfully installed the MaloreTest zip file. But in order to switch views, the tip says to use Smooth FF/REW and FF2/REW2 commands.

I don't want to come off as dumb, but I've yet to figure out how to keyboard access these commands in order to switch views.

Please give me some guidance. Thanks.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by Ron

But in order to switch views, the tip says to use Smooth FF/REW and FF2/REW2 commands.

I don't want to come off as dumb, but I've yet to figure out how to keyboard access these commands in order to switch views.

Go to Detailed Setup -> Commands -> Link Command. Find the commands in the list; if there aren't already keys assigned to them, assign the keys you want to use.

- Andy

[Ron]

Originally Posted by Opus4

Go to Detailed Setup -> Commands -> Link Command. Find the commands in the list; if there aren't already keys assigned to them, assign the keys you want to use.

- Andy

Guess I should have RTFM first, before posting. The powerful features of Sage, including those that I wasn't even aware of, continue to amaze me.

Andy, this is a fabulous enhancement to Malore. Thanks for your efforts and hard work.

[ekiwi]

Andy

I love the new malore views you have implemented

and the ability to turn off the icon and category bars (maybe this should be added to the default to help the Purists)

I was thinking about it and would like to suggest a third option

the bars could be On|OFF|Auto

in auto they are normally off, they don't display and the left arrow will either take you out of a group or exit the page ie everything works as if in off mode

however if you press the rew key they will temporarily appear and you will be taken to them and once you leave the bars they will be hidden again


this would give you the best of both world. the clean "uncluttered" look the "purists" advocate and the great functionality you have put in those bars

-ekiwi

on a cosmetic note: when the bars are hidden the ff2-rw2 still work to change between the alternate views which is great however would it be possible to change the page title to reflect the name as set by the user

-ekiwi

[Opus4]

I might use the entered name for the view as part of the menu title (have been debating that already), but I doubt I'm going to get into an auto-hide/display system for the icon & category bars.

I did finally add an option for wrap-around scrolling to be on or off in the listing tables, though, for the next update.

- Andy

[nyplayer]

When I hit play All on a group of shows... why doesn't it play them in the order I have them sorted. It seems to play them in the order they were recorded. I would like that when I have a series sorted by original air, showid ,date reversed etc.. it should play them in that order.

Is this possible or is this a limitation in SageTV??

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by nyplayer

When I hit play All on a group of shows... why doesn't it play them in the order I have them sorted. It seems to play them in the order they were recorded.

That's just the way it plays groups of videos right now.

But, there is a code flag to have it not resort the grouped recordings for that command, so I should probably just use that when dealing with groups from the malore menus. (Of course, if you have shuffle playback enabled...)

Edit: Done.

- Andy

[nyplayer]

Andy,

Thank you looking forward to a test STV if possible.

[Opus4]

In addition to the last set of changes, the v6.2.6 Release Candidate has the following changes to the hidden features:

1. The malore menus have new option to enable/disable wrap-around scrolling.
   
   
2. Groups of recordings are played in the malore menu's sort order rather than always in the order the recordings were made.
   
   
3. Changed malore menu sort options dialog to list the base options + a single reverse option checkbox.
   
   
4. Added ability to filter multiple categories into or out of the malore custom menus.

- Andy

[Tiki]

Andy,

I like the changes you made to the "hidden extras." It looks like I won't be needing my "malore enhancements" STVi anymore, but was hoping I could suggest three minor additions for a future version:

1. Color-code the items in the right pane ("episodes") to match the colors used in the EPG (ie. movies = purple, sports = green) and elsewhere in the STV.

2. Allow reverse sort order for the left pane too (you can reverse the sort order for the "episodes" but not the "categories" now).

3. Add a setup so we can choose to display the date & time (like older default STVs) or just the day & time (like current default STV) in the upper right corner.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by Tiki

1. Color-code the items in the right pane ("episodes") to match the colors used in the EPG (ie. movies = purple, sports = green) and elsewhere in the STV.

This wasn't already on my list of things to consider, but the other ones were. Good timing, though, since I added some more hidden features that could use some testing. There are still a few things on my list of possible things to do; these were the easiest:

1. Added option to display Day-Date-Time instead of shorter Day-Time in the menu header & OSD.
   
   
2. Added category color BG to right pane of malore's menus, if a color exists for the airing's category.
   
   
3. If an alternate view's name has been customized, add it to the end of the menu's title in the menu header instead of the alternate view number. And, the view name can be reset by editing & clearing the view's name.
   
   
4. Grouping option for malore menus can be sorted in reverse order. (left pane)

- Andy

[nyplayer]

Andy,

Adding the category color to the recordings. Can this be optional. It really makes certain recordings hard to see based on whatever theme colors you are using. They work great for the Standard theme.... but on some custom themes I have I rather have them off. I like the category colors in the EPG but...after they have been recorded I really do not need the category colors. I can easily create a view by category.

Also the only way right now to change the watched bar color is to actually go into the properties and set the color.

ex:
multimenu_blue_bar_color=0xFF0000


PS great work on the Hidden extras menus.

[Tiki]

Originally Posted by Opus4

This wasn't already on my list of things to consider, but the other ones were. Good timing, though, since I added some more hidden features that could use some testing. There are still a few things on my list of possible things to do; these were the easiest:

1. Added option to display Day-Date-Time instead of shorter Day-Time in the menu header & OSD.
   
   
2. Added category color BG to right pane of malore's menus, if a color exists for the airing's category.
   
   
3. If an alternate view's name has been customized, add it to the end of the menu's title in the menu header instead of the alternate view number. And, the view name can be reset by editing & clearing the view's name.
   
   
4. Grouping option for malore menus can be sorted in reverse order. (left pane)

- Andy

Thanks Andy! I just downloaded it to my test machine and it looks great - no problems so far.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by nyplayer

Adding the category color to the recordings. Can this be optional.

Also the only way right now to change the watched bar color is to actually go into the properties and set the color.

I'll note them, but no promises on those options.

BTW: You can change the category colors to work better with your theme in the Help -> Interface Guide menu.


Here's another option to test, though:

1. Allow double-height rows setting per view in the malore menus, and added a setting to auto-switch back to single height rows if the item count is greater than 2 x number of double height rows.
   
   
2. Update: fixed some dialogs that were displaying all radio buttons as selected instead of marking only the active option.

<download removed>

- Andy

[ToxMox]

Something changed in this latest MaloreTest. It doesn't happen everywhere but I noticed for example in the detailed setup - customize - recordings style menu that all the radio buttons are on instead of just the one selected.