Plugin: PlayOn in Online Services (Hulu, Netflix, Amazon VOD, etc.)

[Addict]

Originally Posted by skyeclad

You have a playon setting that processes the whole file. If you don't want to, change the setting. There is a downside but I don't remember what it is.

Awesome, this did the trick. Thanks!

[skyeclad]

Originally Posted by Addict

Awesome, this did the trick. Thanks!

Just be careful because if you pause your show, Playon may stop sending the remainder of the feed forcing you to rewatch the show from the beginning. I prefer this setting to stay on.

[heffe2001]

Is there any way someone can make a fairly detailed how-to to show how to take something from the UPNP Explorer, and make it into a file for Sage to use for feeds? For whatever reason, I just can't seem to grok how it goes together.

It'd be awesome if someone could make an automated program to do exactly that, browse the available feeds on the Playon server, check to select, hit the GO button, and output a feed file with your custom feeds ready for use in Sage...

[saltlyck2]

Originally Posted by pjpjpjpj

Do you all have the latest PlayOn? They have released two updates just in the past 5 days or so. Make sure you have the latest.

Note: If you use scripts, the "options" menu (where it shows what you have available) has changed.

The update I did (playon) last night fixed mine. One question though, the scripts part did change and I cannot find any info on it. I don't know how to use the new way. Maybe I'm lookiing too soon.

[pjpjpjpj]

Originally Posted by saltlyck2

The update I did (playon) last night fixed mine. One question though, the scripts part did change and I cannot find any info on it. I don't know how to use the new way. Maybe I'm lookiing too soon.

As best I can tell, the left column is a listing of all the scripts you have installed in your plugins/scripts folder, and they are all "active", as long as they are set up to work in Sage's interface (and you have a custom Sage file that calls them). I do know that many of the scripts are not able to be read in Sage via the standard customization method, because the "watch now" button is a subfolder under the episode title, rather than the actual episode title being the "watch" button. Robogeek (Jason) has re-written several of the PlayOn scripts to make them work in Sage (see his posts on previous pages of this thread), effectively making the episode name become the "watch".

[pjpjpjpj]

Anyone still able to get the South Park Studios plugin to work in Sage? For me, it shows all the episodes, but none of them load... they try for a while and then give a "timed out" error.

I do notice that the first post in the South Park thread on the PlayOn plugins forum says that the plugin is not working, or not working well, or something like that. I just didn't know if that was true.

ON EDIT: I read through the SPS thread on the PlayOn plugins site and it sounds like it is down until they release a completely redone version of PlayOn, which should be somewhat soon. Now let's hope that this doesn't completely mess up the Sage plugin itself!! EP, have you e-mailed the PlayOn devs about this API change?

[heffe2001]

I would think the API's to connect TO the Playon server would stay the same, or at the very least be backwards compatible, to work with the legacy devices out there that may or may not be being updated anymore. The API's used to connect from the Playon server to the actual content would be where I would expect major changes over time, to keep up with the content hosts attempts to be more in control of where and what their content is played on.

[mbowling]

Originally Posted by bela41

If this helps anyone, I hardcoded the .properties files for two of the Netflix shows that were in my queue (Leverage Seasons 1 & 2 and Lost Season 1). It might be enough to at least show people what they should look like. Then just change the shows as necessary to fit your queue.

Thank you for providing this example. I created a CustomOnlineVideoUIText_UPnP2Podcast_NetflixTV.properties and CustomOnlineVideoLinks_UPnP2Podcast_NetflixTV.properties file and added the first three seasons of Heroes. These three categories are working fine and display all the Heroes shows for each season. I tried to add the season of "Keeping Up Appearances" but it is not displaying any shows to select.

What is the format of this section of the file?
^Heroes..Season.3$:+2

Should there always be two dots between words?

The .3 works fine to display season three of Heroes, but what if the show doesn't have multiple seasons? Should there be a .1? Or nothing?

What does the +2 mean?

This works:
xFeedPodcastCustom/NetflixHeroes3=xPodcastUPnP_Recent,xPodcast_aabNetflix_Show_Queue;external,UPnP2Podcast,PlayOn:Netflix:Instant Queue:Queue Top 50:^Heroes..Season.3$:+2

This displays the "Keeping Up Appearances" category but does not find any shows to display.
xFeedPodcastCustom/NetflixKeepingUpAppearances=xPodcastUPnP_Recent,xPodcast_aabNetflix_Show_Queue;external,UPnP2Podcast,PlayOn:Netflix:Instant Queue:Queue Top 50:^Keeping..Up..Appearances$:+2

[heffe2001]

Has anybody added anything from the HGTV plugin, or the MTV plugin for Playon? I think I have the Netflix example figured out from a day or 2 ago, but not sure how to procede with HGTV (mainly), or the MTV plugs.

[hillhome4]

Hello,
First time poster please bear with me. Had SageTv for a few months now and love it. Running current STV, HDHomeRun tuner, and Playon with an OTA only setup (internet connection as well).

Ive downloaded appropriate plugins for Justin.TV. Ustream, and PBS they are enabled. I've added a few URLs for streaming sports and am curious how to access these via the Sage interface. I know that the stream was working as I was able to watch part of the NFL game last night on my laptop.

Would they show as Icons in the online services sections and or under Hulu? Thanks again for your patience and help.
David

[evilpenguin]

Hey David,

So, this plug-in only tricks you into thinking you're navigating PlayON, but in reality all of the Hulu/Netflix/PlayOn folders in the online services menu have to be manually created by users for each content source. So basically what i'm saying is that for new plug-ins to show up in the menu someone needs to first manually write a .properties file that supports them, send it to me, and then I can distribute them to everyone automatically.

