[plugin] Movie Showtimes (August 4 Update)

[scottlindner]

I always cringe when people talk about screen scraping. I know it needs to be done in certain EAI situations, but I'd hope there's another way that's more elegant and maintainable.

We're on the same page now. The request seems like a very good one. I didn't understand it at first. You don't want to know what I thought you were describing. Not very pretty.

Cheers,
Scott

[zareh]

Hi,

I've installed the latest Movie Showtimes plugin and the latest version of QuickTime Alternative (1.70). When I play the downloaded trailers off of the Trailers folder directly, QuickTime Alternative plays them just fine, without any stuttering or stopping and starting, but when I play them from Beyond Media, they are jerky and start and stop. What's going on? Why should playing them from Beyond Media be worse, when it's still QT Alternative playing them and it's the same exact file being played????

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

thank you,
Zareh

[sivart321]

I have the exact same problem as posted above. Jerky playback only within BM.

[MikeMurphy]

I have the same problem as well. This is my favorite plug-in, does anybody know a fix for this.

[scottlindner]

I believe jerky playback is due to Beyond Media and not the DVD Library plugin. It may be best to keep the discussion of this problem in a Beyond Media thread instead of this plugin.

I experienced it once and could associate it to only one thing at the time... other stuff BM is doing because of a poor threading model. I have found that if I let BM sit and synchronize everything it wants to do for a couple of minutes before DVD playback that I have no issues at all. The one time I had a problem I was booting up the computer and as soon as BM was started I played the DVD. If you are downloading movie trailers in Showtimes plugin and don't launch BM very often this may be a problem. If you have other processes running on your computer that tie up the hard drive this could also be a problem. Maybe BTV recording at the same time? I dunno. But it does seem that there is no "solution" to this problem... it just goes away. Most likely to users changing their ways and not realizing it. Which is why I suspect threading within BM. You can change your habits to get around it and not even know that you made a change.

[scottlindner]

Has anyone noticed the Send To Netflix doesn't work anymore? I'm curious if it's just my configuration or possibly a change on Netflix end that broke the interface.

[Khris]

Can BM handle streaming video? I ask this as MediaPortal has an excellent Trailers plugin which streams the trailer online rather then downloading and then playing.

Unfortunately I have no programming skills or I would consider working on this myself. Anyone interested in investigating it further?

[scottlindner]

Originally Posted by scottlindner

Has anyone noticed the Send To Netflix doesn't work anymore? I'm curious if it's just my configuration or possibly a change on Netflix end that broke the interface.

Nevermind. Problem was on my end. Embarrassed to admit the network wasn't up for two days and didn't notice.

[scottlindner]

Originally Posted by Khris

Can BM handle streaming video? I ask this as MediaPortal has an excellent Trailers plugin which streams the trailer online rather then downloading and then playing.

Unfortunately I have no programming skills or I would consider working on this myself. Anyone interested in investigating it further?

My personal opinion is that BM's ShowTimes method of caching is better than streaming on demand. The amount of data isn't that great and your vulnerability to connection issues are greatly reduced.

[Khris]

Originally Posted by scottlindner

My personal opinion is that BM's ShowTimes method of caching is better than streaming on demand. The amount of data isn't that great and your vulnerability to connection issues are greatly reduced.

I'd rather deal with potential connection issues than have cached files that stutter during playback!

[scottlindner]

Originally Posted by Khris

I'd rather deal with potential connection issues than have cached files that stutter during playback!

Why do you feel it will be any different when it's streaming? You do realize that connection issues can cause stuttering during playback, and much more.

[Terminal]

Just wanted to say I installed this plug in and it works great. Nice job.

[Khris]

Originally Posted by scottlindner

Why do you feel it will be any different when it's streaming? You do realize that connection issues can cause stuttering during playback, and much more.

Because while running Media Portal I never had any issues watching movie trailiers.

[scottlindner]

Originally Posted by Khris

Because while running Media Portal I never had any issues watching movie trailiers.

Doesn't that point to the software and not the location of the content?

[Khris]

Originally Posted by scottlindner

Doesn't that point to the software and not the location of the content?

True, however my point is still valid. If BM can not handle playing the downloaded clips properly, perhaps it could handle streaming better.