PlayerManager and adding new players (1 Viewer)

[sytone]

Any details on the player manager service and adding new players?

 

[morpheus_xx]

I moved your question into a new thread so we can focus on this topic.

First, the best source for information is the source code of MP2. If you check here: https://github.com/MediaPortal/Medi...tal.UI/Presentation/Players/IPlayerManager.cs you'll find all methods commented.

If you plan to add new players, this can be done by plugins. We are using the much: OnlineVideos, SlimTV, Cinema plugin, all provide own players (mostly derived from inbuilt players and extending them for new features or "linking" them to plugins).

I'll will collect more information about examples and post them here.

What parts you are interested in?

 

[sytone]

So I have embedded the Silverlight player for Netflix in v1 in a hacky way and wanted to see what alternatives there are and if I can use that as a interface so system events can be hooked in better.

 

[morpheus_xx]

Ok, this requires a bit more brainstorming

Can you please post a link to the MP1-way? I need to get an idea first how it works.

 

[sytone]

So I am currently creating WebBrowser control and wrapping calls from MP and translating them to the sliverlight control in the page. This is hacky as I have added the WebBrowser to the forms Controls collection and I am intercepting calls to the window to add/remove it. I also have to do PInvokes to stop the control from eating all command sent to it as JavaScript/IE/Silverlight eat any keyboard commands, I have to refocus to the Media portal window.

I have considered looking at ISilverlightViewer to host natively but not had time and was wondering if I can use the player framework so it was more native for MP. If I do this however I think I will have to deal with the rendering of the hosted instance.

 

[morpheus_xx]

I can explain how current video players work:

Video Player uses DirectShow to playback a file/stream. Its output video frames are "captured" by a custom EvrPresenter, it does a callback to pass the video frame back to MP2. This frame is than used by VideoBrush to be painted in controls (fullscreen background or simple rectangle).

So the chain is:
DirectShow --> EvrPresenter --> Video Surface --> VideoBrush --> Rendering.

I'm not sure if such a chain (or shorter) could work for WebBrowsers. But i.e. if you get a bitmap of the rendered screen, you could use this the same way like the video surface in my example above.

Another way would be to let the plugin run like in MP2, bypassing the player system an using a screen that shows WebBrowser in "fullscreen" (or how you like it).

It's an interesting topic for me, so I appreciate any work on this