XBMC: Add-Ons, and Repos, and Plugins. Oh my!?

[jayhoz]

So I finally got around to adding XBMC to my Boxee Box.  It's up and running.  I watched a Youtube video and managed to install Navi-X but I had no idea what I was doing.
 
Is there a good primer out there on terminology, how to install the add-ons and repos?  What are the must have add-ons, etc?

 

[The_Powa_of_Seiji_Ozawa]

Navi-X is kind of old and clunky, it's good to have that as an option but you'll be much happier with the new, more intuitive programs, as I hardly ever even open Navi-X anymore (in fact, it won't even work on jailbroken AppleTV 2 devices anymore). Be wary of some of the "streamlined" Addon options out there. One such animal is XBMC Hub (now known as Addons Hub) which promises to install all the best add-ons and repos in a simple step, but it also installs a lot of crap and will alter your interface. It is possible to undo much of it, but you then might as well do everything from scratch in the first place. There is the Fusion repo (from the same source as the XBMC/Addons Hub), but as long as you stick to installing the addons you want instead of letting the Hub take over, it's fine. There is also the Lamda Repo and Super Repo. Between those you can find all of the addons you'd likely want...Sportsdevil, 1Channel, IceFilms, Genesis, Project Free TV...those are what come to mind. I don't have them handy at the moment, you can find the repo sources online by address, then in the addons section, input the location as an "add from zip file". I haven't added anything in a long time so I can't remember the exact menu names (I'd imagine the youtube videos handle that, just change the address, as it is likely many of the youtube videos will be from that XBMC Hub guy. For skins, I find that Amber is very efficient and quick and responsive, but it's more about what you're comfortable with.

 

[4 6 3 DP]

I have Kodi and while I think I am pretty good with technology, the platform isn't that intuitive for me. 
 
What I really need to figure out is how to create a kind of "guide" for live TV. It is clearly available but finding it is a monster challenge.

 

[Red Sox Physicist]

I have Kodi and while I think I am pretty good with technology, the platform isn't that intuitive for me. 
 
What I really need to figure out is how to create a kind of "guide" for live TV. It is clearly available but finding it is a monster challenge.

The live TV guide requires setting up a recording backend such as MythTV (Linux/MAC) or Windows Media Center, and TV tuner hardware to record the video. Do you just want guide data or are you going to use it as a DVR?

 

[Nick Kaufman]

It depends on what you re using XBMC for. Personally, I don't do live tv.
 
Here's the addons I ve used/installed and other things I had to learn.
 
1. Sportsdevil for streaming sports.
 
2. Keymap editor for setting up the keys of my remote.
 
3. Eminence Theme. There's a ton of themes and it makes a difference in the way information is presented. There are additional customization within themes; how movies and tv shows are presented and such. This makes a huge difference in your experience IMO.
 
4. Learn the naming protocols for movies and tv shows. Like for example, on movies that share the same title as another movie, you should add the year they got released on the title.
 
5. Play with the movie scrapers and their settings when you import movies. It makes a difference on how they re named and what fan art is used.
Give yourself time. It's going to take a couple of weeks before you re fully comfortable.

 

[SumnerH]

It depends on what you re using XBMC for. Personally, I don't do live tv.
 
Here's the addons I ve used/installed and other things I had to learn.
 
4. Learn the naming protocols for movies and tv shows. Like for example, on movies that share the same title as another movie, you should add the year they got released on the title.
 

 
 
It's pretty easy to name all your movies:
Movie_Name(2011).mkv (or avi, etc)
 
And all your TV shows:
Game_of_Thrones.S01E01.mkv
 
That covers 95% of cases.  If you have multiple episodes in one file (e.g. you record a 2-episode premiere day and accidentally encode them into one file):
Parks_and_Recreation.S06E01E02.mkv
 
That's nearly everything.  For weird stuff, go to thetvdb.com and search: if you have, say, a Downton Abbey or Doctor Who christmas special or a Magnum PI/Simon and Simon crossover episode that you need to figure out.  It'll be listed as a "Special" on the show page; use season zero and that special (special 4 = Downton_Abbey.S00E04.mkv).

 

[AlNipper49]

I use Sick beard and couch potato to download. In addition to renaming they also popular the.nfo files

 

[SumnerH]

FYI I just contributed a new feature to the services.library.data.provider and the Titan skin that adds a "Favourite Episodes" to the TV widget--it'll list only the oldest unwatched episode from each of the TV shows in your favourites list.  
 
It's like the recommended episodes widget but that gets cluttered up with every show you've watched and then abandoned or are waiting between seasons on; this gives you control over which shows you're currently actively watching.
 
If you use another skin that has services.library.data.provider widgets, let me know what it is and I can probably add support for the new function pretty easily.

 

[Nick Kaufman]

It's pretty easy to name all your movies:

Movie_Name(2011).mkv (or avi, etc)

 
 

 
FWIW, the past couple of days I ve had a devil of a time trying to get it to recognize a couple of movies using this format. It really can be frustrating.

 

[SumnerH]

 
FWIW, the past couple of days I ve had a devil of a time trying to get it to recognize a couple of movies using this format. It really can be frustrating.

 
That almost always means you have the wrong year.    Sometimes IMDB and TMDB disagree slightly on the year*; you need to use the latter's years (assuming you use the default scraper) since that's where Kodi pulls its info from.
 
https://www.themoviedb.org/
 
 
*IIRC, one of them goes with the first ever release, the other goes with the date of wide release in the US.