PBS is on my todo list, but in the meantime RoboGeek's got some scripts available that support Justin-TV that you try installing.

-EP

[hillhome4]

Thanks for the explanation EP! I thought I was missing the obvious and just wanted to be sure. Kudos on a cool product.
David

[bela41]

Originally Posted by mbowling

What is the format of this section of the file?
^Heroes..Season.3$:+2

Should there always be two dots between words?

The .3 works fine to display season three of Heroes, but what if the show doesn't have multiple seasons? Should there be a .1? Or nothing?

What does the +2 mean?

mbowling, the "." is a wildcard that takes the place of a single character. So, in your example where the actual location would be "Heroes: Season 3" we replace the colon and spaces with periods. If there is only one space between the words of the title, you would only need one period. And actually you probably don't need any at all since Sage will correctly read the spaces (it's the colons that would cause problems).

Check out what UPnP Inspector is saying for the actual structure - search in this thread for info if you don't already have that. But for now this should work:

xFeedPodcastCustom/NetflixKeepingUpAppearances=xPodcastUPnP_Recent,xPodcast_aabNetflix_Show_Queue;external,UPnP2Podcast,PlayOn:Netflix:Instant Queue:Queue Top 50:^Keeping.Up.Appearances$:+2

The +2 tells Sage to look one level further. It was described here, but I don't remember where.

[TZen]

Please forgive a newbie, but I'm getting stuck in the installation process, with the troubleshooting issue: "Symptom #1: No videos are appearing when you select a menu item." I've installed up to version STV 2009112501. I'm using the extender HD100 (although it's not working on the PC, either. I just don't know how to "revert back to a clean SageTV3.xml." I've searched the forums and read the first 18 pages of posts on this topic, but I'm still not sure what it means. Do I simply directly go into C:Program files/sagetv/sagetv and delete something? I tried going through Setup/detailed setup/advanced/load new sage application package/clicked yes, again extracted v1.6. Still nothing. I'm sorry for what may seem like a ridiculous question, but I really want for it to work. Can anyone help?

[Greg]

Is there a PlayOn plugin for TNT and Food Network?

Thanks,
Greg

[Media Quest]

1st, many thanks to EP for his work.

I am having a problem where Hulu feeds freeze. I am on the latest version of Playon, the default STV, Sage HD200 beta firmware, and of course, the Playon Plugin.

When the freeze comes, I can go backwards, but it always freezes when it catches up to the same place. No amount of pausing, waiting, or fast forwarding will get me beyond that point. Even restarting will freeze once it gets to the exact same point. Often, I will just pull up Hulu on my laptop to finish the episode. Monk on the USA network is the most recent example.

Has anyone seen this?

Any ideas on how to fix it?

BTW, is there some kind of fast forwarding going to be incorporated sometime in the future?

Thanks

[lotusvball]

I have had this happen a few times now. I did get it to work once, but I think I had to soft power down my HD100 and go back it to get it to work.

[sacrament055]

Originally Posted by Media Quest

1st, many thanks to EP for his work.

I am having a problem where Hulu feeds freeze. I am on the latest version of Playon, the default STV, Sage HD200 beta firmware, and of course, the Playon Plugin.

When the freeze comes, I can go backwards, but it always freezes when it catches up to the same place. No amount of pausing, waiting, or fast forwarding will get me beyond that point. Even restarting will freeze once it gets to the exact same point. Often, I will just pull up Hulu on my laptop to finish the episode. Monk on the USA network is the most recent example.

Has anyone seen this?

Any ideas on how to fix it?

BTW, is there some kind of fast forwarding going to be incorporated sometime in the future?

Thanks

Yes, I have seen this but what has worked for me (so far) is to delay watching a show. (Select a show then pause and give it a couple minutes to create buffer space)

so far so good with that method for me.

I do have Playon set to process entire video so if I wait long enough it will eventually complete the download and I suspect it would have no problems there either.

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by Media Quest

1st, many thanks to EP for his work.

I am having a problem where Hulu feeds freeze. I am on the latest version of Playon, the default STV, Sage HD200 beta firmware, and of course, the Playon Plugin.

When the freeze comes, I can go backwards, but it always freezes when it catches up to the same place. No amount of pausing, waiting, or fast forwarding will get me beyond that point. Even restarting will freeze once it gets to the exact same point. Often, I will just pull up Hulu on my laptop to finish the episode. Monk on the USA network is the most recent example.

Has anyone seen this?

Any ideas on how to fix it?

BTW, is there some kind of fast forwarding going to be incorporated sometime in the future?

Thanks

I've experienced this on my parents system. I chalked it up to a slow internet connection (the PlayOn internet test comes up as "Slow") and therefore how fast the show was loading. But it exibited the same symptoms. Once the show froze, I couldn't get past it, regardless of what I did.

I've never seen it on my system, but I have a faster internet connection as well as a quad core machine. I've assumed it is fast enough not to run into this problem (All Playon Tests show green - fast).

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by Media Quest

I am having a problem where Hulu feeds freeze. I am on the latest version of Playon, the default STV, Sage HD200 beta firmware, and of course, the Playon Plugin.

I've seen that before. Its not really a freeze, but rather Sage just stops downloading the video in the middle for some reason. Sage is aware the Online Services area has some bugs like this and is looking to make some changes that should make the whole thing much more robust, but i'm not sure when we'll see it.