TV Guide Genre Colours

[James]

Hi FlipGer,

Would it be so bad is the user can change the colour ? I think the skinner can set the defaults, but the configuration of the genre/group mapping should allow the user to change the colours ?

WebEPG has the ability to translate the genre from each web site into something else. This is an replacement function, but was designed so that a user can try to bring genre from different sites into line.

I think the first step is to agree on the genre/groups. My suggestion is a few as possible say the following:

Movie/Film
News
Sports
Documentary
Series
Other

/James

[FlipGer]

Hi,

i would add:
- Music
- Weather (?)

What about subgenres? Would increase the number much, but it might be nice for the user:
- Drama
- Western
- Sci-Fi

But you are right, it should be kept as simple as possible.

Nothing against user interaction, if she / he wants to change colors, it should be possible, but thats the second step.

WebEPG has the ability to translate the genre from each web site into something else. This is an replacement function, but was designed so that a user can try to bring genre from different sites into line.

This sounds usefull. I will take a look into the code. Are the genres you mentioned above those of the WebEPG?

Flip.

[tomtom21000]

I would absolutely go with James suggestion.

With too many colours in the end nobody could remember which color stands for what.

make it less than 10, no subgenres.

music might be ok. weather is obsolete, I think. I know that there are countries with weather shows, but they are not so important.
is cartoons a genre?

[LordMessi]

Originally Posted by tomtom21000

I would absolutely go with James suggestion.

With too many colours in the end nobody could remember which color stands for what.

make it less than 10, no subgenres.

music might be ok. weather is obsolete, I think. I know that there are countries with weather shows, but they are not so important.
is cartoons a genre?

I would go with a genre called "Kids"

[FlipGer]

Hi,

ok. Less than 10 genres sounds like a good idea. Currently we have:
- Movie/Film
- News
- Sports
- Documentary
- Series
- Music
- Kids
- Other

I have digged somewhat through the code, and it does not seem to be impossible.
Hopefully i find some time this weekend, i really would like to fiddle this out.

Any more ideas?

Flip

[Taipan]

I would suggest that we also need:-

- Drama
- Mystery/Thriller
- Comedy
- SciFi

and that we don't need:-

- Movie/Film (since this is not really a genre, but a format)
- Series (since any of the genres could be a series)
- other

Cheers,

Taipan

[James]

Hi Taipan,

We really want just to have the groupings or over catagories of the genres

Originally Posted by Taipan

I would suggest that we also need:-

- Drama
- Mystery/Thriller
- Comedy
- SciFi

So all these are they Series or Movies ? For example Movie/Drama, Movie/Comedy or Series/Comedy (SitCom), Series/Drama (Soap) or Series/SciFi.

I think when you look at most guide web sites they, often only mark in different colours Series and Films.

So I think the above list is good. I would maybe leave Music out. Only because the music programs tend to be almost always on a music channel and then the whole channel will be more or less a single colour.

However, maybe it should be configurable which catagories to show. So one person can just see Movies and Series, everything else will be the default colour (Other). Or you can show them all. That together with a system for mapping the detail genres from the guide into these groups would be really good.

/James

[FlipGer]

Hi,

yeah, that is the problem. Do we want genres or subgenres? I would stay, as James said, with genres. Looking on www.tvspielfilm.de they have:

- Movie/Film
- Daily Soap
- Series
- Report/Documentary
- Sport
- Entertainment
- Kids
- Talkshows
(most we have except for...)
- News
- Other

Anyway, as far as i could plan this, this can be easily changed by an external XML. This will not be hardcoded, so changes can be made.

Flip

[FlipGer]

Hi,

ok a progress report and some questions for the way to go.

I am at a point where I have to choose between flexibility or data consistence.

What have I done so far?

1) I made a XML called TVGenreMapping.xml.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<genres>
  <genre name="Movie/Film">
    <mapping>movie</mapping>
    <mapping>film</mapping>
  </genre>
  <genre name="Series">
    <mapping>serie</mapping>
  </genre>
  <genre name="Daily Soap">
    <mapping>soap</mapping>
  </genre>
  <genre name="Report/Documentary">
    <mapping>report</mapping>
    <mapping>documentary</mapping>
  </genre>
</genres>

With this XML I map the main genres "name" with keywords. Eg. contains "Spielfilm" the keyword "film" and will be mapped to the genre "Movie/Film". This is done on import and therefore before adding the genre to the TVdatabase!
Cons:
- The user will loose information. I can allready hear some people complaining, that they loose there beloved genre infos.
Pros:
- The genre table will be kept simple. I did have nearly 1000 genre entries, now I have "only" 10, what made the TVGuide much faster

2) I made a XML file for the color mapping in the skins directory.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<profile>
  <section name="GenreColors">
    <entry name="Series">#FF0000</entry>
    <entry name="Movie/Film">#00FF00</entry>
    <entry name="Report/Documentary">#0000FF</entry>
    <entry name="Dail Soap">#00FFFF</entry>
  </section>
</profile>

3) ToDo
- Translation, user interface for changing colors and keywords

So, here are some questions:
1) What do you think about keeping the original genre infos somehow (database, etc.)?
2) I am thinking about to merge these two files into one, to prevent data inconsistence. This could be done in two ways:
a) Having one XML file in the main directory.
- Pro: Maximum data consistence
- Con: The colors can not be changed for each skin
b) Having separate XML files in each skin directory.
- Pro: The colors can be changed for each skin
- Con: Possible data inconsistence

Flip

[James]

Hi FlipGer,

I think use catagory numbers:

0 default/other/unknown
1 movie/film
2 ..

Then these numbers can be turned in the names using the strings.xml files for each language.

<genres>
<genre name="1">
<name>2000011</name>
<mapping>movie</mapping>
<mapping>film</mapping>
</genre>



/James