STV Import: Malore Multi-Pane Enhancements (003a) Jan 9 2007

[Tiki]

I have published a new STVi import to the download section:
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/down...do=file&id=151

Malore Multi-Pane Enhancements STVi
This STVi should work with the stock STVs for Sage Versions 5 and 6.
Requires that the Unofficial Secret Extras be enabled.
It changes the look of the Malore Multipane menus (for Recordings, schedule, etc.) as follows:
1. Lower-right pane now has double-height bars with the same colors, markers, and channel logos as the default menus.
2. You may need to adjust the number of rows to get things to display properly.
3. The two lower panes no longer wrap, so it's easier to find the beginning and end.
4. The Watched Bars are easier to see than with default STV but don't cover the entire cell like in the standard Malore menu.

Version History
003a - (2007-01-09) Fixed ZIP file in download section.
003 - (2007-01-07) First Public Release.

Files Contained in ZIP file
Enhance_Malore_003.stvi (should go in the \STVs\SageTV3\ directory, typically: C:\Program Files\SageTV\SageTV\STVs\SageTV3)
df_sage_utils.jar (should go in the \JARs\ directory, typically: C:\Program Files\SageTV\SageTV\JARs)

Screen shots are attached.

[Opus4]

That solves one thing on my to-do list. I had been meaning to add an option to have the malore menus use a 2-line format to more closely match the regular recordings display, but since I prefer the single line display w/more shows being listed, I never got around to doing it. Your choice of having only the right side use the 2 line format is interesting.

BTW: what was added that requires df_sage_utils.jar? Is that just to handle importing the changes? (I don't use any imports, so I'm not sure if that's what that jar is for.)

Also: even when the lists wrap, it is fairly easy to find the start or end of the lists by using the number pad. Numbers 1 - 0 can jump to any proportional point in the list, with 1 jumping to the first item & 0 jumping to the last one. The numbers make scrolling much faster.

- Andy

[Tiki]

Originally Posted by Opus4

That solves one thing on my to-do list. I had been meaning to add an option to have the malore menus use a 2-line format to more closely match the regular recordings display, but since I prefer the single line display w/more shows being listed, I never got around to doing it. Your choice of having only the right side use the 2 line format is interesting.

I probably should have made it an option, but to be honest, this is the 3rd time I've re-created this code and it was more than I was willing to tackle this week. I had been making custom STV's and then having to re-do them every so often to keep up with the latest changes. I finally decided to teach myself to make an import and simplify things.

Originally Posted by Opus4

BTW: what was added that requires df_sage_utils.jar? Is that just to handle importing the changes? (I don't use any imports, so I'm not sure if that's what that jar is for.)

Yes, the jar file is just to handle the import duties. This was written by Flachbar. It adds functions to make it easy to find, delete, or link to widgets in the existing STV.

Originally Posted by Opus4

Also: even when the lists wrap, it is fairly easy to find the start or end of the lists by using the number pad. Numbers 1 - 0 can jump to any proportional point in the list, with 1 jumping to the first item & 0 jumping to the last one. The numbers make scrolling much faster.

Again, I probably should have made this configurable, but I just wanted to get it done and I prefer it this way. Mostly, because I tend to scroll through lists and when they are long and they wrap, sometimes I don't realize that I'm going around again. What would really be nice is some sort of visual indicator at the end of the list, so you know when you wrap.

Anyways, lots of ideas for future revisions, but first I've got some other customizations that I'm working on re-writing as imports...

[dbfresh23]

I just downloaded this and it doesn't display correctly. Every thing seems to be at the top of my screen, so my recorded show titles are behind the show description on the left.

I am using this on an MVP on a 16:9 TV - maybe that's the problem?

[Tiki]

Originally Posted by dbfresh23

I just downloaded this and it doesn't display correctly. Every thing seems to be at the top of my screen, so my recorded show titles are behind the show description on the left.

I am using this on an MVP on a 16:9 TV - maybe that's the problem?

Try reducing the number of rows. 5 or 6 is a good number, where you may have used 10 or 12 before. The bars are twice as tall, so you can only see half as many items on the screen.

[dbfresh23]

That did it - very cool! Nice STVi

[Tiki]

Originally Posted by Opus4

I hadn't considered that one at all... I don't plan to do that for v6.2; not sure about later. Imported videos won't have metadata to use for grouping/sorting unless the user adds it & most movies are now just put into a group called 'movies'. There are way too many things I would have to think of & test to consider it for v6.2.

- Andy

Andy,

I decided to play with this concept a little on my own (creating a Malore-style Imported Videos Screen). It turns out it was pretty simple to get the basics working (about 15 minutes of work). You are right, the videos won't have any metadata to display or sort with, but now that Sage supports the .properties files, it isn't too difficult to do this. And even without the metadata, you can still see and access all the videos.

I did, however, run into a couple of things.

1. The "Actress" field is not displayed by the Malore STV (it uses the "Actor" field and lists the actors under the "[Starring]" heading, but anything stored as "Actress" is not displayed).
2. The Show Title will be the folder path from the import directory to the video file.
3. The Episode will wither be the name of the video file, or whatever has been specified as "Title" in the .properties file.

Item 2 is the only real stumbling block so far. The Malore STV handles Movies recorded by Sage in a unique way: somehow you managed to get the show title to be "Movies" so you can group them all together. How did you manage this? I couldn't figure it out by looking at the STV code.

[Tiki]

OK - I see how you separated the movie category. The problem I am having seems to be related to the fields available in the .properties file.

It appears that the property "Genre" sets the Category. If I add the following line to a properties file:
Genre=Movies
The show will be added to the Movies group in the Malore menu. However, if I change the line to:
Genre=Movies/Action
or
Genre =Movies;Action
It no longer works.

I guess Genre only sets the Category, not the subcategory. So it thinks the category is "Movies/Action" rather than "Movies" with a subcategory of "Action." I don't see a way to set the subcategory with the properties file.

There is a property called GenreID, but I can't figure out what it's for.

Does anyone have more info on how the properties in a properties file relate to things that can be retrieved with the Show API?

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by Tiki

2. The Show Title will be the folder path from the import directory to the video file.
3. The Episode will wither be the name of the video file, or whatever has been specified as "Title" in the .properties file.

Yes: this is how the Title & Episode fields work for imported videos.

Originally Posted by Tiki

Does anyone have more info on how the properties in a properties file relate to things that can be retrieved with the Show API?

There is a sticky topic in this forum section for this: Details about metadata properties files. There aren't a lot more details, though... the metadata system is more of an experimental thing that hasn't been fully developed yet.

- Andy

[gplasky]

You may want to take a look at the SageMC STV. It handles Genres and Groups in Videos.


Gerry