Native HULU support for MCE?

[geekyhawkes]

I was wondering if it might be possible to intergrate HULU natively (ie not through the web browser) to MCE?  Just a thought as I think we would all bennifit from some online streaming source.

If there is enough interest then I could try and make a move forward with this (I would need a fair bit of help but dont mind getting stuck in).

[sp00nhead]

Being in the UK, hulu isn't that useful for me .... but if we can get a framework to link webTv feeds as a media source in lmce, now that would be useful

I've been using an xbmc linux box for abit now and really like the iplayer and other flash based feeds, if you look at boxee this uses the same plugins

my idea is we take these xbmc plugins (which are python based) and make a wrapper so we can use them as a media source.
Not sure if the current xine player would playback the media, or like the boxee guys have done we'd need a flash based media player. Their one closed source (AFAIK) since its got some DRM code in there for some of the feeds.

The major plus i see in going down this route is we'd get alot of extra media from only doing one bit of work. if you check out the xbmc plugin lists they have alot of cool plugins.

Not sure if using xbmc or boxee API would be best, feeling xbmc one is the better as more docs and existing exampels to go from.


Who wants to join me in this?
i will need to build a new vmware install and download the 810 source and look at the xbmc api

[geekyhawkes]

I would love to help but it is sounding a bit above me, quite happy to do any donkey work that might come up in the process.  Maybe wierdbeard65 could help, from the community letter he seems pretty keen to get involved and this might be a good way.

I completely agree with your comments about streaming media, defiantly be a nice way forward for MCE without distracting from the core Media center role.

EDIT:  Ive updated the Linux MCE twitter page i started asking for help as well.

[wierdbeard65]

Thanks for the vote of confidence!

Avtually, I too am in the UK and, at the moment, WebTV feeds aren't on my personal roadmap. Not to say I won't have a play later on, but if others want to have a go, don't assume I've already started work on this

[sp00nhead]

It's above me too
I see two core parts, First is to expose the needed lmce bits that deal with media source, i'm thinking that new shoutcast plugin will be a good starting point, expanding it to video. Once we have that we can use the xbmc API framework to link the existing plugins.

So if we get people on board we can have two areas to start researching in.
We need a breakdown of the lmce bits of code , what hooks we need to make a python program talk to the DCErouter and other bits. From my understanding we might need to link to a c++ lib to access the shared memory space the plugins use (?? needs checking)

If we can get that bit working, the python to media events, then we can start to expand on that.
I'm house hunting most nights this week, my gf has made a Long list to go see.... so might  not touch this till the weekend.

If anyone want to do some prep work, find some info on the XBMC parts, i've seen in the past on their wiki and forums some good starting guides.
If we can pull the shoutcast plugin apart to gleam how that works that will help, if any of the the final 5 (sorry bsg fan) can shed some light on this or point to a good starting point.

[tschak909]

The first part will be the media source part of the plugin. Using the shoutcast plugin as an example, will be a good starting point.

Then, you will need to create the needed stream handler methods. Look at the Xine Plugin as a reference. This must be done in C++, as it is a plugin, and requires pointers into the other plugins in the system.

Then you will need to implement a player that responds to the commands forwarded from the PlugIn.

The player must be a single window with a proper WM_CLASS.WM_NAME tuple, and must be able to be resized to any size (Orbiter will resize this as needed), and able to be ordered to front/back/etc as needed by Orbiter (the player MUST NOT HIJACK full screen, or do anything remotely close to that. It must honour specifically what Orbiter sets for it.) The Name devicedata specifies this tuple, and the media handler in Media Plugin will take care of sending the appropriate Set Now Playing commands to swallow the window.

The items to display, will need to be handled, either via specifying pre-made queries in the web admin, or by creating new orbiter screens to handle the issue and tying them into ScreenHandlers in Orbiter.

-Thom