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[CadErik]

WHS is almost out now but has rather miserable media sharing capabilities... Any chance to see a MC addon for making a WHS a library server and stream all media everywhere?

Erik

[c00ld00d]

Love to see this!

[CadErik]

Love to see this!

I've seen lots of hacks on the whs forums... It would probably be possible to setup MC as library server, auto import and everything else and then set it up as service but that might require some serious wizardry.
Just thinking that having a separate library server from the player itself would make it way easier to install on WHS.

Erik.

[horse]

Erik,

This would be great, I know others in this forum operate something like this using a main PC and all the other PC's are "clients" but have to run scripts etc to keep it all in sync.
I've been hacking through ways to make the same occur using my W2k3 server the main library and also running the Media server only.
Then have all the other PC's in the house sync the library and play the content from a shared or NFS drive on the server.
Unless I'm missing something (there are so many features I've still yet to discover in MC12) I would like to see the following: -

MC have an option to install the Media Server as a Service and not have the main program install or any of the codec support.  i.e. no content will be played on the server.

Then on a Client machine I want to be able to map a drive and then add all my content and manage the remote library and also the view schemes. (Library sync does not see to bring my view schemes over like a connected library)

I would like an option that allows a client MC to always open the library in Read Only mode. With an option for me to enable RW after entering a password and then switch back to RO when I'm done. (Kinda like switching to superuser in unix or checking out / locking web content while editing)

The client need to be able to "sync" the library and modify the filename and album art paths without actually copying it to the local disk (except maybe caching for speed)

Ideally many of MC's configuration options should be stored on the server so clients are consistant in how they operate. (Some may need to be specific to local machines, not really dug too deep on this one)

The above is very much like the Library server function today, but using a mapped drive for the content to avoid the delay of a download before playing. (or maybe I'm doing something wrong)
This would allow even the DVD iso images to work using the tricks posted elsewhere in the forum.

I was working on a fully featured uPnP client (Hardware based) but then after the improvements in Theaterview, I'm thinking to stay with a PC and use MC as the front end, just need a client server model :-)

BTW what is unique about WHS that doesn't allow MC to install, is it just the installer doesn't support the OS type?

[Chili-Jam]

Bump.

Is it possible to let MC run on WHS as a library/upnp server?
Did anyone do something similar in Windows Server 2003?

[MrHaugen]

I'm not sure I know what you're guys are talking about....
Are there really no way of installing applications on the WHS? I have a hard time beliving that. Would be dumb, even for Microsoft.

If you can install applications, then install MC on it and configure it as a library server. And open the FW for the traffic.
Don't see how this could be so hard....?

[benn600]

lol.  Isn't WHS just Windows with a service on top to help serve files better than XP or vista?

Want to tell us what you think of WHS?  I was intrigued when I heard about it but all I really need is file sharing with Windows so I can run good server apps.

[horse]

Currently I thought you could only get WHS with hardware (Unless you get it via MSDN)?

Chili-Jam - MC12 works just fine on Windows 2003 server with uPnP. I had major problems finding a uPNP AV server with it's own uPnP stack. Most rely on the windows OS to provide the service. XP and other desktop OS's have it. For security reasons they don't release server with it. MC has it's own.

I have tweakUI running to auto logon an MC user that starts MC server so I don't need to login afer a reboot.
I should probably try srvany, but it doesn't work with my security camera software, but probably would with MC starting as server only, as it requires no desktop intercation (I hope)

Would still be nice to have this as a real windows service though!

[CadErik]

lol.  Isn't WHS just Windows with a service on top to help serve files better than XP or vista?

No, not at all. WHS main purpose is to backup all the computers in your house. It has a smart system for backuping everything daily and quickly and takes quite little place on the server. In addition to that, it has shared folders with file duplications and web access. WHS makes it very easy to add/remove hard drives as well.

Erik.

[CadErik]

Currently I thought you could only get WHS with hardware (Unless you get it via MSDN)?

The good part is that you will be able to buy WHS without hardware but the bad part is that it won't be part of MSDN.

I have tweakUI running to auto logon an MC user that starts MC server so I don't need to login afer a reboot.
I should probably try srvany, but it doesn't work with my security camera software, but probably would with MC starting as server only, as it requires no desktop intercation (I hope)

This is what I was thinking but it would be quite a pain to configure... If the library server could run as a server it would make everything easier!

Erik.

[horse]

This is what I was thinking but it would be quite a pain to configure... If the library server could run as a server it would make everything easier!

Not sure what you mean? I just installed MC as if it was on a client machine, point it at the shared library and the media on the drive M: that I share anyway. Set the media server to start automatically for a specific user and then set TweakUI to log that account on when windows starts up. When I get a chance I'll try srvany for MC.exe and see what happens. Just not high on my list. More interested in seeing how I can use Theaterview as my front end in the living room instead of uPnP.

Sure it would be nice to just have a nice clean MC Daemon that provides library, uPnP and Tivo services without any of the front end stuff, codecs etc (assuming no conversion). But I'm not sure it is a big deal the more I think about it. Stuff gets installed, just doesn't get used.

The good part is that you will be able to buy WHS without hardware but the bad part is that it won't be part of MSDN.

Thanks for the update, MS have changed there mind from the original release. So what does WHS give us (or not as the case maybe) from say an XP machine or a basic 2000 or 2003 server?

[CadErik]

So what does WHS give us (or not as the case maybe) from say an XP machine or a basic 2000 or 2003 server?

You don't really have a user logged in permanently on WHS... And you are not supposed to. Most WHS machines are even supposed to be totally headless and you interact with the server through the WHS console. You *can* login remotly via RDP but that is not the "usual" way. Also the RDP only works for the admin.

Erik.