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

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by ryttingm

Thanks much for the update. Absolutely love the new Instant browse feature.

As a confirmation, I am seeing similar issues to Brent with my menus not being quite lined up.

-Mike

Thanks. I know what is wrong there now. Needs a little update anyway. Looks like an old menu from the original STV.

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by JDizzy

Everything is looking good but I must have a funky DSL connection.
Would it be possible to increase the buffer size, or even let the entire trailer load prior to it starting to play?
I am having to restart the playback 3-4 times before it will play through.

Is this possible? Maybe a setting in the Netflix Extra menu?

I also use the Movietimes plugin and don't have problems when those playback?

***EDIT***
After installing the Sage 6.10 update the buffer is working better as far as not having to restart the playback 30 seconds into the video.

Interested in how you are using the LM keymapper to control the Netflix site.

It uses the same code as the other online videos. It appears to be a fixed time wait. If it is still a problem I can show you where to modify it for a longer delay.

The MovieTime trailers are a fixed number of videos that are downloaded when your times are updated, so they are not being streamed down on demand.

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by Brent

Just curious Morgan, what do you use to do the page scraping? I'm looking for a way to list all Netflix watch-now movies for another purpose.

It is in the Java code, mostly in the xxxHtMLParser files.

[Brent]

The Netflix Watch Now titles aren't coming up for me under browse any more. They worked last night, but tonight there aren't any showing up. I'm assuming there was a change on the Netflix Watch-Now pages?

[JDizzy]

Originally Posted by Morgan111

It uses the same code as the other online videos. It appears to be a fixed time wait. If it is still a problem I can show you where to modify it for a longer delay.

I would be interested just for reference.

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by Brent

The Netflix Watch Now titles aren't coming up for me under browse any more. They worked last night, but tonight there aren't any showing up. I'm assuming there was a change on the Netflix Watch-Now pages?

Yes, they changed a silly tag type that I was keying on. Very little was changed although it did affect one other minor thing in a new feature I was adding. The fix will be included in an update that I will probably have tomorrow with the other updates

[Muchacho]

Thanks for the update which is working great. I still am unable to alter the queue as I had mentioned before. I can change to order, but it does not save properly. I would be happy to do any testing for you if needed.

Thanks for putting the settings in the SageMC extras- I think that cleans up the interface. On my screen that "netflix.jar date..." appears quite large. If possible, it would be nice if that was not visible or could be turned off as an option. Not to be nit picky, but it would also be nice to have the option to turn off the Watch now features. I am using an HD extender, so it confuses my wife that it does not work (yet?).

Also, I have noticed that when I go back from the main NetFlix menu it does not go back properly using the left arrow.

Thanks again for all your hard work and this import is great as it is!

Cheers, Mike

[Addict]

Hi. Got my new extender and got 'er all set up for SageMC and I'm relatively happy. Been looking forward to this so I could install this Netflix plugin.

I followed the directions, restarted both my server and the extender...but when I click on the Netflix Main Menu item that I added to my main screen, the result is a very pixelated version that looks awful. I can't navigate (well, I can...but I can't see what I'm navigating to). As well, there's no "setup" anywhere that allows me to put my ID and such in.

Clicking the back button on the remote a few times gets me back to the main screen and normality.

Did I do something wrong? Thanks for any help...

BTW, I'm using the latest 6.3.10 RC and the latest MC release. Oh yeah, the menu icon should be prefixed "hover" not "hoover". <grin>

[Brent]

I've been doing a little research on keyboard shortcut commands for Netflix Watch-Now. Here's what I've found so far:

In full-screen viewing mode:
pause/play toggle
left mouse button click
enter key
space bar

play (not a toggle, just play)
Page-Up key

pause (not a toggle, just pause)
Page-Down key


I knew about the play/pause toggle keyboard shortcuts but not the play-only and pause-only buttons. I'm still playing around with this to see if there are any others I'm missing.

[mkanet]

I havent had the chance to play with Girder's ability to lock onto various controls for watch now. If anyone tries this before I do, can you please post here? Id like to use my ff/rew/and stop buttons on my remote control.

[nebulink]

Originally Posted by Addict

Hi. Got my new extender and got 'er all set up for SageMC and I'm relatively happy. Been looking forward to this so I could install this Netflix plugin.

I beleive this plug-in will not work with the HD Extender due to some DRM issues.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by mkanet

I havent had the chance to play with Girder's ability to lock onto various controls for watch now. If anyone tries this before I do, can you please post here? Id like to use my ff/rew/and stop buttons on my remote control.

I'm messing with the girder controls today matter of fact. Problem with the ff/rew stuff is the netflix watch-now doesn't have fast forward or rewind functionality as far as I can tell. With your mouse you can click on a point in the time-bar, but no fast forward or rewind.

