I am missing something here....

[David HVR1600]

I have been told by support and read "hints" on this board about using DVD profiler to import DVD information (including ratings) in to sage so I can keep my kids from watching rated R DVD's. I can find no reference to profiler in the manual, in the software. What the heck am I missing? I can find no Guide on this forum to enabling and using Profiler with Sage to do what I want.

Any help or direction would be appreciated.

[Conejo]

My understanding is that DVD Profiler is a third-party application that you use to collect data on your DVD library.

Here are a couple of posts that were found using SEARCH: Profile '(x) Show Posts':

http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...3&postcount=20

Here's a thread that runs for over a year that talks about Stanger89 making an STVi plug-in that works with Profiler v3.
ATT Stanger89 - Help needed
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...95&postcount=1

But here IS a post that mentions MPAA and filtering content.
Assigning ratings to imported videos
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...96&postcount=1

Don't fret, your original post may yet pull someone knowledgeable.

[David HVR1600]

Yeah, support just said I could import the DVD profiler XML info (I guess by osmosis since I see no function for it) and sage would use it.

I got profiler and listed one of my DVD's and made a single XML and a collection XML... I am stuck after that. I tried putting them in the movie DIR. I will read the above posts as I can.

[David HVR1600]

Ok..well now I have imported ilv stvi after copying gregs studio to the proper folders. i get the "I" icon on the bottom left.

I click on it and set up the collection XML path and the program path.

I think I may understand my problem.... I am ripping DVD's with DVD Decrypter. Does this thing not work with ripped DVD's like that? Do I have to convert to a single MPG file?

Thanks.

[David HVR1600]

This has got to be the most infuriating thing I have ever had to deal with.

Has no one written any kind of a "get this and copy it to sage DIR"... get that... import the STVI type guide and voila?????

I can appreciate this is a collection of efforts but damn... how hard would it be to come up with simple step by step directions. I guess if I ever figure this out I will write them and post them.

All I get at this point is Collection XML not found in the importer StVI setup window.

I have installed Garys studio, the ILV STvi and even copied the dvdpro2sage java files to the sage dir and re-imported the STVI. WHAT am I missing?

[David HVR1600]

I used Nielm's IMDB plugin and the metadata importer and that does what I need. Problem solved.

[wbarber69]

There are hundreds of users here that use dvdprofiler for importing data you are a new user and may find it difficult to find exactly what you are looking for here next time you ask you could use a more positive dictation to your forum threads you may find you will receive more positive replies

[David HVR1600]

Wbarber,

I defy you to find a post outlining what I was looking for. I searched this forum endlessly and spoke to a friend who turned me on to sage in the first place. He couldn't do it and hes been running sage for a few years. There are posts from 2006 with no longer valid info etc... and it was really difficult to piece together what I did pouring through 2 + years worth of posts and trying to filter for relevant info. I didn't start looking the day of this post, It searched off and on for nearly a week before I posted.

Your right I was frustrated but to tell the truth what frustrated me more was the fact that I asked support how to do it and their response was essentialy "just use x" and it works like I was a retard for asking. It's not that simple as we all know.

I should add that the Nielm IMDB method plus XML import allows me to put the data in to the sage DB so I only have to set up one client with the add-ons. The rest use the Sage DB imported info for ratings which I like too!

[mherce]

Reading this thread: ouch. Just wanted to post to say David HVR1600, you are definitely not alone. I was searching the forums for exactly the same thing and was going to post something like this myself.

I gave DVDprofiler another try again today (last time I trialed Sage I gave up) and its not good. In fact it may be the worst movie software ever created. There are a ton of opensourced free movie dbs that are much more intuitive and will actually scan drives and opticals for you instead of laboriously putting in things manually. And by UPC code? Give me a break! UPC codes aren't the same in the whole world.

Note: this is not a comment on Stranger's work, which is probably really good. Don't know, never got past the lousy DVDprofiler interface and UPC/manual entry system (what am I Walmart?). I've got much respect to at least someone trying to add some movie functionality to SageTV, so I am only talking about DVDprofiler here.

Wbarber69, no offense to you but David HVR1600's frustration is similar to my own. You talk about "hundreds" of Sage users using DVDprofile? Mymovies for MCE has a user base in the hundreds of thousand, if not millions. In fact, every HTPC software I've tried since learning that MCE will not run without hacks on WHS, has a movie system that is used by their entire userbase which will automatically seach for and scrape metadata. Most of them will even get covers for you and its always a system that requires no payment and is usually integrated into the app.

Again, the last thing I want to do is offend anyone, but dealing with movies in SageTV is going to be a real frustration point for anyone new to Sage but not new to HTPCs. So I would please ask you bear with us and give us some slack.

I should add that the Nielm IMDB method plus XML import allows me to put the data in to the sage DB so I only have to set up one client with the add-ons. The rest use the Sage DB imported info for ratings which I like too!

Ok, so I understand the IMDB plugin but what is the XML import? That sounds like what I am looking for. Right now, I have the MY importer which will save the info from the IMDB plugin. However, that means I would have to manually click, search and save metadata for my hundreds of DVDs transcodes! Since I got my movies up and metadataed in under 30 minutes with free Media portal, this seems an excessive use of my time. Could you document or point me to a link that generates and can import the XML Sage needs?

Thanks!

[Conejo]

I'm sometimes surprised that user questions go unanswered, but I can understand why some may shy away when the topic turns to ripped DVDs since that's a third-rail item under the fair-use interpretation.

