Topic: Theater View Show Stoppers (Read 5305 times)

NickM · « **on:** March 09, 2007, 06:28:58 pm »

As requested... This thread is supposed to be a list of the most important show stoppers for Theatre View. Whilst many people have contributed the finer points to the theatre view improvements, let's try and keep the show stoppers list to a more concise & brief summary.
3 suggestions per user, then the MC team can collate and act on the results.

So here's a start:-

1. No dialogue boxes.
2. No unexpected exit to Standard view.
3. Option to turn off animations.

globetrotters1 · « **Reply #1 on:** March 09, 2007, 06:56:31 pm »

my 3 suggestions are:

1. no dialogue boxes
2. no unexpected exit to Standard view
3. stand-alone Theater view version with read-only rights (just a player with menus/display view etc.), simple and easy, besides normal MC12 program

Matt · « **Reply #2 on:** March 09, 2007, 11:29:51 pm »

I use Theater View at home a lot with a remote. I don't accidentally end up in Standard View or see popup dialogs.

Please give the exact dialog or Theater View exit behavior you're describing if you think there's a problem here.

Thanks.

Griff · « **Reply #3 on:** March 09, 2007, 11:37:06 pm »

Quote

I use Theater View at home a lot with a remote. I don't accidentally end up in Standard View or see popup dialogs.

Ditto

NickM · « **Reply #4 on:** March 10, 2007, 01:58:33 am »

Quote from: Matt on March 09, 2007, 11:29:51 pm

I use Theater View at home a lot with a remote. I don't accidentally end up in Standard View or see popup dialogs.
Please give the exact dialog or Theater View exit behavior you're describing if you think there's a problem here.

Pop-ups
1. When a NAS is off-line and the files to be played are temporarily missing.
2. When CD is inserted and the look-up functions start.
3. When there's a DVD codec error.
4. When starting TV.
Standard
After an error like 1. above

raym · « **Reply #5 on:** March 10, 2007, 04:48:32 am »

Quote from: NickM on March 10, 2007, 01:58:33 am

Pop-ups
1. When a NAS is off-line and the files to be played are temporarily missing.
2. When CD is inserted and the look-up functions start.
3. When there's a DVD codec error.
4. When starting TV.
Standard
After an error like 1. above

I don't accidently end up in standard view either but I can confirm the popup/message/dialog boxes as listed above.

In addition to these is when a DVD has been ejected and replaced with a different one. Hit play and a message box appears stating that the previous disc cannot be found. You have to exit the CD & DVD view and re-enter it to update the view. Perhaps Theater View could auto-refresh this view when a new disc is inserted?

Thanks

jabjabdad · « **Reply #6 on:** March 10, 2007, 07:41:30 am »

Please add "Add all" to "Play", "Play All", etc. This allows user to add multiple playlists to now playing on the fly. I know...this should be easy with a right mouse click, but the remote setup I'm using can't be programmed to mimic right mouse.

AnalogRoaming · « **Reply #7 on:** March 12, 2007, 07:28:37 am »

I think this is awesome. I've used MediaCenter on my HTPC for three years.... but I've used Meedio as the front end. The only things I can see that I would like are

1. create your own menus to launch lnk and bat files
(I like to launch my games, other programs from the tv, and don't want to clutter the home page, so a nested menu system would be really cool.)

2. X10 home autmoation support - I can fake this with #1 above though.

A plugin for pandora.com like PandoraMee would be neat, but not necessary.

Just want to say how excited I am that the Theater View is finally getting attention. It is the reason I bought MC in 2004.

Osho · « **Reply #8 on:** March 12, 2007, 10:10:55 am »

My top 3 Show-Stoppers, in the order of prioirty:

No dialog boxes: on DVD/CD lookup, on NAS being offline etc. All dialogs have to be handled in LARGE readable-from-couch fonts with OK, Cancel etc. button that can be selected by remote control's left/down/right/up and OK buttons.
DVD playback - Aspect and Subtitle cycle/selection possible using Remote Control - necessary commands need to be added to USBUIRT etc.
Better OSD: OSD for Play/Pause etc. is there but not for Aspect/Subtitle etc. Seek could also have a much better OSD (a bar showing total length of the play item, where one is in it and how fast one is moving along that bar).

Osho

John Gateley · « **Reply #9 on:** March 12, 2007, 11:13:36 am »

The only dialog boxes I see during CD or DVD lookup go away after the lookup is complete (whether or not the lookup succeeded).