To do a pause, I've mapped my pause key on the remote to the page-down.
To do a stop (this exits the watch-now screen entirely), I have a "windows close" command in girder and it closes iexplore.exe and brings focus back to SageTV. If you go back to play that same video after stopping in the middle of it, it will resume where you left off.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Addict

Hi. Got my new extender and got 'er all set up for SageMC and I'm relatively happy. Been looking forward to this so I could install this Netflix plugin.

Originally Posted by nebulink

I beleive this plug-in will not work with the HD Extender due to some DRM issues.

I was thinking you could browse, modify queue and watch previews with the HD extender, but not do watch-now. That's how it works with the SD extender at least.

[Addict]

Originally Posted by Brent

I was thinking you could browse, modify queue and watch previews with the HD extender, but not do watch-now. That's how it works with the SD extender at least.

That was my understanding as well...essentially everything but "Watch Now"?

[gplasky]

That is correct. I have it working on my HD Extender. Because Watch Now is IE dependant, only Watch Now is not usable on the SD or HD Extender.

Gerry

[Addict]

Originally Posted by gplasky

That is correct. I have it working on my HD Extender. Because Watch Now is IE dependant, only Watch Now is not usable on the SD or HD Extender.

Gerry

Gerry, did you have to do anything special to get it to work on your HD100 or just follow the provided instructions?

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by Addict

Gerry, did you have to do anything special to get it to work on your HD100 or just follow the provided instructions?

Just followed the instructions and imported it on the HD Extender. Make sure you start with the original STV (one without the -X number after it.) and don't import over a STV with a previous Netflix import done to it. Treat it as a clean install.


Gerry

[Morgan111]

Originally Posted by Addict

Hi. Got my new extender and got 'er all set up for SageMC and I'm relatively happy. Been looking forward to this so I could install this Netflix plugin.

I followed the directions, restarted both my server and the extender...but when I click on the Netflix Main Menu item that I added to my main screen, the result is a very pixelated version that looks awful. I can't navigate (well, I can...but I can't see what I'm navigating to). As well, there's no "setup" anywhere that allows me to put my ID and such in.

Clicking the back button on the remote a few times gets me back to the main screen and normality.

Did I do something wrong? Thanks for any help...

BTW, I'm using the latest 6.3.10 RC and the latest MC release. Oh yeah, the menu icon should be prefixed "hover" not "hoover". <grin>

Make sure you transfer the entire zip contents to the Program Files/SageTV/SageTV directory. And they of course the other tip given where it must be imported in a SageMC that does not already have another NetFlix already loaded. And if you have other imports, there could perhaps be a conflict from some previously loaded import that causes the NetFlix to import incorrectly. Try loading NetFlix right after going back to a fresh SageMC STV load if that is the case. But of course wait a few minutes for version 1.10...!

How did I miss that hoover thing?

[Morgan111]

3/2/08 Update 1.1

• Update parsing for change to Watch Now video item list.
• Improve main menu:
  • move Jar version info to Setup Menu,
  • change text alignment and style,
  • add netflix graphics
  • add listener for left cursor key navigation
• Add option on setup page to disable Watch Now features (usefull for extender users)
• Add button on movie detail screen to show a list of actors for the movie. Can click on any actor and bring of a list of DVD titles for that actor.
• Add button on movie detail screen to show a list of episodes with descriptions for a TV series. Can click on any episode to begin plaing that episode in Watch Now viewer.
• Move NetFlix menu icon to SageMC/Themes/default/MenuIcons where it was meant to originally go.

Thank you to Dirk for helping me locate some encryption functions for the password. I had that set to go until I realized it was going to be a problem having to enter a password through the extender instead of just editing the properties files (to get lower case). I'll figure that out for next update.

There are likely some minor cases where the actors links may not update correctly and minor incidents where some movie details don't update completely. I'll be working through those as I find them as well. There is still some tweaking to do with the current features, but should be good enough to use.

I will also get a summary of what I do to get the LM Remote driver software to detect the IE movie window starting and mapping the keys to do fullscreen, Prev, next, volume, shutdown.. I need to work out some timing to prevent the view from wigging out when things are done too fast. For prev and next I take it out of fullscreen if it is in it, click on the button, and then force it back to fullscreen. Things like that need sufficient pauses in there. Doesn't look like you can move ahead or back in the movie using mouse clicks. Looks like you have to drag the timebar cursor, which does not look possible.

Enjoy!

[Optimator]

Morgan111

I installed v1.0 and now v 1.1 and I'm seeing the same minor issue. When I click "Watch It Now", nothing happens. The thing is, my root drive is K: (not C. Is your STVi calling out Internet Explorer from a nonexistant location and is there a workaround?

I've used this since the initial release with no problems. Unfortunately, my hard drive crashed last week. After a fresh Windows install on a new hard drive, it assigned my root to K: instead of C: like before.

Keep up the great work!