OR it could be that there are only a few users on this board who have gone overboard and tricked out their SageTV systems with the Terabytes necessary to take the edge off their fanatical addictions.

Personally, I don't like orange, stripes or replacing high-density hard drives.

[mherce]

Originally Posted by Conejo

...ripped DVDs since that's a third-rail item under the fair-use interpretation.

Not where I live and in the majority of the world .

Originally Posted by Conejo

OR it could be that there are only a few users on this board who have gone overboard and tricked out their SageTV systems with the Terabytes necessary to take the edge off their fanatical addictions.

Browsing this forum trying and, so far, failing to get SageTV to replicate some of the basic features that I've enjoyed with MCE, I think you are on to something there. Maybe, besides a small minority, most SageTV users aren't that sophisticated? Or maybe the active user base is just that much smaller?

In my ongoing quest to find something that I can run on a WHS lan to replace MCE, I spent a weekend setting up Media Portal a couple weeks ago. I never even made a post, as every question I had was answered there already, plus ways to go far more advanced with my setup than even I was looking for. Too bad their TV system is still a bit rough as compared to MCE. Its seems some Media Portal users use BeyondTV or SageTV as the TV fill in for it. I really don't want to divide myself into multiple HTPC apps. I tried with my MCE setup a few times and it was always more work than it was worth.

I still have more things to try this weekend before I can decide if SageTV is really as limited as it seems, but things like simple movie scanning and metadata and music handling, which every HTPC platform I've tried so far does, SageTV does not do well or at all. I've noticed that with other platforms, its the users who fill in gaps that the main app is missing. There are talented plugin makers here but the number is much smaller than other mainstream HTPC apps. I've also noticed that there was a very active and talented plugin designer who made lots of useful plugins but seems inactive now. I wonder if he's moved on and what platform he went to?

This company should do a better job of enticing MCE plugin makers to it. Its clear that the Media Portal devs would not move to such a limited system, with its closed database system, but MCE plugin devs do it for the money and this platform is akin to MCE in that regard. If this company could figure out how to entice them this would be a much more competitive app. The door is open, as MS clearly has no intention of making MCE WHS compliant, nor even LAN compliant, and that opens the door to 3rd parties to take advantage.

Well, I'm not done with the weekend yet and SageTV's LAN system is better than anything else I have tried by a fair margin. I still have to try the beta and a bunch more plugins, and I would really appreciate an answer to the XML import thing. I've searched exhaustively but found nothing like what was described. The J River browser plugin looks like it might help the music but its going to depend on how much I have to do to manage another app, but maybe it will at least be able to replace the incredibly bad visualizations of SageTV.

[David HVR1600]

mherce,

I downloaded the following:

http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/atta...1&d=1205056205

That is the newest beta the following is the "Current" and is about 6 months older:

http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/down...do=file&id=155

Import Nielm's IMDB Plugin and the above metadata one. After that you can go to "Customize" under Detailed setup on the machine you imported it on. At the bottom of my list I had a new option: "Metadata Options". Set those up as you see fit. Under "Metadata save to DB" I had it save the .my files info to the DB. I also set it to overwrite but that is your choice.

With those configured you can then go to a movie in the videos under the DVD header and choose the IMDB Search. Once you choose the IMDB entry you want you will be presented with a "Save" option.

You could have configured the metadata tool to import automatically on a timed interval and/or there are option to run it immediately. You can either wait for the timer to elapse if you have it configured or you can run the data import manually. Once that is done and assuming IMDB retrieved ratings info then it should work and not only the machine that created the data should work but the default STV on other computers/extenders should work too. If IMDB doesnt retrieve ratings info then you can edit the .my file manually.



/RANT on

As far as the whole "3rd Rail" business... I bought and paid for the DVD's in question. I even have a 5 disk changer because I have 3 young children and they seem to watch DVD's a lot. The problem is I am on my 3rd player (and no I don't buy cheap ones) because my little ones watch the same show 5 times a day and are wearing them out. If sage provides a neat solution that keeps me from buying a player every 6 months then *I* see no problem in it.

All the organizations out there trying to figure out how to stop people from doing what they want should be disbanded. I find it ridiculous that the American consumer is so timid and brainwashed that we put up with this kind of B.S. These groups should be providing solutions, not obsticles and/or hinderances to their customers viewing abilities. They couldn't control the Analog VCR and they used ALL the same arguements then. Now with digital they got in on the ground floor and put in there two cents from day one and are limitting us. Perhaps if they spent as much time, energy and effort on researching solutions for their customers and providing products at REASONABLE prices then they wouldnt have to worry so much about piracy because it wouldnt be worth the bother if DVD's were more affordable to the masses. Sure they will have to produce more and earn less per unit in profit but in the end I am sure they would earn more money because they would have more customers. Instead they focus their efforts and blame it all on piracy and restrict the 90+% reasonable folks so they can try (and repeatedly fail) to stop the 10% or less that are pirating.

If they don't like DVD's on my sage system they can KMA.

/Rant off

[mherce]

Thanks David HVR1600! I see, I was hoping for a more automated setup, like getting the IMDB importer to run itself. I guess, as its dead, that won't be happening even if it was possible . I think I may have another way to go about this, following the tv.com importer model and using properties/my files. However, I'm having trouble with the properties file and I am not sure I will use SageTV, so putting in the effort to write it is not on the table till I decide to do so.

If I do end up writing it, I'll let you know.