Netflix Plugin

[cfaslave]

Looks like the old Netflix plugin is having issues with the preview function again. Netflix must have updated the way they show previews again. Anyone know how to hack the plugin to get that working again?

UPDATE: I can preview "the departed", but not "over the hedge". Not sure what the difference is, but there are a bunch like that.

[ClamsTheCat]

Originally Posted by cfaslave

Looks like the old Netflix plugin is having issues with the preview function again. Netflix must have updated the way they show previews again. Anyone know how to hack the plugin to get that working again?

UPDATE: I can preview "the departed", but not "over the hedge". Not sure what the difference is, but there are a bunch like that.

Same issues here. I wish the author would release the source to the community. I know he is upset with SS about Beyond Media and all, but he should not take it out on all of us.

[dequire]

I am having the same issue. I was hoping the link would be buried in an xml file somewhere, but I couldn't find it. Must be hard-coded Right now, none of my selected movies will prevue.

[ClamsTheCat]

Maybe we can send a group letter to the author and ask him to let us continue developing the plug-in. It is my second favorite plug-in after the DVD library. The wife can't live without it.

[cfaslave]

Originally Posted by ClamsTheCat

Maybe we can send a group letter to the author and ask him to let us continue developing the plug-in. It is my second favorite plug-in after the DVD library. The wife can't live without it.

Its worth a shot. The author is Craig and he goes by cncb on this forum. He still uses BTV and visits this forum regularly. I would recommend each of us send a friendly note via PM to see if he would be willing to help us out. Craig is a good guy - he just is frustrated with SS and Tvedia for that matter.


Brent

[ClamsTheCat]

Originally Posted by cfaslave

Its worth a shot. The author is Craig and he goes by cncb on this forum. He still uses BTV and visits this forum regularly. I would recommend each of us send a friendly note via PM to see if he would be willing to help us out. Craig is a good guy - he just is frustrated with SS and Tvedia for that matter.

Brent

I wasn't trying to say anything negative about him. I really like his plugins, and I understand his frustration with SS. I just hope we don't lose the Netflix plug-in, because I think it is easily in the top 3 plugins on everyones list.

[cfaslave]

Originally Posted by ClamsTheCat

I wasn't trying to say anything negative about him. I really like his plugins, and I understand his frustration with SS. I just hope we don't lose the Netflix plug-in, because I think it is easily in the top 3 plugins on everyones list.

Agreed. It is on my top 3.

#1 DVDLibrary
#2 JRiver Media Center Plugin - by cncb
#3 Netflix by cncb
#4 Webvideos by mockware (could easily
#5 PSEPhotos by cncb

Other Favorites
Pandora
Movieshowtimes
NFLscores

[cfaslave]

Originally Posted by cfaslave

Looks like the old Netflix plugin is having issues with the preview function again. Netflix must have updated the way they show previews again. Anyone know how to hack the plugin to get that working again?

UPDATE: I can preview "the departed", but not "over the hedge". Not sure what the difference is, but there are a bunch like that.

The problem appears to be due to the fact that netflix is using embedded flash movies for many of the previews. The ones that work are not flash, the ones that don't are flash.

Brent

[cfaslave]

Update:
Not only is it a bit of a problem that netflix is using flash for some (but not all) of its movies, it is also difficult to find the underlying swf file and distingish each preview from each other.

links seem to be unique for each swf preview (not just a different id substituted in the same link) so there doesn't seem to be a way to predict what they will be

Here are some examples of movie previews on netflix and the underlying link code - you can copy each one and paste into your browser to see the preview:

Cars
http://screeningcdn.nflximg.com/us/flash/235.swf?movieId=31181&bl=http%3A%2F%2Findex.ehub.n etflix.com%2Fitem%2Ftrailers%2F&sid=10111630449930 140917869161885d694429384e30de0e640376911dabf&dlid =31181

Da Vinci Code
http://screeningcdn.nflximg.com/us/flash/210.swf?movieId=30209&bl=http%3A%2F%2Findex.ehub.n etflix.com%2Fitem%2Ftrailers%2F&sid=10111630239808 9509178691618a8807061fe47cbe74c0ea3ea994dfd3b&dlid =30209

Eight Below
http://screeningcdn.nflximg.com/us/flash/210.swf?movieId=30596&bl=http%3A%2F%2Findex.ehub.n etflix.com%2Fitem%2Ftrailers%2F&sid=10111630482116 940917869161867f0c3bfe3cda72584c9fbcb99c3a58d&dlid =30596

As you can see, the movie id is distinct (31181 for cars, 30209 for da vinci code and 30596 for eight below), but the rest of the link seems to be somewhat unpredictable. look at the number after sid= on each link. This number is different for each one.
It looks like the http://screeningcdn.nflximg.com/us/flash/210.swf part of it seems to be the flash based embedded object that pulls up the movie player. Try it in your browser to see what I mean. I'm not sure why cars uses 235.swf and the other two use 210.swf, but I did notice that cars will play the preview even with 210.swf in the link. I'm more interested in the sid (long number starting with 10111..............) that is in the code. Not sure how to decifer that part of it. The old, non-flash previews were easier to pull up since the only unique thing about them was the movie id number (like 31181 for cars).

O.k. Anyone have any ideas on how to deal with this problem on the netflix previews? I think flash previews are doable, its just a matter of knowing the rest of this mess

For some additional info about the coding of the previews check out this post on the Mediaportal forum

Brent

[cfaslave]

Well no responses so far so I guess there either isn't much interest or nobody has any ideas. For the record the following is the part I can't figure out how to "decifer" so it can be predicted for the plugin:

sid=10111630449930 140917869161885d694429384e30de0e640376911dabf&dlid

Brent

[cfaslave]

Just in case, I'm throwing this question to the masses. I've posted on the Media Portal forums and posed the question to the author of www.Hackingnetflix.com blog. Surely there is a way right?

[Mamba]

I love the Netflix plug-in but don't use the "previews" feature anyway. Generally I check the upcoming movies (via the Showtimes plug-in), view the trailers, then use the NF linked one to add movies of interest to my Saved queue.

[cfaslave]

The question has officially been asked of www.HackingNetflix.com blog readers. The post can be read HERE

For any hackingnetflix readers that are visiting feel free to ask any questions regarding the Netflix Plugin written by Craig - or anything else related. Thanks!
Brent

[ClamsTheCat]

Honestly I don't use the feature very often, so I am not really going ape over it. If the core functionality broke though, then I would be

[cfaslave]

A Post on HackingNetflix.com regarding linking to Flash Netflix Previews:

OK, the 210.swf and 235.swf just refer to the players version. As far as I can tell the "bl" variable refer to an alternate hosting url for the flv (flash video) files. But that does not seem to be implemented yet.
The "sid" and "dlid" variable seem to not do anything but make the url look scary.
To retreave the .flv files, you use the url http://cdn.nflximg.com/us/trailers/ then follow that with the last 2 digits of the movieID then another slash, then the movieID in full and end that with .flv so that would look like http://cdn.nflximg.com/us/trailers//.flv
So CARS would be:
http://cdn.nflximg.com/us/trailers/81/31181.flv
And Eight Below:
http://cdn.nflximg.com/us/trailers/96/30596.flv
---
After looking over the code some more, it looks like the sid is just a session id for use in the analysis statistics via the log files to see which movie trailers are viewed most and by whom and which browsers ect.

Posted by: dmardan | November 10, 2006 at 11:00 PM

Not sure if this is helpful or not. What do you think?