 

[Nick Kaufman]

del

 

[Nick Kaufman]

Nope, I ve got the right year. I ve tried putting it in parenthesis without parenthesis, in a different year etc, no dice. The Guard (2011) and Babel (2006) just will not get recognized. The Guard keeps coming up as the Guardian and babel as a 1998 movie or something.

The other thing is that the problem originated when i moved the movies to a different drive and had the library rescanned. Before, they were recognized just fine. May be that's because I used subtly different settings on the universal movie scraper, but nonetheless, the program feels capricious some times.

 

[SumnerH]

Nope, I ve got the right year. I ve tried putting it in parenthesis without parenthesis, in a different year etc, no dice. The Guard (2011) and Babel (2006) just will not get recognized. The Guard keeps coming up as the Guardian and babel as a 1998 movie or something.
The other thing is that the problem originated when i moved the movies to a different drive and had the library rescanned. Before, they were recognized just fine. May be that's because I used subtly different settings on the universal movie scraper, but nonetheless, the program feels capricious some times.

 
I have those both, they scraped okay as:
Babel(2006).mkv
Guard(2011).mkv  (I always omit leading "The" from filenames for sorting, but it should work as The_Guard(2011).mkv also).
 
So it's probably something you tweaked on the scraper somehow.
 
The music scraper is the one that I find idiosyncratic.  Every once in a while it'll replace all the artist's portraits with Lorde or some such jiggery-pokery.

 

[SuperManny]

Nope, I ve got the right year. I ve tried putting it in parenthesis without parenthesis, in a different year etc, no dice. The Guard (2011) and Babel (2006) just will not get recognized. The Guard keeps coming up as the Guardian and babel as a 1998 movie or something.
The other thing is that the problem originated when i moved the movies to a different drive and had the library rescanned. Before, they were recognized just fine. May be that's because I used subtly different settings on the universal movie scraper, but nonetheless, the program feels capricious some times.

 
I don't have any issue using the Universal Movie Scrapper with Babel. My structure is to have a single movie in a folder with the same exact name, I know I've previously had an issue when the file and the folder are not the same name. Can you manually assign to movie by going to Movie Information (type "I" when on the movie title) -> Refresh and then selecting the correct movie?

 

[SumnerH]

 
I don't have any issue using the Universal Movie Scrapper with Babel. My structure is to have a single movie in a folder with the same exact name, I know I've previously had an issue when the file and the folder are not the same name. 

 
My movies are all in one directory (I have ~/lib/movies/Star_Wars(1977).mkv, ~/lib/movies/Godfather(1972).mkv, etc).  My understanding is that having subfolders is better if you use some of the extrafanart stuff, I've always found it a little extra hassle a feature I don't use.
 
I put shows in their own directories ( ~/lib/shows/better_call_saul/Better_Call_Saul.S01E01.mkv, ~/lib/shows/agents_of_shield/Marvels_Agents_of_Shield.S01E01.mkv, etc) and music in artist and album subfolders (~/lib/music/Beatles/Abbey_Road/01.Come_Together.mp3, etc).

 

[Nick Kaufman]

Ok, I solved it. FWIW, if you re on a movie and you press the info button, then there's an additional menu if you click the down button. I knew of that menu, because i used it to change fanart, but on the botton there's an option to "refresh". This allows you to manually associate the file with a specific movie from the list that this option offers you.

From what i gather, the problem with Babel was that there was a second Babel title from 2006 in IMDB about an 8 minute dance of some sort. The problem with the guard probably was that for some reason, imdb serves the greek title of the movie on my pc so the program opted out for the closer title which was in fact the guardian.

 

[jayhoz]

Anyone have an easy way to push XBMC through a Roku 3?  I'm pretty sure you can screen cast it from a PC, but that seems cumbersome especially on a headless machine.

 

[djhb20]

Problem with that method is that you have to re associate it if you ever do anything to your library.

I had trouble with O and W. My solution was to make an nfo file -

W (2008).nfo

To go along with

W (2008).mkv

The nfo file is a text file that contains xml with a link to the moviedb page for the movie:

<movie>
<id>http://www.themoviedb.org/movie/10523-w</id>
</movie>

Then, so long as I move the file nfo file with the movie file, I don't have to worry about it again.

D

 

[SumnerH]

Anyone have an easy way to push XBMC through a Roku 3?  I'm pretty sure you can screen cast it from a PC, but that seems cumbersome especially on a headless machine.

 
You can't install XBMC on the Roku 3.  You can screencast to it, and that is cumbersome.
 
I serve out over UPNP from XBMC (settings->network->UPNP and turn it on) to my WDTV Live.  I'd assume that'll work with the Roku, too, but:
 
a) You'll be using the Roku's interface rather than XBMC's, and their media browser interface is a letdown compared to XBMC; and
b) XBMC doesn't transcode, so the Roku may have trouble with some codecs (e.g. divx and many mkv files that have mp3-coded DTS; it'll do fine with h.264/aac single-soundtrack mp4/mkv files IIRC).  This is the area where WDTV kick's Roku's ass (Roku returns the favor with the number of online services supported).  Using UMS or Plex or something that transcodes is an alternative, though transcoding has its own set of problems.