MP2 - Development Suggestion - Web Configuration Interface (1 Viewer)

[robbo100]

Hello all in MP2 land (I have never ventured here before)...

I submitted a development suggestion within the MP1 forum, and they have told me that it is unlikely to happen on MP1 but might be worth consideration for MP2 - so hence this post.

Background: Many users use some form of remote desktop to configure their MP clents and server using the normal configuration programmes, however, this can be an awkward way of working. I was wondering if it might be possible to create a web based configuration tool for MP (covering both the client and server) so that users can change configuration settings from the web browser on a non-MP computer on the network.

Description: If developed, I envisage the system working as follows:

The "web configuration service" is a seperate part of MP server and client (since it must be possible to change the configuration whilst MP is not running). Each server/client on the network can be accessed individually by their differing IP address, if both the client and server exist on the same PC then there it must be possible to access either configuration area.

The "web configuration service" should be installed as part of MP basic installation and can be turned on/off from within the normal configuration programme (but there is no reason why this can't be developed as a completely seperate plugin).

The user should have access to all the normal configuration options for MP within the "web configuration service" as well as some additional features such as - "Restart MP Client Software" and "Restart TVServer", which will allow the user to test the changes made.

Plugin developers would be able to write addons for the web configuration service to allow their plugins to be configured using this method (to be honest, it is plugins like Moving Pictures, TV Series, Streamed MP (skin), etc that this would be most useful for (on top of the obvious advantages of Tuning TV channels etc).


Robbo100

 

[miroslav22]

Yea we've been discussing this on the team's internal forums recently (for the TV side anyway )

I'm very much for it and we have 2 or 3 devs already interested in helping (myself included)

 

[robbo100]

Great news.

Rock On MP2!

 

[Albert]

AW: MP2 - Development Suggestion - Web Configuration Interface

Very short answer:
MP2 is designed to provide several ways of configuration. The config engine provides all configuration settings to the system and it provides an API to read/set/upate the settings. A config program only needs to access that config API. Currently, we have a plugin for the MP2 application (shown in the settings menu point) and we have a standalone config application (which doesn't compile atm, IIRC). To provide a Web UI, you just need to write a plugin which renders the config settings into a HTML page and install that plugin in the client and server - that's all. Even a HTTP server is already included in MP2 and can be used by such a plugin.
Most of the config settings are simple settings which can be rendered by just providing standard renderers - string, number, multi-entry-list, single-entry-list, filepath etc. Some settings are more complicated, for example the shares config. For those more complicated settings, the plugin which provides that setting must provide a kind of plugin for the configuration renderers to make the setting visible in the renderers. For example, the shares configuration is currently only available in the MP2 UI, not in the standalone config app because we currently only provide a renderer plugin for the MP2 config UI.
That's the architecture in short, maybe that already helps a bit.