I had thought someone said they had a dialog box they had to actually click on to remove it. Can someone verify?

j

Osho · « **Reply #10 on:** March 12, 2007, 11:39:29 am »

Quote from: John Gateley on March 12, 2007, 11:13:36 am

The only dialog boxes I see during CD or DVD lookup go away after the lookup is complete (whether or not the lookup succeeded).

I had thought someone said they had a dialog box they had to actually click on to remove it. Can someone verify?

CD/DVD lookup dialog box does go away after the lookup is complete but some other dialogs don't go away. For example, if the file is on NAS and the NAS is not mounted then we will get error saying "Media Center could not open last several files" (or something like that) - that doesn't go away without mouse-click. Suppose DVD graph creation wasn't successful then also we get an error that doesn't go away until you click with a mouse. If the file that is being played needs access to internet and internet is not up, we get some error (like youtube video links or rm audio file links that download the data from internet).

The point really isn't that whether the dialog box goes away or not without clicking. When the dialog box comes up, I can't even read it from couch 12 feet distance. So, one has to get up just to see what it is saying. In CD/DVD lookup cases I no longer get up because I have become used to it. But, it still is not very user-oriented interface IMHO.

thanks,
Osho

maxxsid · « **Reply #11 on:** March 12, 2007, 03:20:57 pm »

Not everyone is smart enough to set the remote/girder to fix the weak spots of the Theater View.
I am trying to make everything work from the remote but very often I have to reach for the keyboard/mouse.
I think the Theater View is more keyboard/mouse friendly than remote friendly even though its interface is designed with a remote in mind.

Quote from: Griff on March 09, 2007, 11:37:06 pm

Ditto

raym · « **Reply #12 on:** March 12, 2007, 05:27:38 pm »

Quote from: John Gateley on March 12, 2007, 11:13:36 am

The only dialog boxes I see during CD or DVD lookup go away after the lookup is complete (whether or not the lookup succeeded).

Hi John. As others have said, even the message boxes which go away are next to useless in Theater View as they cannot be read from across the room anyway. They also spoil the look of Theater View. As detailed here, there are many of these and not just related to DVD lookups.

Thanks.

jgreen · « **Reply #13 on:** March 12, 2007, 06:34:07 pm »

When I load theater view, I get a black area in the lower left exactly corresponding to the AW/Display. When viewing an image in theater view, if I right-click/play, that image shows up in the black area as if it were the AW display. If I double-click that image to go to display view, I am then taken out to standard view and no display view. If I double-click the image there, I go to display view.

If I am playing an image in theater view and select "display view" I go there exactly as hoped. However, any method of getting back to theater view takes me to standard view instead. I pretty much dozed my way through the theater view development--are these behaviors expected?

Griff · « **Reply #14 on:** March 12, 2007, 06:48:14 pm »

Quote

If I am playing an image in theater view and select "display view" I go there exactly as hoped. However, any method of getting back to theater view takes me to standard view instead. I pretty much dozed my way through the theater view development--are these behaviors expected

Shift F11 will cyc. full screen and back to Theater View.

Esc will cycle Full screen/Theater View/Std view

Hope this helps

Edit: If you are using a mouse only try a rt. click / toggle Theater View.

JimH · « **Reply #15 on:** March 12, 2007, 07:10:16 pm »

Quote from: John Gateley on March 12, 2007, 11:13:36 am

The only dialog boxes I see during CD or DVD lookup go away after the lookup is complete (whether or not the lookup succeeded).

John,
Let's remove them.

jmone · « **Reply #16 on:** March 13, 2007, 01:42:59 am »

Quote from: John Gateley on March 12, 2007, 11:13:36 am

The only dialog boxes I see during CD or DVD lookup go away after the lookup is complete (whether or not the lookup succeeded).

I had thought someone said they had a dialog box they had to actually click on to remove it. Can someone verify?

j

That was me - from memory it was after inserting a new DVD, then a "YADB Lookup" DiagBox then a "Failed to Find" DiagBox. It may of gone away but I started clicking away to get rid of them!

maxxsid · « **Reply #17 on:** March 13, 2007, 02:49:27 pm »

That's exactly my problem with Theater View.

-- Esc _shouldn't_ cycle to Std View. (same goes for double click/Enter on Full Screen)
-- When I watching Full View it's really hard to get to Playing Now (double click/Enter should lead there)
-- There shouldn't be "right-click". Well, there should be right-click/pop-out Menu in Theater View readable and selectable from 12 feet distance.
-- My remote control doesn't have Shift-F11 button. I don't want to mess with girder or anything else except MC (ideally) to get where I want.
-- I said this before - all this Shift-Alt-F13 and right-clicking is good for desktop MC not for HTPC 10' interface
-- Second monitor adds to the problem where Std View jumps to another monitor (it's good but I don't want to see it at all)

Esc - cycles Full Screen/Theater View/Playing Now
Back - goes back to where I was before
Home - Main Theater View page

Quote from: Griff on March 12, 2007, 06:48:14 pm

Shift F11 will cyc. full screen and back to Theater View.

Esc will cycle Full screen/Theater View/Std view

Hope this helps

Edit: If you are using a mouse only try a rt. click / toggle Theater View.

jmone · « **Reply #18 on:** March 20, 2007, 02:38:28 am »

Here is an example of how TheaterView can drop back to STDView.
1) Start TheaterView
2) Select say "Video" (it does not matter)
3) Select "Display View" (you should now see a blank screen with the MC Watermark)
4) Press STOP

= Drops to STDView

raldo · « **Reply #19 on:** March 28, 2007, 01:23:44 pm »

Show stopper: Girder, MC commands

If you do a search for "remote control" in the forum, you will notice that there are several unanswered requests wrt. remotes.

I think a media center application needs to support remotes properly. You cannot expect people to purchase Girder and then tweak the GML file.

Could it be a possibility to pick two or three "recommended" remotes and make them work "on the fly"?

Matt · « **Reply #20 on:** March 28, 2007, 01:43:36 pm »

Media Center ships with an IRMan and USB-UUIRT plugin. We recommend both pieces of hardware.

You'll be able to use any remote with them. Simply configure them in Options > Remote.

You can also use remotes that simulate keyboard / media key presses. The MCE remote is like this.

JimH · « **Reply #21 on:** March 28, 2007, 01:54:32 pm »

Quote from: Matt on March 28, 2007, 01:43:36 pm

Media Center ships with an IRMan and USB-UUIRT plugin. We recommend both pieces of hardware.

We don't recommend IRMan any longer:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=38666.0

But there may be a compatible device.

Osho · « **Reply #22 on:** March 28, 2007, 07:11:14 pm »

Quote from: Matt on March 28, 2007, 01:43:36 pm

Media Center ships with an IRMan and USB-UUIRT plugin. We recommend both pieces of hardware.

I have been using USB-UIRT plugin for a while now with MC. It *mostly* works. The key things that it doesn't work with are: DVD Aspect ratio changes, DVD subtitle changes. Can you please add these two actions (which just goes through all possible Aspect and Subtitle choices) in a future release?

thanks,
Osho

jmone · « **Reply #23 on:** March 29, 2007, 04:57:55 am »

Can we Please have the REC button!

gappie · « **Reply #24 on:** March 29, 2007, 07:25:20 am »

Quote from: Matt on March 28, 2007, 01:43:36 pm

Media Center ships with an IRMan and USB-UUIRT plugin. We recommend both pieces of hardware.

You'll be able to use any remote with them. Simply configure them in Options > Remote.

You can also use remotes that simulate keyboard / media key presses. The MCE remote is like this.

suddenly got hope.
no usb-uuirt in my shipment. and downloading it from the page did not help. still the same error message as in 11.1. but then again, a streamzap is not any remote.

JimH · « **Reply #25 on:** March 29, 2007, 07:29:12 am »

Quote from: gappie on March 29, 2007, 07:25:20 am

suddenly got hope.
no usb-uuirt in my shipment. and downloading it from the page did not help. still the same error message as in 11.1. but then again, a streamzap is not any remote.

