LCD plugin, programmer needed. (2 Viewers)

[pshdo]

Hi there.....

What about if MedtaPortal could give data that Girder could pickup ??

I use Girder becource my VFD only is supported by Girder (with the LCDMaster plugin)..... :roll:

Also i think that many people use Girder anyway, together with varius remotecontrols and so on, so perhaps a way for MediaPortal to talk to Girder would be the bedst/easyest way to make this....

 

[SePPiE]

Hi there.....

What about if MedtaPortal could give data that Girder could pickup ??

I use Girder becource my VFD only is supported by Girder (with the LCDMaster plugin)..... :roll:

Also i think that many people use Girder anyway, together with varius remotecontrols and so on, so perhaps a way for MediaPortal to talk to Girder would be the bedst/easyest way to make this....

I dunno, ofcourse it'll work and it saves some coding on MP side, but I just don't like it too use middleware to do something that can be done integrated...
Also, Girder is not freeware so it wont be for everyone.. Other thing is, that it's not really needed in the first place and if we can do without then I rather have that..
I do used to have Girder for my remote, but got a MCE remote now and no need for it.. I would like to keep Girder off

 

[MadAxeMan]

I agree, I would rather see it native first - but hopefully this can be done so that it leaves an interface within MP to make any further extensions much simpler to write.

I will check out some exisiting code tonight as this may already be many spokes of the wheel

 

[pshdo]

Hi there.....

I agree that it would be a mutch nicer solution if the LCD/VFD was integrated in MP itself as a plugin or something like that....

The only problem i have with that is that some Futuba VFD´s normally is not supported by eg. Smartie and the other LCD programs there is....

The only one that i have found is Girder with LCDMaster, in the LCDMaster package there is a Futuba driver, and this is how (and the only way) i can get my display to work......
(I know of a few other people that use Futuba display with their htpc.....)

Maybe the plugin you are thinking about for display support from MP, perhaps could be able to use the display-drivers from LCDMaster..... :wink:

Or maybe there could be an option, so people can chose to eigther use Girder, or the upcomming buildin plugin directly.......

Perhaps it would be no problem to serve information so people can use eg. girder (or some other LCD program), at the same time as upcomming MP plugin is running.......

 

[FullMoon]

Just as an update, I know Snapstream Beyondtv also now has a plugin to use LCDsmartie. Programming is outside my realm, but am interested in what transpires.

 

[AllenConquest]

What information that could be used by LCDSmartie can currently be extracted from MP, and how ? I might have a go at producing a DLL if I can get my system reinstalled :roll:

 

[Anonymous]

Sam,

Can you send me the code you use to get the now playing data etc.? I am going to write a plugin for LCDSmartie if I can get the info for the interface.

 

[samuel337]

Sam,

Can you send me the code you use to get the now playing data etc.? I am going to write a plugin for LCDSmartie if I can get the info for the interface.

Well, I've just been working on my External control plugin II which allows external programs to access MP information, and I've discovered that basically all this information is stored in the GUIPropertyManager.

You probably want to create a seperate plugin, so I suggest you check out the GUIPropertyManager class in MP. It basically has all the information there - I used a different method, but with all the changes going on in MP, I think using the PropertyManager to get details is much more stable. I'm going to change my code to use the PropertyManager as well.

Its relatively easy to use the PropertyManager - you just have to know the tag names, (e.g. #currentmodule).

Sam

 

[AllenConquest]

I have written a very simple plugin for LCDSmartie, but I'm not sure that this is the write approach. It would be nicer to not need any other software (I've got enough running in the background already).

It looks like it's not too bad to write to a standard HD44780 compliant parallel port LCD. But what I want to know is what other sorts of displays are out there that would need supporting too.

An alternative would be jaLCD which you can control a bit more than LCDSmartie, but does this support everyones displays ?

I need some feedback.

 

[MadAxeMan]

I'm running the USB iMon setup through a Silverstone LC10M case. I was working on an LCD plugin but the guys at iMon are dragging their arses at getting the plugin support documented. So support for this would be good.

Apparently it takes six months to get a few function APIs written down on a piece of paper/html :roll: