Plugins for Mediaportal Important! (2 Viewers)

[Harley]

Hi all plugin developers,

the way mp goes, is that the plugins are all add ons for the main software MediaPortal and not be included in the mainsoftware.
So it is realy important for MP that each plugin has complete support for the defaultskin of MP.
In this case, each plugin developer should be add skinfiles for the deafault skin as default in his plugin.
That should be the first step, by doing a plugin for mp, because all plugins for mp should work with a fresh install of mp, in other way it is no MP Plugin.

So we need here the Help of all Plugindevelopers, please update all your plugins for the default skin.

If you have do it, so please post here in this thread the Pluginname and the downloadlink, so we can see what real Mp Plugins we have, that supports full the Mainsoftware.

Many thanks Harley

mmh, as it seems, we have no Plugins that full support mediaportal and his default skin´s

 

[fforde]

mmh, as it seems, we have no Plugins that full support mediaportal and his default skin´s

As I stated above, I am no skin designer. I would love for Blue3Wide to support Moving Pictures, and MPTV-Series as well for that matter. But I do not have the skills to create a skin file for Blue3Wide. Harley, it is your skin, why are you so reluctant to skin even the most popular plug-ins yourself? And if you really don't want to install and skin them, why do you not ask for help from other skinners rather than developers?

It's like going to an Italian restaurant and ordering a hamburger. Maybe they can make you one maybe not, but if they do, it's not going to be that great because it is not their specialty.

 

[tourettes]

mmh, as it seems, we have no Plugins that full support mediaportal and his default skin´s

As I stated above, I am no skin designer. I would love for Blue3Wide to support Moving Pictures, and MPTV-Series as well for that matter. But I do not have the skills to create a skin file for Blue3Wide. Harley, it is your skin, why are you so reluctant to skin even the most popular plug-ins yourself? And if you really don't want to install and skin them, why do you not ask for help from other skinners rather than developers?

It's like going to an Italian restaurant and ordering a hamburger. Maybe they can make you one maybe not, but if they do, it's not going to be that great because it is not their specialty.

The problem is not as easy as it sounds. There are many things that contribute to the fact that we dont want to provide any skin files for 3rd party plugins

I - Extra work it causes, currently Harley is working almost alone on the B3/B3W so he has already too much workload

II - If we provide .xml files for only some 3rd party plugins other plugin devs will feel they should have the same threatment -> as a result there will be nagging

III - We cannot distribute the 3rd party plugin .xml files with the applications as they would get out dated at some point (most likely pretty soon) as the plugins itself are envolving)

IV - When developer creates a plugin hé should be able to create some sort of skin files (for B3/B3W at least. Skin developers should be using those as the starting point for 1) making the B3/B3W skin files better 2) providing support for other skins)

...so, if developer is not able to provide skin files for the default B3/B3W skin he/she should ask some skinner in the MP community to provide such files that then can be distributed within the plugin installation (preferably MPI)

 

[fforde]

The problem is not as easy as it sounds. There are many things that contribute to the fact that we dont want to provide any skin files for 3rd party plugins

I - Extra work it causes, currently Harley is working almost alone on the B3/B3W so he has already too much workload

II - If we provide .xml files for only some 3rd party plugins other plugin devs will feel they should have the same threatment -> as a result there will be nagging

III - We cannot distribute the 3rd party plugin .xml files with the applications as they would get out dated at some point (most likely pretty soon) as the plugins itself are envolving)

IV - When developer creates a plugin hé should be able to create some sort of skin files (for B3/B3W at least. Skin developers should be using those as the starting point for 1) making the B3/B3W skin files better 2) providing support for other skins)

...so, if developer is not able to provide skin files for the default B3/B3W skin he/she should ask some skinner in the MP community to provide such files that then can be distributed within the plugin installation (preferably MPI)

Hrmm... well I am not suggesting Harley be solely responsible for skinning all the plug-ins, I am just saying that it might be wiser to ask skinners to help create a skin.

I think your point about not including plug-in skins in Blue3Wide is a little contrived though. Skin's are updated all the time and I think it's unreasonable to suggest you can't include support for a plug-in because you'd have to periodically update it. Every skin except Blue3Wide has some sort of plug-in support and when major changes are made to how a plug-in should be skinned (which does not happen often), a new version is released, simple as that. I was under the impression though that the whole point of this thread was to get skin files for existing plug-ins... why are you now suggesting the skin files being requested, would not be included?

And yes I agree a plug-in should be distributed in a way that is usable out of the box. This is the reason for the generic skin files that are shipped with Moving Pictures. They will work fine in Blue3 and Blue3Wide (as well as any other 4x3 or 16x9 skin).

 

[Spragleknas]

And yes I agree a plug-in should be distributed in a way that is usable out of the box. This is the reason for the generic skin files that are shipped with Moving Pictures. They will work fine in Blue3 and Blue3Wide (as well as any other 4x3 or 16x9 skin).

Then there really isn't any problem, since when Moving Pictures is no longer beta, I guess the plan is to use MPI, and the files can be added to B3/B3W

 

[fforde]

And yes I agree a plug-in should be distributed in a way that is usable out of the box. This is the reason for the generic skin files that are shipped with Moving Pictures. They will work fine in Blue3 and Blue3Wide (as well as any other 4x3 or 16x9 skin).

Then there really isn't any problem, since when Moving Pictures is no longer beta, I guess the plan is to use MPI, and the files can be added to B3/B3W

Exactly, when we are out of beta we will put together an MPI and post on the repository on the main site. The plug-in is progressing quickly, but I still feel like it's missing some important functionality.

 

[Spragleknas]

Just don't go google
A .mpi "version" would be nice when MP1 final is released.

 

[tourettes]

Hrmm... well I am not suggesting Harley be solely responsible for skinning all the plug-ins, I am just saying that it might be wiser to ask skinners to help create a skin.

I agree, but it should be the plugin developer who asks the skinners to provide the skin, not team members. As most likely we arent able to poll all plugins and thei skinning needs. Also the developer itself can easialy say how the skin should be improved etc.

I think your point about not including plug-in skins in Blue3Wide is a little contrived though. Skin's are updated all the time and I think it's unreasonable to suggest you can't include support for a plug-in because you'd have to periodically update it. Every skin except Blue3Wide has some sort of plug-in support and when major changes are made to how a plug-in should be skinned (which does not happen often), a new version is released, simple as that. I was under the impression though that the whole point of this thread was to get skin files for existing plug-ins... why are you now suggesting the skin files being requested, would not be included?

Plugin should provide the default skin file(s) for B3/B3W. The reason is that we aren't releasing the B3/B3W skins as separate package so they are updated maybe once or twice a year (and thats definately not enough when it comes to plugins and changes in their skins).

And yes I agree a plug-in should be distributed in a way that is usable out of the box. This is the reason for the generic skin files that are shipped with Moving Pictures. They will work fine in Blue3 and Blue3Wide (as well as any other 4x3 or 16x9 skin).

Good that Moving Pictures have default skin files, but it would definitely be much better when all the plugins would have the same. Also its nice if the defaults skin files would be done in the B2/B3W style so that users have good out of box experience (B2 was the most used skin by the poll...).

Would be nice if we would have some skinning style quide for the B3/B3W, but unfortunately there haven't been anyone (mainly Harley) with enough free time to do such.

 

[framug]

My point of view :
For Kazer and WebEPGfr (fr plugins), B3 and B3w will be released soon.
xml will be same as B2, only .png will change.
As fforde, I don't want to spend all my time for skins.
And, I don't see users (or skinners) provide B3 skins for plugins (like My Explorer) they want to work with a fresh MP install.
And, when I see how I loose time for create a skin Video compliant for a new plugin, it's a pity.
This time is taken on plugin dev.
Maybe, I loose a post but, for B3, I was surprised, when a new MP release has come, to discover that B2 wasn't the default skin anymore.
Maybe sometimes, communications are missing ?
Regards.

 

[Spragleknas]

It was supposed to be a (pleasant) surprise. To much communication will often revel surprises