I can confirm this. We'll fix this in the next build.

sdgrizdan · « **Reply #26 on:** March 30, 2007, 03:13:51 am »

Functions such as "print...", "delete...", "visualization studio" and "set as desktop background..." under the controls should be removed b/c these bring up dialogs that are not compatible w/ theater view (too small to view and/or too complex to be done via remote)

Osho · « **Reply #27 on:** March 30, 2007, 10:44:56 am »

Quote from: sdgrizdan on March 30, 2007, 03:13:51 am

Functions such as "print...", "delete...", "visualization studio" and "set as desktop background..." under the controls should be removed b/c these bring up dialogs that are not compatible w/ theater view (too small to view and/or too complex to be done via remote)

Yeap I agree. But, these are more display view features right? In fact, I think there should be a whold different "Display View" for theater view type of setting. In this view, all the right click commands will be missing and the relevant commands would be available by keyboard/remote control. In this view, the top part that comes into view (with track info, Play, pause etc.) when mouse is moved over there will be removed. In stead, there should be overlay over the picture indicating the remaining track time, elapsed track time, Play, Pause etc. (when Pause, FF, RWD etc. are selected using keyboard/remote control) with much better OSD integration than we have now.

thanks,
Osho

gappie · « **Reply #28 on:** March 30, 2007, 10:52:48 am »

i agree 100% with Osho. very good points.

gappie · « **Reply #29 on:** April 01, 2007, 10:14:47 am »

altough the sorting in theater view is much better now,there are still isues. i have one view with albums sorted. when i choose an album, i get the songs in right order, but when i choose 'all', i get all songs from those albums, sorted the otherway around.

i think theaterview is harder to use for an album oriented person, like me. for instance , i have a view with my albums sorted in number plays and grouped in most played less played etc. i get the albums always alphabetic. when i try to put number plays behind the album, like i do in standard view, i get the album two or three times depending on the number plays from the individual songs, not the average like in standard view.

some other things:
it would be great if there was an option to have two or three sentences to show the file info, instead the the one that is there now.
and maybe it would be a nice idea to have the possibility to set the size of the letters independen of that from the view so that there can be a bit more info underneath it.

gappie · « **Reply #30 on:** April 01, 2007, 11:09:20 am »

an other small thing: when playing now is a long list. the song that is playing is the last in what you see. it would be nice if the song that plays now is at the top, or even beter imo, half way. so you can see without scrolling what the next song is.

edit: this only happens when there are a few songs left to play, otherwise it is half way.
it is nice that there are already so much improvements in tv. im using it a lot again.

MrHaugen · « **Reply #31 on:** April 01, 2007, 02:43:08 pm »

Got a few additions and new suggestions my self:

In normal view there are a choice of behavior of double click on tracks. Why can't you implement a similar option for the theater view? An example would be to use the enter button to traverse the menus and put the track directly as playing next in playing now. All without the irritating menu. I know you can play directly, but I think the menu should be available through a pop up on a secondary button, not the one people think of as the primary (enter).
I love the new search feature! But why are there none for playing now? When you get a 50 song list or bigger there might be people that want to search there too... Options where to include it would be nice.
Another thing is the search letter pad. Would it not be smart to implement an option for viewing the pad and one option for just having a search box, like in the normal view? The pad is GREAT for touch screens, but it might be less nesessary for people with PDA's for remotes etc.
Animations. There should be an option to turn it off (for slower computers, and people that just don't like them). And also an option to set the speed for the animations. I feel them somewhat slow.

I would like to se the theater view more customize friendly. The normal view has a lot. I think theater view is what most people would use the most of the time with TV's and projectors. And therefore we need to focus on this to make it even more attractive for the masses.

park · « **Reply #32 on:** April 02, 2007, 11:00:59 am »

I have just played with MC12's theater view for the first time (it wouldnt load on my computer until I downloaded some new drivers for my graphics card). I must say that I'm mighty impressed with the smooth yet subtle animation. Could do with some smoother sound effects (I turned mine off for now).

I really like the big dialog boxes and easy to read fonts on the main interface. But I have to agree with everyone else that "every" piece of text within the whole interface needs to be like this. No right click menus unless their contents are legible, no tiny illegible menus in display view and no tiny text in the playing now bar. Strip the user interface down to just the bits that are necessary for navigating and playing on a tv.

Since people are keeping advice to 3 points, I'll give just 2 more:

We need some indication that there are tiles off screen. Currently we can page up/down but there is no indication of whether we need to or not. Maybe make the last tile a "..." or animated down arrow.
I have made an ultra simple viewscheme to be used as my theater view viewscheme. However, there is no way to make it the default one, even if I turn all of the other viewshemes off. Instead, MC is showing the default top level audio viewscheme regardless of whether i have it ticked to show or not. That's cheatin'

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Author Topic: Theater View Show Stoppers (Read 5305 times)