One Ultimate MediaPortal Webinterface/streaming-client for different platforms (1 Viewer)

[jonaskp]

By popular request (Well, just Cheezey, but I bow to his infinite wisdom), I am posting a new thread.


There is so much going on at the moment regarding getting MediaPortal TVserver to stream LiveTV/Recorded TV to other clients such as webbrowsers, mobile device and so on:

MP Webinterface by Big_Kev, originally just a webinterface to schedule recordings, but in the later versions have implemented streaming of TV.

iPIMP For the iPhone by cheezey. Schedules recordings and has recently begun streaming recorded TV to the iPhone.

StreamTV by Valk. Streams LiveTV. Accessed with an RSS feed that has a link to the desired channel.


To me it looks like all of these plugins are trying to do some of the same things, just with different focus. Perhaps all of these plugins/projects could prosper from some sort of cooperation? Sharing knowledge about streaming/transcoding and possible merging together to one plugin - MediaPortalStreaming/MediaPortalWebinterface ( I know, sucky name) - to make it easier for new users to install and use?
This is just something I thought about, because following these threads it seems that the developers are struggling with some of the same issues.

What do people think? And most importantly, what do the developers of these plugins think, because they are the ones that could potentially get some work done by the others or save time researcing - but they are also the ones that would have to commit time to do the coordination.


The scope of this topic is basically anything that interacts with the MediaPortal TV-server, except for TV-server Configuration and the MediaPortal GUI TV-plugin.

 

[cheezey]

iPiMP wasn't originally about streaming - it was about a web interface to allow the management of TV schedules & recordings following an iPhone like design. I have used Big_Kev's interface for a long time (still do on my PC) and did attempt to make an iPhone like skin for it but that was impossible - I did make a few tweaks which made it a bit more usable but that wasn't what I wanted.

So I started tinkering myself. I'm not a developer by trade but can write some .NET, it was originally just a pet project but as I delved into it it grew and grew. Now, as well as fulfilling my original requirements for a TV scheduling iPhone interface, iPiMP does a lot of remote control stuff for MediaPortal clients - it acts as an MCE remote, does limited music playing and the next version will have My Videos support. This history mirrors that of Big_Kev's and how that has developed.

The streaming component isn't specifically wrapped in iPiMP - the TV server plugin is standalone and could be replaced with whatever, again I just wrote it to get iPhone compatible MP4s.

My personal preference would be for a TV server plugin which would allow live streaming and scheduled or live transcoding into multiple formats to cater for many possible video players/devices (including iPhone quicktime). iPiMP would then just hook into that to stream the MP4's.

I agree that two web interfaces isn't ideal but Big_Kev and myself have approached the solutions from two different angles, Big_Kev directly manipulates the TV server database scheduling recordings etc. iPiMP uses TV server and MediaPortal client interfaces and does no direct database access it also relies heavily on async calls so keep the web traffic down and hence responsiveness up. iPiMP also uses the WebApp.Net iPhone web framework which means I don't have to understand or code HTML or CSS (which is good).

I personally believe that using the MP published interfaces is the way to go as you get the benefit of all the coding already done by the MP devs and a good usable app. I suspect merging Big_Kev's & the iPiMP interface would mean drastic changes to one or the other and I'm having too much fun at the moment to start looking at working out SQL. That may be development inexperience talking though.

Again personally - I would ideally like to see one web interface and the presentation to different browsers/devices handled using standard web development techniques (much like 4TheRecord will when I get round to making the iPhone skin for them ) Indeed there is an unfinished webinterface project in SVN which uses ajax - this may have been the ultimate aim of that.

So in summary I don't believe Big_Kev's interface and iPiMP are about streaming - that's just a nice add on - thay are primarily web interfaces into the TV guides and remote controls so you don't have to use the MP GUI to use it.

I'm all for co-operation and have invested a great deal of time in iPiMP over the last 3 months (approx 20hrs a week which probably would have resulted in a much better interface if a real developer did it )

I'd be interested in hearing other's views.

 

[Valk]

I was actually thinking of re-doing the webserver I use to have it so you could register plugins with it to allow this sort of diversity with what i'm doing (i'm finding that i'm registering alot of modules with the webserver I have now).

My plan was to get something stable out the door then sit back and write a small plan down on how to tackle something like this.

The big problem is probably what cheezey has said and that is we all have taken our own approach to achieve our goals. If big_kev and or cheezey are interested i'm happy to work with them in finding a good common ground framework we can all use to achieve our goals (though I imagine it will be more work on there parts then mine).

Anyway my 2 cents

P.S. I just noticed after I wrote this post cheezey's post https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/...-i-call-streamtv-50470/index3.html#post367650

 

[cubii]

dont forget piiptv for nokia phones it can stream also to pcs...
Edit : i am missing Music streaming (upnp?)

 

[dvdfreak]

Again personally - I would ideally like to see one web interface and the presentation to different browsers/devices handled using standard web development techniques (much like 4TheRecord will when I get round to making the iPhone skin for them ) Indeed there is an unfinished webinterface project in SVN which uses ajax - this may have been the ultimate aim of that.

Yeah, that's the whole idea behind For The Record: make everything modular with a clearly defined API based on standards, so you get a bunch of "pieces" talking to each other (trying to avoid technical terms here ).

 

[johanj]

Where can one find "MP published interfaces"? I haven't seen any APIs for mediaportal. Are seeking a tcp/ip API

Johan

 

[Mr.Montesa]

I'd say, a single webserver makes sense, which is registring & maintaining all the plugins.
At the moment I do have 3 webserver running on one machine creating load (StreamTV, MPwebinterface & iPIMP).
Would be cool to have only one webserver where I can register the plugins and tell the webserver: Read data from this folder and deliver it on that port.

But I think this is something MediaPortal Server or "Team Mediaportal software" should handle.
Just my 2 cents.

 

[hick]

I think a full blown UPNP interface should be part of this solution. StreamTV and Tversity give you that but it should be built into the tv engine instead and MediaPortal would be killer. Note UPNP is one of the big pros with Mythtv that it has over MediaPortal.

Hick

 

[Valk]

UPnP is going to be how mediaportal 2 communicates (I believe) when it comes out.

Also to implement UPnP takes a lot more effort than a simple HTTP server.

MPwebinterface & iPIMP are designed around an http interface to control the webserver and UPnP would be no use to them (well you could setup a menu system to control everything but there main goals don't go down that path).

StreamTv was initially designed to give a intermediate solution to allow UPnP clients to watch live TV because I wanted results more than long winded UPnP support only to find mediaportal 2 released the next day. As development has come along a few people have asked for more features then I initially envisioned for StreamTv (transcoding, channel groups, different listing output e.g. html) which UPnP wouldn't of been able to offer.

Wait for mediaportal 2 if you want native UPnP support.

 

[Keneo]

bump